On the floor of the U.S. Senate last week, Georgia's Walter F. George read a manifesto signed by 82 Southern Representatives and 19 Southern Senators. It pledged the signers to exert "all lawful means" toward reversing the Supreme Court's desegregation decision, and it appealed to Southerners "to scrupulously refrain from disorder and lawless acts."
The idea for a Southern manifesto was conceived by South Carolina's Senator Strom Thurmond, who enlisted the powerful aid of Virginia's Senator Harry Byrd. At a caucus of Southern Senators, Thurmond produced mimeographed copies of his own arm-waving call for nullification. The caucus pushed Thurmond aside, ordered the...
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