1960s Diary Entry
October 1, 1962
Dear Diary, A lot has happened over the past few months. You absolutely would not believe what happened today. You remember me telling you about that negro, James Meredith, who was trying to get admitted into the University of Mississippi around the end of May of last year? Well, rather than letting it go and forgetting about it like he should have, he decided to get the NAACP involved. Apparently they appealed his case all the way up to the Supreme Court and they ruled that the University had no choice but to allow him to enroll here as a student. We thought that was the end of it and we would be forced to go to school with a negro. However, the Governor of this great state of Mississippi, Ross Barnett, tried to block him by having the Legislature pass a law that prohibited any person who was convicted of a state crime from admission to a state school. This law applied to Meredith because he had been convicted of false voter registration. However, Governor Barnett soon received a few calls from the US Attorney General Robert F Kennedy. Kennedy finally made Barnett agree to let James Meredith enroll in the university. Last month, Meredith tried to enter the university. We could not let that happen. A group of us students along with some police and even state officials blocked Meredith’s way. We threw bricks, among other things, at Meredith and the guards surrounding him. We were angry! This could not be happening at our school. We simply would not allow it. Apparently this was not our choice to make. Attorney General Kennedy sent in his federal troops to disband us; so much for that First Amendment Right, huh? Well, I guess it would not be violating our rights because we were not being too peaceful about our assembly. But, I digress. Anyway back to the troops sent in; they were also there to enforce the law and allow Meredith to enroll. We were not going to go away without a fight though. We attacked the troops. It was
Dear Diary, A lot has happened over the past few months. You absolutely would not believe what happened today. You remember me telling you about that negro, James Meredith, who was trying to get admitted into the University of Mississippi around the end of May of last year? Well, rather than letting it go and forgetting about it like he should have, he decided to get the NAACP involved. Apparently they appealed his case all the way up to the Supreme Court and they ruled that the University had no choice but to allow him to enroll here as a student. We thought that was the end of it and we would be forced to go to school with a negro. However, the Governor of this great state of Mississippi, Ross Barnett, tried to block him by having the Legislature pass a law that prohibited any person who was convicted of a state crime from admission to a state school. This law applied to Meredith because he had been convicted of false voter registration. However, Governor Barnett soon received a few calls from the US Attorney General Robert F Kennedy. Kennedy finally made Barnett agree to let James Meredith enroll in the university. Last month, Meredith tried to enter the university. We could not let that happen. A group of us students along with some police and even state officials blocked Meredith’s way. We threw bricks, among other things, at Meredith and the guards surrounding him. We were angry! This could not be happening at our school. We simply would not allow it. Apparently this was not our choice to make. Attorney General Kennedy sent in his federal troops to disband us; so much for that First Amendment Right, huh? Well, I guess it would not be violating our rights because we were not being too peaceful about our assembly. But, I digress. Anyway back to the troops sent in; they were also there to enforce the law and allow Meredith to enroll. We were not going to go away without a fight though. We attacked the troops. It was
Bibliography: http://www.eduplace.com/ss/socsci/ms/books/bkd_ms/biographies/bio_template.jsp?book=bkd_ms&bio=meredithj&name=James+Meredith http://www.history.com/topics/ole-miss-integration