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Memphis Cares -- But Not Much

Memphis Ministers' Association had scheduled a memorial service for two o'clock on Sunday afternoon in Evergreen Presbyterian Church. A group led by a Memphis businessman and calling itself the "Memphis Does Care Committee" suggested that a larger "Memphis Cares" meeting be held instead, in E. H. Crump Stadium. The ministers acquiesced.

About 5,000 people attended the "Memphis Cares" meeting. The racial composition of the crowd was about the same as that of the city's half million population -- 60 per cent white and 40 per cent Negro. Attendance at the meeting had been urged by virtually all ministers at their services that morning and on television by dignitaries, including Mayor Loeb, all day Saturday.

Those attending were handed a printed program as they entered the stadium. It carried the following statement:

We live in Memphis. It has been a good city, but far from perfect -- much less perfect than many of us realized. Something happened here which laid bare a side of our common life to which all too many of us had been blind.
We are brother Memphians in name. We can become so in fact as we have never been before. We will, not leave this to someone else, but each of us will take the responsibility upon himself.
Our goal is a city in which a man's honest and openly expressed opinion can be respected, without fear of punishment or retaliation, and differences resolved in the understanding that we are all human.
We therefore solemnly, in the presence of God and of one another, pledge ourselves -- our time, our effort, our resources -- and if need be, our lives themselves -- to the building of a city where people can trust one another, respect one another. and respond to the needs of one another.
Memphis cares.

On the back of the program was a small section in which were printed the two words "I Care." A line for a signature was beneath them. Memphians attending were asked to sign this two-word statement, tear off the section, and drop it into a receptacle before leaving.

The program itself was very simple. It consisted of the national anthem, an invocation, a hymn ("O God, Our Help In Ages Past"), an introductory statement, statements by eight "Memphians Who Care," unison reading of the "Memphis Cares" statement, a singing of "God Bless America," and the benediction.

The first of the eight speakers said, "The time has come when you must stand and be counted . . . choose your ground and stand on it." He did not suggest what ground. (It was learned later that those who planned the program sought to exclude specific mention of (1) the garbage strike, or (2) Dr. Martin Luther King. This prohibition was ignored by at least three of the speakers.)

Tommy Powell, head of Memphis' Central Labor Council, AFL-CIO, was the fifth speaker. He drew applause when he affirmed a laboring man's right to a recognized union. ("Look!" said one Negro to his wife. "There are some white folks applauding.") The loudest applause of the afternoon came in response to Mr. Powell's call for news media to present fairly and impartially both sides of issues.

The sixth speaker was Judge Ben Hooks, a Negro. He said that Martin Luther King was much misunderstood because the news media "will not tell the truth." Again there was loud applause on that point.

During the fifth and sixth talks, a reporter noticed a large number of white people drifting out of the stands -- a hundred or more. There was no obvious reason for this, so during the seventh, speech -- by a businessman named Tom O'Ryan -- the reporter began asking a few of these departing what they thought of the meeting.

"You see me leaving, don't you?" snorted one elderly gentleman. Asked if he would say what he disliked about the meeting, he grumped, "Not for quotation," and kept walking.

The question was asked of two young men next. "That Irish fellow told it like it was," one of them replied. "A dual effort. I'm a young man, and I've never done anything to oppress a nigra . . . They're not going to ravage through the streets and endanger my family . . . If they want to practice what they preach, okay with me, but it's going to have to be a fifty-fifty proposition."

Another elderly man on his way out volunteered good- naturedly, "This thing has turned into a nigger protest meeting, hasn't it?" He explained that he had thought it was to be a memorial service for Dr. King. He was glad so many whites had come to show that they cared, "regardless of what they hear . . . But I don't like these nigger preachers making all those rabble-rousing speeches."

Two middle-aged women were next. "I'm disappointed one said. "I came to support the mayor and the city, not to honor King -- although I'm sorry ... I do feel that it's good that Negroes and whites can sit together like this. It certainly does no harm . . . I'm just sorry the mayor is not here. He's in a tough spot. He needs support."

By that time the meeting had ended. A Negro man was asked what he thought of it. "Nice meeting," he answered, "if they do what they say; not say one thing, then turn around and do something else."

A white man and his wife, with their son, were among the last to leave. The boy, about eight years old, was wearing a "Charlie Brown" sweatshirt which read, on the back, "HOW CAN WE LOSE WHEN WE'RE SO SINCERE?"

"That was about the right shirt to wear, wasn't it?" the father asked. He said he felt "sort of two ways" about the meeting. He too thought "the Irishman" had put it best -- that it is something for the whole community to work out, not just the whites. He was fatalistic. "It's been this way since time began. There's no reason to think this will change things very much for very long."

This wholesome-looking family had recently moved to Memphis from Houston, where they had lived when President Kennedy passed through en route to Dallas. The man said the atmosphere in Memphis before Dr. King arrived was much like it was in Houston before President Kennedy came through -- "people said they wished he were dead." "And since King was shot," he went on, "I have heard numerous comments to the effect that they are not sorry he was shot -- just sorry it happened here."

A policeman directing traffic at the gate of the stadium motioned a Negro motorist toward a different lane, yelling, "Pull it on over here, boy!"

One reporter viewing the crowd had said before the meeting began, "Memphis cares -- but not much."

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