Although barely two decades have passed since the modern “civil rights era” began, a folk wisdom about the history of desegregation and civil rights activism has already developed. In broad outline at least, the major themes of this new folk history are contained in the following assertions: (1) the white South greeted theBrowndecision with massive resistance; (2) this opposition was centered in violence-prone poor whites who would not tolerate the idea of blacks and whites “mixing” in the same schools; (3) more “enlightened” southerners, especially in the border or moderate states, did their best to counter such extremism; and (4) the plight of blacks improved only when John Kennedy became president, and in response to the leadership of Martin Luther King, Jr., initiated change in the South through federal intervention.
12 Million Black Voices. A Folk History of the Negro in the United States.