Epilogue

This brief conclusion echoes the argument of the book, that the VEP served as the civil rights movement’s behind-the-scenes engine, and conservatives sabotaged the movement through the Tax Reform Act of 1969. Conservatives continue to fight black voting power, and the roots of these efforts go back to the VEP. Vernon Jordan concludes this book by suggesting the fight for political power will continue.

The Tax Reform Act of 1969 and the Undermining of the Voter Education Project

This chapter cuts through all the dry, complex legal language of the 1969 tax reform bill to demonstrate how conservatives leveraged this law to undercut the VEP. Conservatives realized the VEP strengthened black voters, and they input language into the bill that would make the VEP’s fundraising and programming much more difficult. Ultimately, the Tax Reform Act of 1969 decimated the VEP, but the VEP continued during the 1970s under the leadership of John Lewis. After Lewis left in 1976, the VEP withered until it closed for good in 1992.

Setting Up the Voter Education Project, 1959–1962

This chapter explains the origins of the VEP. Over four years, three very different sides came together to form the VEP: the Department of Justice, civil rights activists, and liberal philanthropists. After John F. Kennedy became President, the Department of Justice under his brother, Robert F. Kennedy, signalled a willingness to help African Americans vote. Civil rights activists worked with philanthropists like Stephen Currier to create a source of funds for widespread registration fieldwork. Working together, all parties sought tax-exemption for the project, and to do so, they kept the VEP idea discreet because they did not want to attract attention from segregationists in government.

The Second Voter Education Project, 1965–1969

This chapter chronicles the VEP’s impact on black southerners and politics after the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Under the leadership of Vernon Jordan, the VEP went beyond voter registration and started programs to educate African Americans about the political process. The VEP also started hosting conferences designed to swell the number of black candidates running for various political offices across the South. During this period, not only did the VEP increase the number of black southern voters, it also grew black political power in a variety of ways at local and state levels across the American South.

The Voter Education Project, 1962–1964

This chapter explores how the VEP empowered 129 separate African American voter campaigns during this period, spending over a million dollars, and registering 688,000 black southerners. This chapter argues that this surge of black voting power paved the way for the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Wiley Branton led the VEP during this period, and their support, with philanthropic backing, energized thousands of black civil rights activists across the American South. This chapter chronicles how VEP money and support empowered grassroots movements across the South, and how the civil rights movement relied on the VEP.

Southern Disfranchisement and the Long Origins of the Voter Education Project

This chapter gives the century-long context to the VEP, going back to Reconstruction and the Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution. To fight back against white supremacy and disfranchisement, African Americans pursued voting rights and political power, though with limited success before the VEP. This chapter argues that three main events led to the VEP. First, the Southern Regional Council trailblazed a research path; second, the Prayer Pilgrimage for Freedom signalled to the nation that black voting rights were patriotic and Christian; and third, the Crusade for Citizenship failed, but proved that a southwide social movement for the ballot was possible.

Introduction

This introduction lays out the main arguments of the book. It begins with a case study, a voting rights campaign in Orangeburg, South Carolina, during the early 1960s with support from the Voter Education Project (VEP). It then zooms out and explains the scope and importance of the VEP during the civil rights era. The book argues that the VEP was the main engine that drove the civil rights movement forward by providing money and support to hundreds of African American grassroots campaigns throughout eleven southern states, money deriving from philanthropic foundations, up until conservatives cut off the money supply through the Tax Reform Act of 1969.