“A hypocrite despises those whom he deceives, but has no respect for himself.”

– William Hazlitt

Recently when angry Democrats attacked U.S. Sen. Tim Scott for claiming that America was not a racist nation, little did they know they did that on the 65th anniversary of “The Southern Manifesto?”

In 1954, when the Supreme Court ruled on Brown v. Board of Education and outlawed segregation in schools, Southern Democrats began a massive campaign to defy this! President Eisenhower’s Republican Congress responded by passing the 1957 Civil Rights Act to enforce the Court’s decision.

The day Republicans filed the Civil Rights Act, Southern Democrats wrote a rebuttal named “The Southern Manifesto.” This was a show of unity against Eisenhower and the Republicans attempts to enforce desegregation. This credo accused the Supreme Court of “abuse of power" and to use "all means” to reverse Brown v. Education. This solidified the Democrats stand against Brown v. Education and their defiance to future desegregation. One hundred Southern Democrats signed it.

Howard Smith of Virginia, chairman of the House Rules Committee, was the key segregationist in the lower chamber to lobby Democrats to support The Southern Manifesto. Under Smith, the Rules Committee became the graveyard for every civil rights initiative in the 1950s. Smith declared, “The state ship has ‘drifted from her moorings,’ and the high court’s record on civil rights demonstrates it will continue to deviate from the core fundamental separation of powers in the U.S. Constitution.”

House Republicans passed Eisenhower’s Civil Rights bill 286-126 and Senate Republicans 72-18. But Lyndon Johnson was ordered to destroy it by Senate Democrats. He and Georgia’s Richard Russell and Mississippi’s James Eastland “gutted the bill.” But the Republicans salvaged one key element: “they ended segregation in public schools and federal troops had authority to enforce it.”

The 1964 Civil Rights Act, a carbon copy of the 1957 bill, passed with 60% of the Democrats and 78% of the Republicans voting yes. But Democrats in the Senate, led by and William Fulbright and Robert Byrd, claimed it violated the Southern Manifesto and destroyed the South’s “social order and racial impurity.” They filibustered it for 83 days before Republicans finally got the bill to the floor.

Despite a huge Democratic majority, Republicans outvoted Democrats by 20% in passing The 1965 Voting Rights Act. Democrats, led by Robert Byrd, filibustered it. He told Congress he’d take every possible measure to protect The Southern Manifesto. Although LBJ was under pressure from Civil Rights leaders to pass this bill, he failed to gain support from many key Democrats.

“A president is like a jackass stuck in the rain. All you can do is let s*** hit your a** and take it.”

– Lyndon Johnson

When Robert Byrd introduced The Southern Manifesto in the Senate, he said, “The Constitution nor does the 14th Amendment or any other amendment mention anything about schools. The debates preceding the 14th Amendment clearly showed that education would be maintained by the states.”

Democrats used the Southern Manifesto to garner resistance to the Brown decision in their local districts. They mobilized en masse to nullify the Supreme Court’s decision. In the states across the South, Democrats used public funds to set up private white-only schools. Prince Edward County, Virginia, closed their entire public school system for five years rather than desegregate.

“If there was ever a Senator who was the embodiment of his state, it was Robert C. Byrd.”

– Joe Biden

In 1995, Bill Clinton praised his political mentor William Fulbright for making our country and our world better. “In the work he did, the words he spoke, and the life he lived, he stood tall against the 20th century’s most destructive forces and fought to advance America’s brightest hopes.”

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