One Of The Things That Has To

One Of The Things That Has To Be Faced Is The Process Of Waiting To Change The System, How Much We Have Got To Do To Find Out Who We Are, Where We Have Come From And Where We Are Going.

One Of The Stories That Dominates Our Family Literature Was The Fact That My Maternal Grandfather Contracted For - I Don't Know Under What Terms - But, For A Large Section Of The Old Slave Plantation. He Established Himself - Sisters And Brothers, Cousins, Etc. On Fifty- And Sixty-acre Plots.

In '32 We Organized The Young Negroes' Cooperative League And Had Some Degree Of Success In Terms Of Establishing Stores And Certainly Buying Clubs In Various Sections Of The Country. I Was Designated As - I Don't Know What Exactly - I Believe It Was Director. I'm Not Sure What It Was, But It Had To Do With Getting Out The Necessary Mail And All Of That - Organization.

I Began To Feel That My Greatest Sense Of Success Would Raise The Level Of Masses Of People, Rather Than The Individual Being Accepted By The Establishment. So, This Kind Of Personal Thinking, Combined With, Say, Even The Little Bit More Radical Thinking - Because At One Time The Pacifist Movement Was A Very Radical Concept.

The Major Job Was Getting People To Understand That They Had Something Within Their Power That They Could Use, And It Could Only Be Used If They Understood What Was Happening And How Group Action Could Counter Violence.