What to make of James Meredith? This is the question after reading his autobiography.
Of course I knew that Meredith integrated The University of Mississippi in 1962. Everybody knows that. What I did not know before reading this book was the details of that momentous event and I did not know anything about one James Meredith. Now I know about both.
James Meredith is a mess. Great person for his courage in 1962 and afterwards and for being a cultural icon. Yet he admittedly comes across as vain and self-centered. His politics is all over the place. It is as if he revels in being "different" just for the sake of being different. I get the impression that he likes to run his mouth just to create attention and controversey.
There is a statue of Meredith on the campus of Ole Miss. Meredith demands in the book that the statue be torn down, yet I don't get a good reason in the book for why it should be torn down.
He complains over and over that white supremacy and racial prejudice still exist in this country, and who can argue with that, yet he says that blacks have to assume responsibility for their own future as if there were no structural problems standing in their way. He seems to contradict himself.
James Meredith inexplicably worked a year for the arch-segregationist Sen. Jesse Helms of North Carolina. I would never forgive Meredith for this. There is a Republican side to Meredith that I do not understand.
Meredith talks about how much he admired his father, yet he admits that in the last 2 years of his father's life, he did not visit his father. The last time he saw his father was at his Ole Miss graduation. I do not understand this.
His Ole Miss experience with the stress that it put on his family had a severe price. His sister hanged herself at the age of 25.
James Meredith was and is a brave man who talks about education these days. Nobody can ever take away from him the part he played in the civil rights movement of the 60's. It's just that he is a strange bird.
Meredith was shot while on a civil right march in 1966 heading down from Memphis down highway 51. The word went out that he was dead. This was perhaps his last day in the world spotlight.
He supported Ross Burnett in his relection bid for governor. Stange man indeed!
After spending 9 years in the Air Force, James Meredith was not naive or innocent. He had enough credits to almost graduate at then Jackson State College in Jackson. He deliberately sought to enroll at Ole Miss to challenge the structure of white supremace in the state of Mississippi. Four times he was turned away when he tried to register. The Kennedys got involved. I suppose the President can be faulted for not handling the situation with proper federal force until it was too late. There was the famous riot on September 30, 1962 when two people were killed and scores were injured. The right-wing General Edwin Walker, fired by the Kennedy administration, was there stirring up the masses. Meredith was able to register the next day in the mess that was the Ole Miss campus. It is utterly amazing and mind-boggling to realize that just 51 years ago it took mass rioting and deaths to integrate the Univ. of Mississippi.
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