They Voted

Though in many Mississippi counties blacks outnumber whites by 2 to 1, only one Negro has held public office in the state for nearly a century. Last week, with record numbers of Negroes registered and voting in the Democratic primary, the white monopoly began to crack.

While no Negro won a statewide post, 15 were nominated as candidates for county posts, and twelve of them will face no opposition in November's election. Six won the nomination for justice of the peace, four for constable, three for supervisor, one for coroner and another for chancery clerk. Twenty-two others, including four campaigning for sheriff, got enough votes to enter the August 29 primary.

The impact of the Negro vote was also evident in the gubernatorial race, in which two comparative middle-of-the-roaders--by Mississippi standards--beat former Governor Ross Barnett and four other candidates. Facing each other in the runoff will be State Treasurer William Winter, 44, an able administrator and reluctant segregationist, who won the top spot with 218,045 votes, and Congressman John Bell Williams, 48, a Democrat for Goldwater in 1964, who generally avoided airing his racist views and got 194,230 votes. Despite Winter's early lead, the pros picked Williams as the likely winner, since he stands to pick up the 118,675 votes cast for Radio Disk Jockey Jimmy Swan and the 74,726 for Barnett, both implacable racists.

Delta Gains. In the campaign for Lieutenant Governor, voting was so close between Governor Paul Johnson, 51 (who ran for the No. 2 spot because state law prevents him from succeeding himself), and State Representative Roy Black, 52, that a recount appeared necessary for the runoff against Front Runner Attorney Charley Sullivan, 42. Byron De La Beckwith, still under indictment after two mistrials for the 1963 murder of Civil Rights Leader Medgar Evers, netted only 34,000 votes. In all, 670,000 of the state's 800,000 eligible voters went to the polls, including nearly 70% of the 194,000 registered Negroes. Most Negro gains were in the delta area where Evers' brother, Charles, has vigorously organized voters since 1964.

Doing All Right. Despite the large Negro vote, violence came only after the election. At a farm near Fayette, where Evers has his headquarters, Farmer Cecil Kling, 54, was so riled by the success of Negro candidates that he pulled a shotgun on four Negro farmhands and declared: "I'm gonna shoot you all." When one of the Negroes, Samuel Carroll, 53, tried to plead with him, Kling triggered a fatal shotgun blast into Carroll's heart. "I oughta kill all of you," snapped Kling, then drove into town and gave himself up. That night, 400 angry Negroes demonstrated in Fayette, but Evers kept them from rioting by arguing that "the only people we would hurt would be ourselves."

Evers had his eye squarely on the elections. "We didn't do what we hoped," he allowed, "but we did all right." Negro leaders this week will hold a strategy meeting to concentrate their support for local candidates and size up the race for Governor. "We will pick a candidate," said Evers. "But we're not gonna say who it is."

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