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[[bold]]FREEDOMWAYS[[bold]]
[[bold]]THIRD QUARTER 1966[[bold]]

The second fact that emerged was that, despite the fact that these challenges were theoretically "a Congressional issue," the illegally elected delegation received the full support and protection of the Johnson administration which quietly put the word out to potential supporters- within the Congress and outside that the White House was opposed to the unseating of the Mississippians.

By September, when the House voted for the second time, the members of Congress had available to them an overwhelming volume of evidence-if any were needed-that the five Mississippians were fraudulently elected. In addition to three volumes of sworn and notarized statements taken in Mississippi by lawyers for the MFDP outlining the ways and means of Negro disfranchisement, there was the evidence presented by the Department of Justice in the case [[italics]] U.S. vs. Mississippi,[[italics]] in which the Department argued that Mississippi's electoral laws were unconstitutional and discriminatory, and the report of the U.S. Commission of Civil Rights entitled [[italics]]Voting in Mississippi,[[italics]] which also concluded that 94 per cent of the black population was systematically disfranchised by terror, violence, economic intimidation, and deliberate policy of the State.

Despite the evidence, neither the full membership of the House nor any of its committees ever debated the issue of the constitutional validity of the contested elections. In fact, at the same time that the House voted to dismiss the challenge on grounds that the people bringing the challenge had no legal standing to do so, it also rejected a conclusion that the Mississippians were "entitled to the-seats." So the House of Representatives, like the national Democratic party, while drawing the line at publicly endorsing Mississippi's racism, found itself unable to take political action to renounce it. Both groups, Congress and the national party, also made strong public statements concerning the future. If there is discrimination in future elections or in future convention delegations, they said, the Mississippians will not be accepted. We intend to take them at their word.

Until the final House vote, the disposition of the challenge was never a foregone conclusion. In Mississippi the leadership of the state was at no pains to conceal its anxiety. At strategic times the Congressmen were commuting to Mississippi weekly to prepare their defenses. They sent letters to all law enforcement agents and registrars in their districts asking for a moratorium on violence related to voting. For the first time in 75 years Negroes in Mississippi re-

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