Mississippi Burning

The recent arrest of Edgar Ray Killen for the 1964 murder of three civil rights workers was no doubt a large part of the reason for the showing of Mississippi Burning this week. And provides me the opportunity to recommend that If you have not seen it, go watch it. It is the story of the killings. The movie should be required watching for all.

The best web site I have found for information on the case is from The University of Missouri Kansas City. It centers on the resulting 1967 US vs Cecil Price et al trial.

How people could be so ridiculously hateful and say then they are doing it because it is God's will, is totally beyond me.

And lest you think that it was only a select few. This quote is attributed to the Dallas News. I would not believe it myself if it weren't listed on such reputable college (University of Missouri Kansas City):

"A thousand college students from the North are reported to be invading Mississippi this summer in order to engage in a Negro voter registration drive. It is unbelievable that a thousand college students would do this of their own volition. Those who know the ways of propaganda, especially of a Communist nature, probably correctly suspect that the idealism of some college youngsters has been taken advantage of by some very hard boiled left wingers and Communists who know exactly what they want to do--stir up trouble in the South.
This newspaper a long time ago pointed our that [a part of the Communist plan in the United States is to stir up racial strife]. The ultimate aim is . . . a black revolution. The invasion of Mississippi this summer is . . . part and parcel of this plan.
These young people who have gone to Mississippi have been attending training schools which can be described as nothing short of inflammatory . . . The naive inexperience of these youngsters has been preyed on, and they have been stirred up by tales of horror and violence that simply don't exist in Mississippi."

I guess we really cannot always trust the media.


Pitt also has some info on the trial.