African-Americans

from Scotty Kirkland “Pink Sheets and Black Ballots: Politics and Civil Rights in Mobile, Alabama, 1945 – 1985” Thesis, University of South Alabama, 2009, p. 35; sent to the library by former newspaper editor Ralph Poore.

In the summer of 1931, Mobile NAACP secretary John “LeFlore and others had begun their attempts to revitalize the branch. They arranged a visit by Oscar DePriest, the first African-American Congressmen elected since Reconstruction, in an effort to renew their membership campaign. DePriest’s visit exposed internal divisions between LeFlore and other NAACP members. The Congressman’s record of speaking out against segregation alarmed some black ministers who feared white reprisal. Several ministers who were also NAACP board members had arranged for the Congressman to speak in their churches throughout the day but withdrew their invitations due to intimidation by white leaders and the local Ku Klux Klan. A deeply embarrassed LeFlore arranged for a consolidated meeting at a local Catholic church.”