
The Citizens' Council
Organized Resistance to the Second Reconstruction, 1954-64
How the white South organized to fight the Civil Rights Movement
Paper – $44
978-0-252-06441-8
Publication Date
Paperback: 01/01/1994
About the Book
This in-depth account of the rise and decline of the Citizens' Councils of America details the organization's role in the massive resistance to school desegregation in the South following the 1954 Brown vs. Board of Education decision. Neil R. McMillen blends history with analysis to highlight the leading figures of the movement and provide insights into the methods and ideology of the people whose implacable opposition to integration defined an era of the Civil Rights Movement. This edition includes a new preface and updated bibliography.Reviews
"A tour de force of research and narration in highly readable style. McMillen. . . seems to have read everything the historical record has to offer on the subject and to have known exactly what to make of it. . . Himself squarely on the side of the future, he is sensitive to the anguish that prompted the hysteria of the misguided racist. . . . By any test, a masterful study."--Journal of Southern History"Takes seriously the people who made the movement, when ridicule and caricature would have been an easier analytical technique. Solidly researched and well written, an intriguing story."--Augustus M. Burns, Social Studies