THE MOOD OF AMERICA

...They demonstrate that ordinary persons, working together on problems apparent to all, can reduce dirt and disorder, improve sanitary and other services, and transform vacant lots into much-needed playground space...

...Eby replied for the four: "We wouldn't eat in the kitchen if we were starving to death...

...And on a larger, less intimate scale, it is one of several agencies participating in a planning study directed toward preventing the vast arc of middle-aged buildings that swings across Chicago's South Side from aging into a full-fledged slum like the older areas to the north...

...Negro and white walked down the street and across the campus together...

...II An exciting discussion followed his first lecture...

...In three sentences, Eby told the Conference why: "Segregation," he said, "is inconsistent with the-witness of the Friends and of John Woolman in particular...

...And a wave of scare selling does not occur...

...Only then, says Eby, was he conscious of what had come into focus—Southern mores and institutional regulations...

...II What is a block...

...To you, sir," he told the startled school official, "I am Prof...

...She admitted the possibility," he says, "but she left me with a remark, about 'it all sounds subversive.' Maybe," he concluded, "we Christians ought to be a bit subversive...

...The groups live only where they have something to do and results are visible...

...Through the late Tom Wright of the Mayor's Commission on Human Relations they got in touch with other local groups and individuals with similar concerns...

...He's a Communist," a woman contributed...

...It assures city action against illegal conversions and zoning violations reported from the blocks...

...They have learned to assume initiatives, to accept responsibilities...

...He told Branson that he would not speak further to a segregated meeting and that unless the situation was remedied at once, he was prepared to return home...

...Thus, through the intervention of the block group, this story had a happy ending...

...The outcome of the conference with Bell was that the issue went before the full Institute...

...So many of the delegates chose to eat at the church that extra food had to be brought in...

...Unaware of the segregation at the Institute and believing that the Friends would never run a segregated conference, he included two Negroes in his invitation...

...While they landscaped and painted, she sulked behind drawn blinds—her unpainted fence and shabby front yard a silent blot on their efforts...

...Over 250 came to the second, and the Conference was launched...

...Some grew from the civil defense block organizations of the last war, others by example...

...Such a moment came during the Friends' Institute at Woman's College of North Carolina at Greensboro in 1952 when Kermit Eby, an invited leader of the Institute, refused to speak on America's role in world peace and politics...

...So far as I observed," says Eby, "no one even stared at us...

...It would at least be following in the footsteps of Jesus of Nazareth, Martin Luther, and John Woolman...

...Almost stone deaf, the poor woman had been unable to communicate with anybody and had no idea she had ever been asked to join the project...

...Eby agreed...

...They have learned that ordinary persons like themselves can get things done...

...He concluded that Christians should begin to take their religious professions seriously...

...A young lady came up to me after my talk and said, 'You worry me, Mr...

...Eby of the University of Chicago with four inches in Who's Who, and while I have never considered it important to anyone else, right now it is to you...

...Recently, for instance, it concluded a successful two-year legal action against over-crowding in one large building...

...Indecision and a feeling of helplessness before the immensity of the task facing men of good will in a disturbed and disunited world changed to confidence and hope...

...How successfully have the block groups met the problems that prompted their founding...

...Block groups discuss the rumors at their weekly or monthly meetings...

...They recalled that the promotion announcements for the Institute had said that delegates would be housed at Bennett College and Woman's College...

...The incident Eby's outburst provoked offers hope for a Christian solution of the problem...

...The events leading up to this indignant outburst provide a picture of the segregation issue in the American South...

...If democracy was workable, it should be able to work in a Christian assembly of Protestant churchmen...

...In each case, when word reaches the Conference, information on property values and sales is made accessible...

...Today it boasts 60 organized blocks within a one and one-half square mile area and is helping organize similar groups in two adjoining neighborhoods...

...Cannot Christians sometimes take the intiative in reform?' Eby shrugged his shoulders sadly...

...Before the meeting ended, the delegates were joining hands in folk dances...

...In this way isolation and hostility are broken down...

...There was no untoward action until the four, two whites and two Negroes, had reached the point in the cafeteria where they picked up their trays...

...As they started to pick up their trays, however, the woman in charge of the dining hall "leaned over to Eby and asked him and his party to step out of line...

...But the evening meeting was crowded...

...And it is futile to talk about the problems of peace and international relations and democracy's task unless we do something about our democratic inconsistencies here and now...

...No one moved...

...If, indeed, this was the spirit of the much-lamented "good old days" of rural life, then it may be said that in these block groups, urban living has found its own frontier...

...At the afternoon session, Dean Edgerton announced that Eby would not take part in the afternoon panel until the problem of segregation was solved...

...The Conference provides guidance for block leaders in tri-weekly work sessions...

...Actually, one of the most exciting aspects of the block groups has been the people involved," she continues...

...After hesitating briefly, the school official recovered his aplomb...

...Forty persons concerned with adapting themselves to the neighborhood's changing population attended the first meeing...

...It must be built by those who keep their feet planted in the mud of realities while never letting their eyes wander from the hope in the sky...

...Of all the churches, the Quakers had the most thrilling tradition of brotherhood...

...His appeal was so direct and moving that several delegates begged him for specific suggestions as to what should be done about the situation...

...if they differ, then each side has its own block group...

...A feeling of friendship permeated the group...

...The younger generation in the South seems ready to take integration of the races in stride a"s good Americans and democrats...

...It was received with enthusiastic interest...

...Nichols, Paul Johnson, a Florida farmer, and a pre-medical student from Hampton Institute, James Norris, crossed the campus to the dining hall...

...Working together to improve the physical appearance of their block had awakened in them a feeling of neighborliness and concern...

...Ill The conference agreed to take up the matter after the evening lecture, with all delegates participating...

...Paul Green, former professor of philosophy at the University of North Carolina, author and world traveler, opened the 1952 Institute with an eloquent address, insisting that America would lose all influence with the majority of...

...He emphasized the responsibility of the ordinary citizen for world conditions...

...Representatives of an unscrupulous real estate firm invade a changing neighborhood...

...The songs moved from the religious to the popular...

...No longer hungry, Eby and his three friends walked to the Alumni building to await Bell...

...Among the delegates, the topic spread like backyard gossip...

...At dinner that evening, the breaking of bread held special significance...

...Fresh from a world tour under the auspices of UNESCO, he noted America's loss of face with the peoples of Asia and Africa, and made a fervent plea for democratic example at home...

...Laughter and friendly chatter made the church ring with gaiety...

...Elsewhere, the rumor spreads that a large building is going to be subdivided into a tenement...

...Each new resident of a block, regardless of his race, is greeted by a group of his new neighbors...

...Residents of a large court building may constitute the group...

...He was unaware of the dissension when he attended the morning worship service, where the necessity of spelling out our abstract ideals in concrete action was brought to focus by William Roosa of the Greensboro Friends' staff...

...Every single one of our block groups has grown in response to a problem sensed by the people living there," says Julia Abrahamson, the energetic executive-director of the Conference...

...We ought to challenge the status quo...

...Perhaps the greatest contribution has been made in an area of racial tension by the blocks associated with the Hyde Park-Kenwood Conference...

...Overwhelmed by anger at the condescension in the man's tone and refusing to distinguish between the remarks addressed to himself and to the Negroes, Eby exploded...

...They discover that they do not have to lose themselves in urban isolation or watch passively as their neighborhood degenerates into a slum...

...Most of the time was spent in spoken dismay that the Friends had accepted the conditions of segregation...

...They waited an hour...

...Theirs is the complex task of combatting prejudice, quashing rumors, and building a healthy community in a middle-aged belt of white home-owners and apartment dwellers adjacent to Chicago's constantly expanding Black Ghetto...

...Realizing that his opponent was not the school official but an entire system, Eby apologized for his temper and marched across the hall to where Russell Branson of the Friends was sitting...

...The Urban League "block beautiful" groups were the earliest...

...In spite of the few die-hards who insisted they had come to "discuss international relations and not the race question," consensus gradually emerged...

...Their limited aim is to instill in city dwellers a pride and sense of responsibility in the appearance of their neighborhood...

...Jim Crow among The Christians By Ray Montgomery Greensfcoro, N. C. ONCE in a while the whole complex of a major social issue comes to sharp focus in a single incident, at once clearly revealing and prophetic...

...Hyde Park and Kenwood have been free from the type of violence that has accompanied Negro expansion into every other section of the city...

...In a few minutes the director of buildings and grounds, a tall, dignified gentlemen dressed in white linen, came up to the group...

...A place to eat was found—the basement of the College Park Methodist Church...

...In an adjoining section of the city, the Hyde Park-Kenwood Community Conference has organized in a racially heterogeneous area the most self-conscious and ambitious block groups...

...There is little question of their success as beautifying and clean-up agencies...

...The argument precipitated by his proposal raged on but reached no conclusion the first day of the Institute...

...They are recreating the communities which nourish democracy...

...Four years ago, members of the local Friends Meeting decided to try to find some expression for their concern about social justice right in the neighborhood...

...Someone," she said, "will soon be here to speak to you...

...And its pioneers...

...THE MOOD OF AMERICA Notes on New Battles in Old Wars Democracy Works On the Block Level By Albert N. Votaw Chicago FOR ALMOST a year members of a block group in Chicago grumbled over the uncooperative attitude of one home-owner...

...Nor was there a decent eating place near Woman's College that would serve Negroes...

...It is futile to talk about the problems of peace and international relations and democracy's task," said Eby, "unless we do something about our democratic inconsistencies here and now...

...As might happen in any small town—but not in the large, impersonal city—a group of them called on their "bad neighbor...

...The most articulate voice was that of Prof...

...You fellows—all of you," he said, "can eat in the kitchen...

...Treading delicately within the letter of the law, they suggest to homeowners that they sell before property values drop...

...Furthermore, the groups combat rumor and fear, acting as channels of communication and panic control...

...Tell -me, why did you do it...

...A Quaker-Christian conference had a responsibility that was greater than that of ordinary lay meetings and something must be done about the segregation...

...Furthermore, you are speaking to educated gentlemen...

...Standards of neatness set by the group are explained, and the newcomer is invited to join...

...I do not want to participate in a meeting held under the auspices of the Friends and supported by other religious groups which is less democratic and progressive than those of the labor movement of which I was so long a part...

...And to the Negroes he said, "You boys will have to eat in the kitchen...

...He had just been refused table service in the college cafeteria for his party of four because two of them were Negro delegates to the conference...

...These people had organized an Urban League "block beautiful" group...

...Still ignorant of the previous day's occurrence, Eby taught his first class in "Peace and Politics...

...Although their existence scarcely guarantees the creation of any silken purses from the sow's ear of Chicago's inadequate housing facilities, within their self-imposed limits they have helped create or restore a feeling of community pride and responsibility all too rare in areas of urban overcrowding...

...At the block meeting the four families agreed, at the urging of their neighbors, to stay on long enough to get to know their new neighbors...

...They quickly discovered a simple reason for her indifference...

...The dishwashing and cleaning up were done cooperatively...

...But," says Eby, "speeches cannot solve the problem...

...The air of the conference had changed...

...Eby opened the discussion with an elaboration of his stand...

...Only the initiated would know that Bennett was a Negro college and so expect the segregation...

...Disappointed with the vagueness of his reply, several delegates suggested beginning with the Institute...

...And in scores of blocks—slum, near-slum, and middle-class—city dwellers are creating communities, where face-to-face friendliness replaces the usual urban pattern of disinterest and anonymity...

...Peace," he told his class, "will not envelop us as a mantle come down from Heaven...

...In still another block, four homes were put up for sale when a Negro bought one building...

...The last evening, the instigator of the revolution made a speech on "Positive Action For Peace...

...it was a good feeling that, however small, a beginning had been made toward the peace and brotherhood they had come together to discuss...

...The more energetic delegates gathered around the teacher to continue the discussion at lunch...

...Bennett College was also at commuting distance from Woman's College and required auto transportation...

...You cannot eat in here," he told Eby...

...If dwellings are similar on both sides of the street, one organization may suffice...

...The chairman appointed a committee to find a place where all might eat together and share their fellowship in their living as well as in their thoughts...

...The next day the committee and volunteers bought food and prepared it in the church kitchen with the blessings of Pastor James C. Stokes...

...Someone played the piano...

...Why not, he argued, integrate the Institute on its living level as well as its intellectual plane...

...Not only do they meet the problems of playgrounds and inadequate street lighting...

...Kermit Eby, Brethren minister and ex-director of research and education for the CIO, did not arrive in Greensboro until the morning after the initial outburst...

...Frequently, in the process of working together, a spirit of neighborliness and self-help emerges...

...The four agreed that the moment had arrived to do something about the intolerable lack of democracy...

...Eby, Dr...

...He's just a plain damn Yankee," said another...

...The group joined in the familiar old church hymns...

...To this, the Negro delegates present replied that they had been patient and had proved themselves...

...In a community noted for its abundance of liberal groups, our most active and valuable workers have never before been involved in organizational activity...

...Branson apologized for the situation and asked Eby to wait until he could get in touch with Tartt Bell, director of the Institute...

...Are you a Communist?' "I said, 'Young lady, must every decent act be attributed to Communist inspiration...

...Charles Nichols of Hampton Institute...

...Or, in an area of single homes or two and three-flat buildings, the groups may encompass all four sides of a Chicago block...

...Eby is an exhibitionist," said one Southern delegate...

...As for me, I am 48 years old and I don't feel a bit bdyish...

...I was wholly unconscious of any objection from the other diners...

...mankind unless the American people began to live up to their democratic profession...

...The usual argument was offered: "Let us be patient, give the Negroes time to prove themselves...

...These experiences have taught many persons what their own efforts can accomplish...

...William Edgerton, dean of the Institute, then spoke on "The Challenge of Russia," describing America's role in world politics...

...You caused this incident...