(Saturday, June 22, 1996)
Toledo, Ohio

"A Woman's Courageous Life Spent
Fighting the Power"

(Click here for printable version)

Editor's note: Associate editor William Brower and urban affairs reporter Eddie B. Allen Jr. recently completed a journey to 24 cities to examine racial issues in this country. Their seventh installment in this 12-part series today addresses the fight for social equality when it transcends color lines:

Louisville, Ky.
"Fight the power" was a popular saying in the 1960s
among black so-called "radicals." But few know the meaning of the phrase as intimately as a small, gray-haired, white woman by the name of Anne Braden.

"The power," "the system," and "the Man" were all terms used to describe an oppressive, often racist American social structure in the post-civil rights era. Though historically, they have enjoyed the privileges of race and class, many whites, such as Mrs. Braden, have attempted and continue attempting to change the system, so that race and class will no longer be privileges, but mere circumstances.

"So what do you all want to talk about?" Mrs. Braden asks two visitors, as they sit comfortably in her parlor. Two walls of books on either side of her, ranging in topics from slavery to contemporary politics, help tell the story of her journey. In 1954, the year of the Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas decision that declared the "separate but equal" government racial doctrine unconstitutional, Mrs. Braden and her husband Carl met Andrew Wade.

Mr. Wade, a black World War II veteran, asked the Bradens if they would covertly help him purchase a home for his family in the segregated Louisville suburb of Shively. He had no desire to live in Louisville's historically black west end. "I've always thought that there were two coincidences," recalls Mrs. Braden. "One was, we later found out, that Shively was full of [white] people who had moved out of the west end to get away from black people. The other thing was that he moved in the weekend before the Supreme Court decision came down."

The Bradens, both newspaper reporters and considered socially progressive in the 1950s, bought the house and transferred its title to Mr. Wade. But the same weekend that the Wades moved in, rocks were thrown and shots were fired into the window of their new home. Mrs. Braden never found out how it was discovered that she and her husband bought the house, but she says they made no denials.

"Nobody has ever asked that question before but I do know the reporters called us that weekend and asked us for a statement," she says. The Bradens began receiving death threats from other whites, and "a mob" assembled outside their home one night. "Carl told them to get out of our yard, and stop stomping on his grass." But other persecutors were not so easily dismissed.

About a month later, an unknown person or people caused an explosion, destroying half of the Wade house. No one was injured, but the incident finally drove the lone black family out of Shively. By fall, commonwealth prosecutor Scott Hamilton brought charges of sedition against Mrs. Braden and her husband, saying the transfer of the house and the explosion were part of a Communist plot to cause strife between the races.

"If you haven't lived through a community hysteria, it's hilarious," Mrs. Braden says between drags on a cigarette. "Looking back on it, I find it hard to believe. People who we had known for years were afraid to talk to us."

Ultimately, Mr. Braden was the only person convicted. He was sentenced to 15 years in prison, but served only eight months in 1955 before winning an appeal. Meanwhile, Mrs. Braden, whose charges were dismissed, had begun traveling the nation and speaking about their experience. She says the public began referring to the ordeal as the "Wade-Braden case," but eventually abbreviated the tag to "the Braden case."

"That showed how deep racism was—and I've told other white people this—that people thought a white man being given 15 years in prison was more important than a black man not being able to buy a house." Mr. Braden's conviction was later overturned on grounds that the state could not prosecute a federal sedition case. He and Mrs. Braden remained in the area, and became increasingly active in the civil rights movement. Mr. Braden died of a heart attack in 1975.

"For years, people's blood pressure went up at the mention of the name Braden," she says. Mrs. Braden wrote a book, "The Wall Between," which deals with race and her life in Louisville. She says she joined the fight against racism to become an example for whites like her own parents, who were prejudiced: "I saw what I thought were good people who believed in helping your neighbor, who turned into animals when their assumptions of racial privilege were challenged."

 

  

 

 

Beverly Watts, director of the State Commission on Civil Rights, says Mrs. Braden's contributions are appreciated. "Anne is always there," she adds. "Anne is always challenging white folks to listen." But Mrs. Braden admits she relates to certain people, places, and events in a way similar to many whites. "I wouldn't sit here and tell you I'm not racist now, because I think every white person struggles with it. But you make up your mind, and choose what side you want to be on."

People like Rhoda Faust, of New Orleans, continue to work in their communities. Ms. Faust is a member of the group ERACE, which she co-founded with Brenda Thompson, a black Chicago native, in 1993. The organization, which has about 100 active members, holds weekly meetings at which people of different backgrounds can talk about race and social issues.

"I'm white, but I'm one of those people who would be happy when there is not a category," Ms. Faust says.

Direct communication at ERACE meetings and social functions is often a first step in understanding people of other cultures, she says, and understanding may, in turn, lead to friendship.

The ERACE slogan, "Eracism," has become a recognizable phrase in the area, promoted on buttons at Mardi Gras and seen on the bumper stickers of numerous cars that travel the city. "If you're not a racist, let people know," Ms. Faust adds. "Let your family know, let people at stop lights know."

On Varnum Street in Brentwood, Md., just outside the Washington, D.C., beltway, a two-story house sits inconspicuously in a quiet subdivision. The Quixote Center, founded 20 years ago in Mount Rainier, Md., and with only nine full-time staff members, operates five secular and religious projects with goals ranging from the improvement of conditions in Haiti to changing the American judicial system. A mostly white, Catholic organization, the center works primarily around issues that concern people of color.

"Its mission was, and remains, to work on big projects with very few resources, to serve as advocates," says Jane Henderson, co-director and coordinator of Equal Justice USA project. "I often get asked, 'You're a white woman, why do you do this work?'" To think that the number of black men in prison doesn't ultimately affect me is a sham, because human rights affect us all."

Equal Justice, which serves to create awareness about race in the court and penal system, has a mailing list of about 10,000. Mrs. Henderson says she believes more whites would become involved with similar racial and human rights issues if they were more conscious of how they could contribute.

"I may be optimistic, but I don't think the public is so apathetic, just disempowered," she says. "I think there are a lot of people who think things are pretty messed up, but don't think they can do anything about it."

Ron Kuby, the New York lawyer who in April helped win a $43 million civil settlement for Darrell Cabey, a black man left paralyzed by Bernhard Goetz in a 1984 subway shooting, says everyday people—such as jurors—can affect race relations. Goetz served less than a year in jail on a weapons conviction, but was found not guilty of attempted murder for the incident, which many believe was racially motivated.

"Black life isn't worthless. It's worth $43 million in one estimation," says Mr. Kuby, who is white. "The message that went out to bigots was a very good one."

Mr. Kuby, who helped defend two Hell's Angels gang members in Toledo with controversial lawyer William Kunstler in 1989, says working on race and civil rights-related cases is his contribution to improving society. Race was not a central issue in the Toledo trial.

"Bill Kunstler's perspective on American life was relatively unique for a white American," says Mr. Kuby. "Bill regarded race as the fundamental issue in American culture, the problem that created other problems. That's the view I share."

Whites who have joined the struggle for social equality have even died in their efforts to promote change. Michael Schwerner and Andrew Goodman, of New York, were shot to death in 1964 with James Chaney, a black civil rights volunteer, in a well-documented Mississippi case. Viola Gregg Liuzzo, a Detroit housemaker, was also killed in 1965 by Ku Klux Klan members who resented her participation in Alabama march efforts.