Senator Theodore Bilbo on Black Voters

Background: A profile of Mississippi Senator Theodore Bilbo published in the national magazine Collier’s included this excerpt from one of his campaign speeches. When the U.S. Senate deliberated on January 4, 1947, over whether to sanction or expel Senator Bilbo, this excerpt was entered into the Congressional Record of the debate. (Tom Clark was U.S. Attorney General, and Hugo Black was an Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court).

The poll tax won’t keep ’em from voting. What keeps ’em from voting is section 244 of the constitution of 1890 that Senator George wrote. It says that a man to register must be able to read and explain the constitution or explain the constitution when read to him. And then Senator George wrote a constitution that damn few white men and no ni***rs at all can explain. Why, the ni***rs are having meetings all over the State. We don't know what they’re up to. They’ve had meetings in every county—meetings behind locked doors. Two policemen up at Jackson broke in on one of their meetings and do you know what they found? Northern ni***rs teaching them how to register and how to vote.

Mississippi is white. We got the right to keep it that way, and I care not what Tom Clark and Hugo Black say. I’m calling on every red-blooded American who believes in the superiority and integrity of the white race to get out and see that no ni***r votes. And the best time to do it is the night before.

Source: Harry Henderson and Sam Shaw, “Bilbo,” Collier’s July 6, 1946