Black politician energizes black voters
Henry reflects briefly on the gubernatorial campaign of Charles Evers, brother of Medgar Evers and mayor of Fayette, Mississippi. Henry believes that Evers's campaign energized black voters.
Citing this Excerpt
Oral History Interview with Aaron Henry, April 2, 1974. Interview A-0107. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007) in the Southern Oral History Program Collection, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Full Text of the Excerpt
- JACK BASS:
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How do you assess the whole Charles Evers campaign? We get two responses usually. One is that it had the result of really bringing about enthusiasm in the black community, really getting people interested in the campaign and out to vote. The other one is a negative response that it tended to take attention away from local candidates, diverted resources from local candidates, ad therefore didn't have a positive effect.
- AARON HENRY:
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I think it had a positive effect. I don't know of any resources that it usurped from local candidates. Because most of Charlie's money was raised out of state. And the local areas were not, you know, assessed or bound to contribute. And I think that in the campaign they ran, it did serve as an adrenalin builder, shall we say, for many of the other campaigns that did exist.
