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Transcript on deposit at The Southern Historical Collection, The Louis Round Wilson Library
Citation of this interview should be as follows:
“Interview B-0069, in
the Southern Oral History Program Collection #4007,
Southern Historical
Collection, The Wilson Library,
University of North Carolina at Chapel
Hill”
Longtime Charlotte politician Charles M. Lowe discusses the county-city consolidation issue in Charlotte, North Carolina. Lowe seems to have embraced the spirit of his recent retirement, attributing the failure of consolidation in Charlotte to a trend of voter apathy that is sure to reverse itself eventually. Lowe concedes that the politics of race and class played a role in defeating consolidation, but seems to believe more in impersonal patterns, alliances that dissolve and reform, and periods of change followed by periods of settling. Lowe's focus on the big picture means that he rarely speaks in specifics about the political battle over consolidation in Charlotte. For this reason, this interview will be most useful for researchers who already have a grasp of the issue.
Longtime Charlotte politician Charles M. Lowe discusses the county-city consolidation issue in Charlotte, North Carolina, and offers his thoughts on the broad, impersonal trends that dominate the political process.
[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]
Mr. Charles Lowe at his house in Charlotte on March 20, 1975. I want to say that I do appreciate your allowing me some time to talk to you. Now, let me just get it straight. You've retired from business?
January 2 of this year.
That was a happy day, I expect.
It surely was.
Just to run right quickly. You were first appointed, I believe, to the county commission in '61, then ran on your own in '62, didn't run in '64, president of the Charlotte Area Fund in '66, ran again, was elected in '68, was elected chairman, then in 1970, ran again. I've just read in the newspaper up through just the consolidation election in '71. One thing I'm wondering about sort of at the start. How would you characterize your political philosophy? Are you on the more liberal side, or the more conservative side?
I'm from middle-of-the-road to liberal, I would say.
Which sort of brings me to ask, what's the status of the local Democratic party? Some body's commented, though that maybe the Boy Scouts in the area were about as influential as the, at least the party organization.
Well, we have had some problems in the Democratic party, locally, state-, and nation-wide, but we have made a strong come-back locally. Dave Kelley has been elected chairman. Dave is a man about thirty-eight years old whom we can all rally around, the whites, the blacks, the rich, the poor, the liberals, and conservatives. I just talked with him a few minutes ago. I think we're well on the way to rebuilding the Democratic party locally.
For a number of years it's been pretty much splintered. Without necessarily mentioning any names, would you say that is because of personalities or because of real philosophical conflicts.
Because of philosophical conflicts. The Democrats don't fence anybody
out. They fence everybody in. The Republicans just take a few people in
who are conservatives and are for things. The Democrats are for people.
When you take everybody in and let everybody speak,
The Republicans have been quite successful. Strong organization, do you think, is the primary…Concentrating on a certain type of person. Or, are they maybe getting a backlash from some of the racial?
Well, it's a combination of things. Part of it is…You do get a backlash, of course, from racial things. The Republicans do concentrate, and the Republicans are together. They're well organized. They're well financed. They stand behind their candidates. They turn out on election day. At the same time, this is their weakness, too, because, when their candidates or their philosophy goes against them, they have nothing to fall back on because they have given their all to begin with. They have no reserves. This is the weakness of the Republicans and the strength of the Democrats. We can bring victory out of defeat. They can't. When they go down, they go down hard, and it's a long time coming back.
The reason why I was asking about the party is…One thing I'm interested in as far as the consolidation effort …I'm wondering if there were partisan reasons, maybe, either for supporting or for opposing. Was one party more likely to support than the other?
Yes. The Democrats were more likely to be for consolidation than the
Republicans. The Republicans did not want district representation. They
did not want blacks. They wanted things to be at large, in the way of
election. They wanted to feel that their party could get a majority.
That the white, influential, well-educated would be a majority.
Consequently, they were not for it. That's not really what defeated
this. What defeated this was two things. One, school system had had
quite a blow, and everybody was in a turmoil about this. The second
thing, if you study consolidation over the country, I don't know
anywhere it has succeeded the first time. Consolidation
If so many different groups were either opposed or lukewarm, what got the idea started in the first place? I mean, the idea had been kicking around for a number of years.
Well, the chamber had been pushing this idea since about 1962. It does make sense, consolidation. I mean, the buckpassing does stop. You do do better planning. There's no question about it, and there's no question but what, while the tax rate increases, it does not increase as fast. These are things that most people are not concerned about. Most people are concerned about their garbage, their sidewalks, their tax rates, where their kids go to school. These sort of things, what we call bread-and-butter or gut issues, and the high issues? That doesn't really concern them. Really, the chamber and the thinking people, which were in the minority, were pushing it. They got it on the ballot and got it going, but we just had too few of these, unfortunately.
Some people, in looking at consolidation, see it, to an extent, as sort
of an urban or civic imperialism. The city seeking to control more area,
to control more people. Could that…Would the
Not really. I think just the opposite is true. I think we could have sold consolidation had we gone about it the wrong way. I think if we had told the people "Look, if you don't have consolidation, you're going to have another Atlanta in Charlotte. It's going to be predominantly black. The whites are going to move out. You're going to have a decaying tax base, and you're really going to be in trouble. Consolidation is really the only answer how to get a handle on this thing, and have the whites where they want to be, and maybe where they should be, overall. In the driver's seat." But, we didn't choose to take that route. We tried to sell it on the democratic route of everybody getting fair representation, the whites, the blacks, the men, the women, the rural, and the city. Of doing it right. Well, they didn't buy this. I talked to one of the opponents afterwards, and he said, "Lord, if you had told me what you're now telling me, I would have voted for it." But, we just didn't want to sell it on that basis. We didn't think that was the proper approach.
Somebody said. It was in a couple of newspaper commentaries just before the election and afterwards that a lot of chamber leaders were behind consolidation as the idea of consolidation, but, once you went to the open meetings and the district representation and the anti-discrimination devices, that a lot of people in the chamber got cold feet, and, in point of fact, a lot of the powers in the chamber actively opposed the charter. Perhaps because they saw some of their influence…Perhaps they had been able to get people elected that they had influence with, and they were afraid maybe that the types of people who would be elected by district representation would not take their influence.
I think there's some validity in what you're saying. I think, to a large
extent, in Charlotte and Mecklenburg County, there are some noblesse
oblige, that some people feel they are born to be
Somebody's also said that this campaign, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg campaign, was handled differently from that, say, in Jacksonville. Apparently what they did in Jacksonville was to get the commitment of the leadership and to get the war chest up before they actually put the charter down on paper, so they had the commitment and they had the funds to wage the campaign before they actually wrote the charter.
Jacksonville did do it better than we did, but, if I remember correctly,
this was their second approach, and this was our first approach. Also,
we started out very idealistically that we would have these open
hearings and we would let everybody be heard, and we would come up with
the very best answers we could to the questions. That we would not have
any preconceived answers. I think theoretically we were right. I think
practically we were wrong from the standpoint of getting it done. Had we
gotten it done, we would have had an ideal situation and an ideal
government. You realize as you go through life you don't get things
perfect. You start with them imperfect and, then, improve them as you go
along. I say today that now, if I had it to do over again, I would
respectfully say that we just abolish the city government of Charlotte
Any chance for that?
I think there is some chance of that in the near future, yes.
One thing I'm wondering about. I see the argument for efficiency and providing services and whatnot and the idea of the bread representation and groups perhaps not presently represented in the government having a voice through district representation and whatnot. That sounds, as you say, very idealistic and humanitarian. Now, a power structure generally does not, the influential group generally does not divulge itself of some of its power willingly. What brought some of you folks to want to, perhaps, to spread some of the representation and the power?
Well, I think we had some very fine, very able men such as Jones Pharr, such as Cliff Cameron, and men of this caliber, who came up the hard way. Yet, they were broad of mind and broad of thought and well-educated, and they realized, in the final analysis, that only the strong can afford to be kind and fair and understanding. They realized, from their own business experience, that, when you give people input into something, you don't make something weaker. You make something stronger. After studying it carefully, they came up with this was the proper way to do it, not to do it halfway or halfheartedly or just get it through, but get it through right. I don't think they were wrong in what they tried to do at all. I think they were right. I think it was the fact that people were not working with their minds. They were working with their emotions. I think history will prove them right. I just don't think we got it as quickly as we could have gotten it otherwise, had we pursued it on a different basis.
Was there any crisis, sort of, in government that sort of prompted the
push towards consolidation? I remember reading in the Observer… The chamber had brought up the discussion of
consolidation somewhere '62 or '63 somewhere program of work in there
for that year. There were several comments in the paper from the mayor
and other people that "This
I think there were a good many things. I think some other communities had
done it. I think this was part of it. I think the fact that we'd put
schools together was part of it. I think that we were studying, putting
together and did later put together, the police departments. I think
this was part of it. I think a few people who were thinking and being
active in government in various ways, whether as elective candidates or
on boards, saw that there's bound to be a certain amount of buck-passing
where you have two bodies who are overlapping. I think they could see
the difference in the planning, whether it be water and sewer, whether
it be schools, whether it be police departments, or whether it be such
things as even the dog pound. We've got two different dog pounds in
Charlotte and Mecklenburg County, and it gets right jackassy sometimes.
You don't get this done until you do sit down and face it. It's very
easy, for instance, somebody calls me up and talks to me from now until
ten o'clock, and says, "Now, what can you do about my zoning?" I say,
"I'm on the county commission. You're in the city. I don't have anything
to do with it." Well, as far as I'm concerned, that's taken care of it,
but, as far as they're concerned, they've wasted an hour and nothing's
been accomplished. I think these were probably the things that triggered
it. I don't really think it was wasted. Let me say that to you very
strongly and very quickly. I think this was something necessary. It's
kind of like you decide to have a good football team. Well, you hire a
coach. You begin to recruit players. You begin to get a better schedule.
That doesn't mean you have a winning season, but, in a few years, then,
you hope to turn it around and have a winning program. I think this was
something we had to go through.
I see something here. You said you think it will be a while before they try again. Not long after the consolidation defeat, annexing all this territory out here. Is that almost, sort of, the same sort of thing. I mean, annex a great deal. Push the functional consolidation. Is this all sort of leading in the same direction?
Hopefully it will. Annexation is not the same thing as consolidation,
though, because annexation takes care of the people who you've taken
into the city, but it doesn't take care of the people who are outside
the city, and it still doesn't do away with overlapping. For instance, I
live in the city of Charlotte. I'm accountable one to the city of
Charlette; two, I'm accountable to the Mecklenburg County commissioners.
Well, if we had consolidated government, there would be one group. I
would be taxed for services in regard to what services I actually
received, whether I lived in the city, whether I lived in the perimeter,
or whether I lived out in a rural area or one of the small towns. The
thing that was very difficult to get over, and it's still difficult to
get over to people in the perimeter, to people in the rural areas and
the small towns…They think the city of Charlette is going to come out
there and gobble them up. They don't realize they would have exactly the
same relationship to consolidated government that they now have to the
county commission. This is a difficult point to get across to them. When
I was chairman of the county commissioners, the mayor of Davidson would
call me and say, "We don't have a very good police force. We want you to
do something more about police up here." I would say, "Under
consolidation, we can do more." And, he'd say, "Oh, I don't want
consolidation. I just want you to give us some money so we can have a
better police force." We never really quite had a meeting of the minds
because his mind was closed. He was asking for something that he didn't
really understand what he
You think there are a lot of, there's an antagonism between a lot of the people who live in the county and the city government or leadership or chamber? Or, is it just sort of small town versus the big city?
Well, it's a strange conflict. It really is. If you go out in rural
Mecklenburg, and it's hard to find rural Mecklenburg today, and the
small towns and you talk to them, they will tell you quickly that they
love their life and their way of doing. It's slower, and they don't want
anything out of Charlotte. They don't need it and so forth. And, yet,
you talk to those same people and you say, "Well, let me ask you a
question. Say, what would you be doing if their was no Charlotte?"
They'd think a bit and say, "I don't know." I say, "Well, let me tell
you. You'd still be raising corn or cotton or wheat or or cattle
whatnot, because you'd be in a rural area. While you don't like the city
of Charlotte, you have a very pleasant problem. The $50 an acre farm
land that your father or grandfather or your greatgrandfather bought and
raised cotton on is now becoming urban land worth a thousand, two
thousand, three thousand, five thousand dollars an acre. Sure, you can't
farm it and pay taxes on it, but you have a pleasant problem. Do you
sell off all of it, do you sell off part of it. If you want to farm, you
have to go
So, you see it more as sort of the general problem of a growing area, not necessarily something that the city government or some of the city interests have done specifically? I've heard some complaints about the perimeter zoning, and, of course, there was the big todo about the water and sewer and some other things.
That's part of it, sure, human nature being what it is. Let me put it in this perspective for you. The pattern of human nature is, one, reluctance to accept change, finally accepting it, and, in the final analysis, embracing it. This is true of all of us. I mean, when I was a boy, I didn't want to wear shoes. Well, I got a little older and I got interested in girls and I wanted to wear shoes. Then, I wanted more shoes. And, then, I wanted them polished, then, I wanted to be in style. This is what you do in life. You change as you go along. It's a slow process. It's a gradual process. It's a process of evolution, not revolution, in my judgment.
Let me ask you this. You have supported consolidation all along?
Right.
You were on the chamber committee there in '68 that first studied it before the actual commission was established, and you've always been a strong Democrat.
Right.
Now, apparently
This had a great deal to do with it. There's an old saying in polities, and there's a lot to it. People don't always come out when they're for something, but they sure as hell come out when they're against something. People were mad, and they were upset. They were just striking back. Not only did we have a "no" vote on consolidation, we needed a new courthouse. We tried to spell that out very carefully, and we couldn't get anything on that.
There seemed to be a period there. They got the civic center bond issue in '69, but there were several school board members defeated, some of the county commission incumbants defeated, the reereation tax went down, four or five issues in the bond issue voted down. Did this indicate some lack of confidence in the leadership or sort of a general protest feeling? Were there some specific things there, or just sort of a general?
Just a general feeling that the government and times and leaders and
conditions were not in tune with what people wanted, the majority of the
people. As I used to tell my black friends, and there's a lot of truth
in this, if you can't oppress the minority, you sure as hell can't
oppress the majority. The majority, rightly or wrongly, felt they had
been oppressed. I don't think they had actually been oppressed, but I
think they felt they had. Consequently, they were against anything. Let
me use myself as an example and not talk about somebody else. I had been
as you said appointed to the county commission, and next time I had run
and been elcted and was chairman. Then, I didn't run for two terms.
Then, I ran again and was elected and was chairman. Then, about '69 or
'70, I ran again. I thought I had done my best work and been most
effective, and, yet, I barely got elected. I ran fifth, and I'd always
run first or second. It was simply
I agree. To get off just a little bit…This idea about if you stay in long enough, you're going to make some enemies… There seemed to be a decision made to make a rather thorough overhaul of the whole governmental system, not just a fairly simple combination…Not really that it would be simple, but a simpler method, a less thorough-going change. The decision was made to go to the thorough-going change, and, as someone said, everytime you study this one department and maybe recommend some changes, you're splitting the department by it. There will be some who are for the changes, there will be some who are opposed to the changes. It seems, perhaps, by making such a thorough-going shift in the administration of the government, that this increased the potential number of those who would oppose the charter, maybe in the fire department or in the police.
I agree with this. I think the more changes you make in anything the more
difficult it is to get it across. I don't think there's any question
about that. I think if we had simply said that we're going to do away
with the city of Charlotte's government, and the Mecklenburg County
commissioners will now be over Charlotte and Mecklenburg County, and
anybody who's now on the city council who wants to be in government will
simply run for Mecklenburg County commissioners, I think we would have
stood a much better chance of getting it across. But, it wouldn't have
been as bold or as fair as imagenstive or as representative a government
as what they tried to produce. I'm proud of what they tried to do. I'm
sorry we didn't get it across. Maybe, in looking back, we'd have been
wiser in taking a very simple step and then
Do you think that, by going so far, then, that they alienated some of those who maybe initially supported at least the idea? Some of the chamber types or some of the business?
They did. Very definitely. But, you know, it's a very funny thing. I was calling back to some of those people and said, "Alright, you didn't like this. How about let's just go in to city council and ask them to simply do away with their charter, and let's just have consolidated government on the basis that you want it." At first they'd say, "Yeah, that's fine. Let's do it." Then, they'd think a little bit, and they'd say, "But, wait a minute. The people voted two and a half to one against it. Maybe we ought to listen to the people." So, I don't know whether that was really it or whether they were using that as an excuse. You know, a lot of times, people will tell you one thing, then they will give you their reason, but it's not their real reason as to why they did it. I'm not sure if we'd have won even if we'd had everything going for us. We might have. We'd have come closer, but I'm not sure we would have.
Let me ask you this, now. You've implied, stated it, in fact, and other
people have commented on this, that it seems that the opposition got the
better part of the emotional issue. Perhaps, to some extent, the pro
forces, the for forces, preached the economy, the efficiency, the more
representative, the more equitable government. Fairly logical arguments.
Only to get hit over the head by all this talk about "ward-heelers" and
"going back to the ward system" which seemed to be, perhaps, code words
for saying "there are going to be more blacks and maybe more poor whites
in government and we don't want that". It seems that the opposition,
then, got up…As you were saying, it's much easier to got people to go to
vote against, or people are more likely to go to vote against than to
vote for. You think that's a… Was there anything that the supporters
could have used as an
I think we could have, looking back. I don't know. Maybe we should have. Maybe we should have been direct and blunt, even though it would have dismayed some of our followers, and said, "Look, if you all sit here and do what we're talking about or you're talking about doing, you're going to defeat this. But, one day, you're going to look up, and you're going to have practically an all black center city. The whites are going to have moved out. Your tax base has eroded. You're going to have blacks running the government. The whites are going to be gone. We're going to be in the suburbs. They're going to be in the city. Is this what you really want? Do you want Charlotte to be another Atlanta?" I think maybe if we had presented it on this basis, maybe we'd have had a lot of support and a lot of understanding that we didn't have. Maybe we should have said this, in looking back, even though I thought at the time and so did the people who were with us that this was the wrong way to sell it. But, maybe it wasn't. Maybe it was the right way to sell it. Maybe the truth would have been the thing to have told. We would have come a whole lot closer, and we might have won.
You see that as a possibility for the City of Charlotte, then? Is that one reason why the city has pursued the annexation policies? Because they…
I don't think there's any question about it. That's one of the answers
for the city, but anybody who studies a living thing, and a city must be
a living thing, understands that it must grow. It's a beautiful theory
that you draw a circle around something and say that's it. Everybody
that's in there we care about, but anybody outside we don't care. Let me
give you an ilustration of that. I was sitting on the county commission
one day with another Democrat and three Republicans. One of the
Republicans was the chairman. He made the statement, "Dern this thing of
growing. We don't want to be the biggest city in the South. We want to
be the finest city between Concord and Gastonia. We
Let me ask. What sort of…I'm looking at my watch. We've been talking a while. Do you have…
I'm all right.
I don't want to take too much time. What was the position in the black community? I know that there was a major force for, and the black precincts seemed to vote…Those who voted, in other words, voted for consolidation. Maybe there were a lot of folks who just didn't vote. There were blacks who were for, and there were blacks who were opposed. What was the…
Most blacks were for it. There was some indifference, of course. But, the
blacks who voted were predominantly for it. The blacks are no different
than the whites. If they feel they've got a stake in something, they're
for it. If they don't see where it's going to be much good for them or
much change in their benefit, then they don't care. The informed blacks
came out. The informed blacks voted quite heavily for it. The blacks who
were not informed or didn't care, why, they didn't come out.
Why?
The blacks saw a chance for them to get something that they didn't have. More of their people on representative government bodies where they could and should have been. When they saw this, then, they said, "Fine. This is to our advantage. Let's be for it."
Did the fact that Mr. Alexander was for it…Did that automatically been that there were some others against it because they were dissatisfied.
To some extent, this is true. Fred Alexander is an honorable and able man, and he has a strong and a good following in the black community and gets elected. But, he is getting older, and you always have, as a man gets older, some young turks or bulls coming along who want to say "He has been alright, but times are changing, and he has not changed. We have got to change. What we need is new ideas and new leadership and a different prespective." Yes. There was some of this, but, predominantly, he did a good job of leading his people in the right direction and in getting their support and getting their vote. But, there was some of this. There was no question about it.
Along that same line, in a lot of the referenda on the various bond issues concerning, perhaps, urban renewal, civic center, the sales tax, not really the sales tax, in some school board elections and whatnot seems to be a fairly strong bloe, at least on occasions, of Southeastern precincts and black precincts. Was one idea behind consolidation to extend this voting strength to the county level in any way? Not only, in other words, were a lot of whites moving into the suburbs, but there were a lot of white areas that had opposed the civic center, had opposed the sales tax, had opposed liquor-by-the-drink. They were raising hell about the public housing. In other words, to some extent, challenging the leadership programs.
No question about it. You have seen a change. I remember
I guess really, in a way, what I'm asking is is there a sort of class or economic base for this protest. You've get, to some extent, upper-class precinots in the Southeast who are to some extent, using, they're benefitting, but to some extent they're using the black vote to achieve to some extent what they want ever the protest and over the opposition, often, of a lot of the middle-class and lower-class whites. Do you see a breakdown like that?
Well, politics does make strange bed fellows. There's no question about
it. An election will come up, and I'll go out to work for something
generally. I very seldom work against anything. I will see certain
groups that are with me. Well, maybe the time before they were agin me.
It just so happens that maybe this one they're for me on
liquor-by-the-drink. Maybe on consolidation
You say it's more issue-oriented, shifting coalitions and factions more than a sort of continuing…
This is absolutely right, and anybody that thinks that they've got somebody in their pocket, and they'll always vote for them, they're kidding themselves. People are learning every day to study it and say "What's in this for me and my group?" If there's something in there for them, they're for it, and, if not, they're against it. We're seeing this right now. They've been talking about building down the creek here, and making nice shops and all. It's surprising the people who come out against it, and many of the people who come out against it you thought would have been for it, but they're shifting. They're getting with some of the blacks and saying there are better places. There are higher priorities for our money. Maybe they're right. I think this is good. I think it's healthy. You know, they say the smartest man, you know is your tailer because he takes your measurements anew every time you meet. A lot of people forget this. They want to keep on building by the same old pattern.
Let me ask you this sort of to change a little bit. We've talked about
sort of this mood of protest especially in connection with the school
busing and some other things. A sort of general mood of sort of
pessimism or something. Sort of anti just about everything. Was any of
this just sort of the city's just getting so big, look at all these
hamburger stands and whatnot, and we've got these topless bars, and
we've got a drug problem in school. Things are just getting too big and
too complicated.
[END OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]
[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE B]
in a persons mind. I get right amused, and I watch it myself. I watch
this program, "The Waltons". Well, everybody likes to watch the Waltons
because this was a simple time, problems were relatively simple, and
solutions were relatively simple. This is a beautiful theory. We can all
go back and live in the country. We can all live well and be one big
happy family, and so forth. But, if you go out in the country today and
live, for the most part, around Charlotte, there's not any country
anymore. You run into exactly the same problems that you run into in the
city of Charlotte. I tried it. I went out sixteen miles from Charlotte
and lived. I found the trucks kept me awake all night worse than
anything in the city of Charlotte. I found people came out there and
stole just like they did in the city. I found just as many problems or
more than I did in the city of Charlotte. So, I moved back to the city
of Charlotte. I think this is a dream that's in everybody's mind. When
you actually get there, I don't you find this to be a fact. I think
people realize this. You've just simply got a new day and age. I
remember when I was a boy, they used to shut up all the small towns, and
everybody would go to the baseball games. Well, that was great, and you
went to the movie, and you went swimming, and that was about it. Well,
golly Moses, you've got your pick of many things today, and things are
faster. You don't get as much time to sit down and visit and see your
friends. There's no question about it. There's a much faster pace. It
doesn't make any difference where you live, a little town, the country,
a fringe area, or in the city proper, you've still got exactly the same
problems. I get right amused. These mayors come in from the small towns,
and the first thing they want to talk about is federal grants and police
protection and how do we get more water and sewer and we need more
revenue. They've got exactly the same problems that the big cities have.
You can't go anywhere
Up there in Cornelius and all up there they've got right much of a water and facilities…
The funny thing about it. Cornelius, Davidson, and Huntersville are now talking about those three cities consolidating. I've wanted so badly to go up there and say, "Why do you all want to consolidate? You've been so strong against it, why are you for it?" They are going to give me exactly the same reasons that we used on them as to why they should have consolidation of city and county government. There's strength in it. Why do a band of sheep get together? Why do quail get together at night?
And, yet, during the campaign, it was "Rescue us from the jaws of death!"
This is absolutely right. This is absolutely right. People fear something that 's new. It's like I go to the table and my wife's got a dish there, and I say, "What's this?" And, she says, "Eat it. You'll like it." I say, "No. Tell me what it is. I've never eaten that. I'm sure I won't like it." But, many times, if I try it, I find out I do like it and it's good for me. It's that old human nature. I don't want any part of something I don't know anything about. It's kind of like you get a little older and you want to be with your old friends. You don't want to meet somebody new. You don't want to get into a new situation. But, you find out many times you meet them and you like them. Maybe you like them better than some of your old ones. Maybe it's better for you. Stimulates you. This is the pattern of human behavior.
You think that may have been a factor, then, in voting against the charter? Not only were they not really quite sure, maybe, what type of government the charter would produce but this sort of "life is getting so complex in the city, and it would be so nice if it were simple again"? You think that was a reason?
I think this is definitely…I think we all search for utopia. I don't
think there's any question about it. I talked to an old
Well, let me…There is one more thing. Was there anything as a reason for consolidation that had to do with this idea of sort of catching Atlanta and staying ahead of Winston-Salem and Greensboro? They're growing, they're doing this. They're growing, they're doing this. I mean not just, say, look at the problems and want to try to avoid some of the problems that they're having, but in this sort of rivalry to stay ahead and be the largest and be the best or to have this, something that they don't have, or to do something that they don't have.
I don't think really it was. Some person or group might have had that as
an idea, but I think really what they had in mind was that anybody or
any group that's progressive looks around. And, if you see somebody else
doing something that's better than the way you're doing it, you try to
figure out how to do that. I remember years ago I tried to play
football. We used to have what we called three yards and a cloud of
dust. Then, I remember, Jim Lelane came along at Carolina, and he opened
up the game with his passing. Teams all over the country, then, started
passing, and the pros went to it. You see some running, as they say, to
keep them honest, but primarily they're trying to play a wide-open game
and, as they, score a point a minute and so on. I think this is what it
was rather than trying to stay ahead of Atlanta or Winston. It was
simply saying here's a new vehicle and a better way to do this thing.
Let's
Who, then…The chamber was, at best, reluctant, and a lot of the chamber was, in the end, opposed. The small towns were opposed. A lot of the white people in town were either opposed or, at best, sort of luke-warm. Who, in the end, really carried the ball for the…
For it? There weren't a whole lot of people. The blacks were for it. Some
thinking whites were for it. Some leadership of the chamber was for it.
That was about it. We were very fortunate to get as large a pro vote as
we did. I think we got beat, if I remember correctly, about two and a
half to one. Looking back, I tried to figure where the vote came from
because practically everybody I saw was against it because they were all
thinking in small terms. They weren't looking at the large picture. Some
school member said, "I don't like what they're saying about the school
board." Some white would say "I don't like district representation."
Somebody in the rural area would say, "I don't want to pay for the city
of Charlotte's playthings like the coliseum and auditorium." The man out
in the little town area he would say, "I don't want any part of
Charlotte." So, really, we didn't get too much from anybody. We were
just lucky to get the vote we got.
Tell you the truth, I don't know…I think we've covered most of the things…
Well, let me take about thirty seconds if I may. In looking back on
consolidation, the theory was right. There were two things. One, you
don't generally win it on the first time. The second thing was we did
try to do too much at one time if we were going to win it the first
time. But, I think we were right in what we did because we laid a good
foundation. Anybody that talks or sells consolidation in the future has
You think that will probably be several years before…
It will be some time, yet, because you've got to get a new crowd, and you've got to get a new feeling about something. There's no use to bring something right back up after it's defeated. That's foolish. You wait a while, and you get a new crop, and you get a new feeling, and you get new leadership, and you get a new spirit, and somebody else says, "Yeah, I think it can be done!" That's the only way that progress is made. You don't take the same old were-out ideas and horses and the same old vehicle and get it done. You get new ones, but you build on that. It wasn't in vain. I don't feel that at all.
Some of the proposals, or, at least, some of the studies have been used as basis for implementing some new programs and whatnot.
This is absolutely right, and you're seeing a consolidation going on
piecemeal now. It's working toward consolidation. There's no question
about it, and anybody who would sit down
I appreciate your talking to me.
I appreciate your coming by.
I'll send you a copy of this.
You're very kind.
Any corrections or whatever you want to make in it.
No problem. I just hope it'll be of some help.
I'm sure it will.
END OF INTERVIEW