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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
G-0029-4, in the Southern Oral History Program Collection #4007,
Southern Historical Collection, The Wilson Library,
University of
North Carolina at Chapel Hill”
Guion Griffis Johnson was a sociologist actively involved in race, poverty, and gender issues. In this interview (the final part of a four-part series), she discusses her work with the Georgia Conference on Social Welfare during the mid-1940s and her involvement in the civil rights movement and the women's movement of the 1960s and 1970s in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. Johnson went to work as the executive secretary of the Georgia Conference on Social Welfare in Atlanta in 1944 when her husband, Guy B. Johnson, became the first director of the Southern Regional Council. She describes the condition of the Georgia Conference when she assumed control over it, noting the divisions on its board over public welfare versus private welfare. Johnson helped to get the Georgia Conference back on its feet by raising funds and promoting awareness of poverty-related social issues throughout Georgia. She discusses in detail her effort to establish a juvenile court in Albany, the interracial dynamics of the Georgia Conference, and the impact of the Eugene Talmadge political machine on the Conference's efforts. In addition, Johnson explains her thoughts on the merits of gradual change for race relations (advocated by her husband and the Southern Regional Council) and more direct action, which she pursued in establishing a child care center for African Americans in Chapel Hill. During the 1960s, Johnson was active in various women's organizations and was a forerunner in the work of the North Carolina Commission on the Status of Women. She describes her thoughts on the Equal Rights Amendment, her political connections and activities, and her thoughts on the student sit-in movement. Johnson concludes the interview by asserting her belief that it was time for black leadership to take a more dominant role in the civil rights movement by the 1960s.
Southern sociologist Guion Griffis Johnson describes her work with the Georgia Conference on Social Welfare during the 1940s and her involvement with the women's movement and civil rights activism during the 1960s and 1970s in North Carolina. She discusses strategies for effecting change, the achievements of the Georgia Conference in promoting awareness of social welfare and race-related issues, and the progress of women and African Americans in their struggle for equality.
[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]
When we talked before, we got to right where you were going to Atlanta.
Oh yes.
So, I wanted to spend a little time talking about when you were there, if that's all right.
Yes.
You said that . . . I asked about your initial involvement with the Georgia Council, the Georgia Conference on Social Welfare. And you said that Mrs. Tilly came and . . .
Yes, Mrs. M.E. Tilly . . .
. . . and asked you to . . .
And asked me to take the job and I said that I would take it tentatively, to see how Edward adjusted, because he was uprooted from the school and from his friends here. We lived in a neighborhood of children about his age, and he was extremely happy here. And our yard was the playground for the neighborhood. Here he was isolated and didn't know any children his age and I didn't want the change to be too traumatic. I think that I told you that our older son, Benny, refused to go to Atlanta.
No, you didn't. How old was he then?
Benny was fifteen. He said, "I went to New York with you. I went
to Chicago with you . . . (when he was in the second grade) . . . I went
to New Haven with you. I went to New York with you, but I am not going
to
Well, you were saying that Benny stayed here and . . .
Yes, and went to school. And Edward and Guy and I went to Atlanta. Of
course, Guy went in January. I did not get to leave until August,
because I was teaching in the V-12 program and could not get released
until that time. Mrs. Tilly asked me about December if I would take this
position and it was not until February that I finally decided that I
would and on a half time basis. Again, to be able to give reinforcement
to Edward at home until he found some friends. And after about three
months, I found that he was well adjusted and then I worked full time.
And very much enjoyed the work. I edited the magazine for the
Conference, called Georgia Welfare, which was a small
magazine giving general information about the area of social welfare,
chiefly as it pertained to Georgia. I was able to get excellent writers.
The members wrote short essays for me and other leaders in national
welfare work [contributed]. So that I felt that it was rather
interesting. Then, we decided as a policy to go out into the communities
to explain the field of social welfare, in the cities and rural areas as
well. And to set up a series of meetings on community council
activities, how a community
How long had the program been set up before you came to work?
Well, the Conference, the Georgia Conference on Social Welfare, was an old organization. I don't recall just when it was organized, but it was in full swing when I arrived. I did not know at the time that I took the position that the convention the previous year had resulted in a fight between private welfare and public welfare.
I was going to ask you about that.
Yes, this was one of the chief problems with which I had to cope: The
conflict between private and public welfare. The organization had been
set up by private welfare and had been dominated by private welfare
agencies: Family Service Society, Child Welfare and the Red Cross and
all the other private welfare agencies, although, of course, Red Cross
is somewhat public related, and yet its funds are private and,
basically, Red Cross considered itself to be a private agency. But
during the thirties, when public welfare became established and money
began to pour into Georgia from the national agencies, public welfare
became stronger and stronger and yet the private welfare leaders would
not permit any public welfare [personnel] to have any office in the
Conference on Social Welfare. And the public welfare people had decided
to overwhelm the Conference and had done so and elected a public welfare
person, Lucille Wilson, as president of the Conference. Whereupon, the
executive secretary had resigned in protest. Stories had been splashed
across the head of the Atlanta Constitution and the
Journal and in all the other papers of the state.
It was almost a riot, the convention was. And this is the situation into
which I walked, without knowing anything about it.
You said that Miss Wilson came with Mrs. Tilly to ask you . . .
No. Well, she did later. Mrs. Tilly approached me alone first,
Now, what did they know about you?
Well, of course, they knew Guy, because Mrs. Tilly had been a leader in the race relations movement in Georgia for years.
You said that she had been doing a lot of the work that Jesse Daniel Ames . . .
Well, she had been working with Jesse Daniel Ames and she knew the southern women, because she held office in the Woman's Society of Christian Service of the Methodist Church. She held a state office and then a Southeastern Jurisdiction office. And, therefore, she set up many, many conferences through the South. She was the one who actually did the leg work for the old Woman's — I don't remember the official title of the group of women who organized for the prevention of lynching — Southern Women for the Prevention of Lynching perhaps, but that name still doesn't seem quite right.
The Association of Southern Women for . . .
Yes, something like that. And she would . . . I have seen her sit down
with a stack of postal cards and her list of names when she would hear
of something that needed to be done, and send out hundreds of cards to
key women in the South. And she used her own funds. She and Mr. Tilly
had no children and he was very much in favor of all the work that Mrs.
Tilly was doing. And they used their own funds for telephone calls when
a threat of lynching occurred. Mrs. Tilly was a sweet little southern
woman with a soft voice, small features, and she dressed like a belle.
In fact, she said to me that she disapproved of my severe clothes, my
tailored clothes, She said, "When you go out to do battle, you
must dress for the occasion." So, she wore frilly hats with
flowers and lace on them and frilly dresses and always with white
gloves, and she was accepted by the sheriffs and the commissioners
and
What was his position, Mr. Tilly?
I think he was in insurance. I'm not quite sure about this, but I think that he was in insurance.
Was she from an old southern family?
Yes, her father was a Methodist minister. And it was from his teachings and her readings of the Methodist literature that she became a liberal. I went, as part of my chore on the Myrdal study, I went through all the early records of the Protestant demoninations at the office of the National Council of Churches in New York, to determine the policy statements on social issues. And I came out of that research convinced that the Methodist Church had the most liberal philosophy of any of the churches. Their Book of Discipline, which is the Bible for the Methodist Church,[is] extremely liberal. The Congregational Christian Church was the only one that came closest to . . . and it was for that reason that Guy and I came back from New York determined to break our affiliation with the Baptist Church and join the Methodist Church.
I see, so you were not brought up a Methodist?
No, I was brought up a Baptist. Although my grandfather had helped establish both a Baptist Church and a Methodist Church, one on one corner and the other on the next in the little town where I was born, Wolfe City, Texas. And my grandfather attended both the Methodist and the Baptist Church. But he was a deacon in the Baptist Church and so I always considered myself a Baptist.
Was Guy a Baptist?
Yes.
But the interpretation of the Book of Discipline in the South at that time wasn't always . . .
Oh yes, this was the conflict that we had in Georgia.
[END OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]
[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE B]
. . . leaders in social welfare, mostly professionals. Mrs. Tilly was the only non-professional member on the Board. And the private welfare people dominated . . .
Although by this time public welfare people were on there as well?
Yes. At least they had the presidency. And I asked Miss Wilson to call a
meeting and said, "May I get out the notices?" and
"May I telephone the Board members?" Most of them
lived in Atlanta, but some were outside. And she agreed, we set the
time, called a meeting and I said, "I have been going through
the files and I see that there was a controversy. I stopped reading the
files because I wanted to hear from you as to the nature of the
controversy. I was confused as to the nature of it and I would like for
you to tell me what the trouble is." I did not get any
information from the Board members. They engaged in a great deal of
double talk. And finally they said, "We will support you in
anything that you want to do. You will have a free hand to operate this
office in the way that you think
How did the legislature fit into this? Were you involved in getting funds?
The legislature was not at all involved.
It was federal money?
Federal money being used for public welfare. The Georgia Conference on Social Welfare was itself a private agency, you see, supported by contributions from the members and by donations from industry. So that one of my chores was to raise the budget, but since I had some past experience in money raising, it was not any great problem to me. I involved the members of the Board in helping.
But you were going primarily to private agencies to get the money?
I wrote to the members and asked the members to pay their membership fees
and to make an additional contribution, if they found it possible to do
so. And then I telephoned prominent businessmen, like Dick Rich and Hal
Dumas of Southern Bell and various liberal-minded businessmen and
industrialist, bankers, and went to see them and asked for
contributions. Mrs. McGeachin from the big life insurance company (I
have forgotten the name of it. It was founded basically for blacks, but
it was white owned) gave me the . . . (Next to the North Carolina Mutual
Life Insurance Company, it was the largest life insurance company in the
country which sold life insurance to blacks and)
Now, what was her position?
She was chairman of the board of the insurance company.
Is she still around?
No, she was elderly at that time and I think that she died a year or two
afterwards. I picked up the telephone to call Mr. Dumas, who was one of
the leaders in shaping politics in Georgia, and I dialed his number and
he answered his telephone and I said, "Could I speak to Mr.
Dumas?" and he said, "This is Hal Dumas
speaking." I said, "What are you doing answering your
own telephone? An important person like you ought to have a secretary
answering." He said, "Who are you?" I told
him who I was and I said, "I want to come to see you. When may
I do so?" He said, "Anybody who can talk to me like
that can come to see me this minute." So, I went to see him
immediately. His office was just around the corner from our office on
Pryor Street and we had a wonderful little visit. He knew Bill Prince,
* who was the illustrator in Chapel
Hill, he had known Bill and Lillian Prince for quite well, and was
delighted that we knew so many people here in Chapel Hill [with whom he
was acquainted.] * William Meade Prince, the author of The Southern
Part of Heaven.
Now, was the Board interracial, was the membership interracial?
The Board was not interracial until '47. I asked that it be
And had been?
Yes, and had been long before I arrived. Yes. Because the social workers and health people were all rather liberal in Georgia.
And were they going to liberal organizations as well as . . .
Yes, yes, they were.
I mean, well, Dumas and Rich, they . . .
They were members of the planning council, the Social Planning Council, which had been organized for quite sometime before we arrived in Atlanta. It was the great liberalizing force. Mrs. Tilly often said to me, "We could not do in Georgia the things that we are doing, if it had not been for the Social Planning Council." She said," I have sat on the board of the Social Planning Council and I have seen men like Hal Dumas and Dick Rich and Mr. Black from Citizens Southern Bank come in saying that no poor person deserved anything. That he was poor because he didn't have the guts to go out and work. He was lazy and he was poor because he was lazy. And I have seen in a year's time the discussions on that board and these men changing their attitudes. No one forced them to change, but facts were brought out which led them gradually to see the reasons for poverty."
And this was the first year that you were sitting on the Board that you saw this change?
Yes, she said, "In one year's time, I saw this change in men who had been considered to be extremely conservative and anti-welfare."
Now, what were the facts and who was bringing them?
The Board was usually, now this was the Social Planning Council I'm
talking about, the Board was usually composed of eighteen or twenty
This was the Atlanta community, or statewide?
No, this was the Atlanta community. And the rest of the members of the Board were social workers and then they had various established committies, housing and . . .
Now, is this where you worked with the roads, the expressways, Grady Hospital?
Yes, it was through the Social Planning Council.
But this was separate and distinct from . . .
Yes, from the Georgia Conference on Social Welfare. It was only when I was recognized as the director of a private welfare agency . . .
That you [were] asked to sit on the Board . . .
That I was then accepted by all the agencies and was put on boards. We also joined the St. Mark's Methodist Church, which was a very prominent one in Atlanta and I taught the large Sunday School Class, two hundred and fifty women. I did not want to teach this large Sunday School Class. I wanted to teach the high school children, whom I had been teaching in Chapel Hill. And Dr. Lester Rumble, who was pastor of the church at the time, said, "You can't afford not to make this change. Because these are the wives of the men who make the decisions for Georgia. You will have an approach to them that you could never get otherwise. You have to teach this class." And I found that he was right.
Now, was Dr. Rumble on a lot of these . . .
Not at any time, not while we were there.
But he was just saying this to you as advice?
As advice. Because, after all, he knew Georgia and he knew what Guy's
work was and my work and he felt that this would be extremely
Now, what facts were coming . . .
As the chairmen of committies on housing, poverty in general and health would make their reports, they would point out the needs in the community. Unpaved streets within a block of the capitol, which was a slum area of the black population. The location of Negro families scattered in the core sections of the city, where the old families . . . in Ansley Park for example, on Fifth Street . . . all the old families have moved from Fifth, but at that time, there were still Negro cabins in the backyards.
Right behind St. Mark's Methodist Church.
Yes. That's right. Most of these men were not aware of this. Most of them lived out in Buckhead, which was the fashionable suburb of Atlanta at the time. And they were not aware. If they were aware of the unpaved streets and the tumbledown shacks within a block of the capitol, they looked the other way. This had nothing to do with them. But when it was pointed out that a great deal of delinquency came from that area and a great deal of disease came from that area and was carried out into the larger community, then they became concerned.
Well, they weren't two-faced, were they?
No, I don't think that they were. I think that they were simply unaware. Of course, I think that much of their pious remarks were made with tongue in cheek. I think that was true, but, no, I think that they became genuinely aware.
Well, from the rest of your work in the rest of Georgia, was this group in Atlanta that was available and willing to listen and change their minds, were they different from other cities in Georgia?
Of course, I did not know Savannah, or Augusta, or Albany, or Columbus,
or Thomasville as well as I did Atlanta, but we took a group of . . .
At that time, your major aim was to get community councils set up.
Johnson: Or at least bring the attentions of a large group of people in
the large towns to an awareness of the needs of the entire community for
the general welfare, for working together to solve the problems. That
was the main purpose, and if we didn't establish community councils . .
. as a matter of fact, we didn't establish even one community council,
but we were using this as a reason for having conferences and as a mode
for the solution of the problem. You see, once you call attention to the
needs of a community, you must point out several different ways that
these needs could be met. So,modus operandi.
Well, did they know that you had an interracial Board?
I think that most everywhere that we met . . . the first year that we met, we had our conference in Savannah, and Savannah is very conservative, much more so than Augusta, even. There was no objection. We met in the large hotel, the DeSoto Hotel I believe it was, in Savannah and the blacks came and there was no word of objection. We met the next time in . . .
Now, this was in '46?
My first big annual meeting was in '45, then '46, '47. There was no
problem in '45, no problem in '46, but in '47, [Eugene] Talmadge was
running for governor. The meeting was to be held in Atlanta and I had
booked the Biltmore and talked to the manager and made all the
arrangements. Two weeks before the conference, ten manager called me
(Mr. Byrd, called me) and said, "I'm sorry to tell you that you
can't have your conference here. If you do have your conference here,
you will have to tell your black members that they cannot
attend." I said, "I do not think that this would be
acceptable to the Board or to the membership. However, I will consult
with the Board and telephone you promptly." I polled the Board
by telephone and they said, "Of course we will not. We will
just call the conference off and not have it this year. We know that the
Talmadge political gang is stirring up the emotions against the blacks,
so we think that perhaps it would be better not to have a
conference." I said, "Well, you let me see what I can
do, because we already have our speakers lined up. They are coming from
all over the country and I would dislike very much to have to call [such
a leader as] Leonard Mayo and tell him that he can't come and speak. Let
me see if I can find another place in Atlanta." We explored
every place that would be large enough to accomodate about a thousand
participants, because it was a large convention.
They gave that as a reason?
Yes. "We can't afford to. No, I'm sorry, we can't afford
to." Then I went to the pastor of my own church. We had ample
room to accomodate the group discussions and the attendance in the
auditorium (in the sanctuary). And I told him exactly what the situation
was and I said, "What is your thinking?" He said,
"I, as the pastor of this church, am the sole authority for the
use of the building and I say that you may have it." I said,
"I do not want to embarrass you. I would like for you to get
the Board of Stewards to accept. Do you want me to come and speak to the
Board of Stewards and explain the situation to them?" He said,
"No, you let me handle it. I'll talk to various key members on
the Board and I think that it will be all right." And I said,
"How long must I wait?" He said, "Well, we're
meeting in three more days and I'll let you know." They said,
"Certainly. She's the teacher of the Richardson Bible Class. We
cannot deny the teacher of the Richardson Bible Class the use of our
facilities. Certainly. And we will provide them luncheon, too. *" * We declined the offer of luncheon as being too burdensome on
the Church staff.
Well, was the church protected because business interests weren't as important as for a hotel? How did the Talmadge group work?
By pressure.
I mean, what would they have done if you had met at the Biltmore?
Well, you can't meet in the Biltmore if the management says you can't.
I know, but say the management had, what would have been the result?
Pressure would probably have been brought upon the manager and he would have lost his job. It was that simple. And probably no threat had to be made. He knew that this would be the result.
Well, were things that bad all over at that time, I mean, was the Southern Regional Council having a lot of trouble during that period, during that campaign when Talmadge was on the rampage or whatever?
There were those who thought that the Southern Regional Council was having a great deal of trouble. I do not think that anyone on the staff felt that it was a bad situation except Mrs. Tilly. The group moved in, rented the offices just across the hall from . . . The Southern Regional Council had one entire wing of Wesley Memorial Church and there was an area across the hall that was available for renting, and it was rented under . . . I have forgotten the name of the organization, but something innocuous. But Mrs. Tilly, being suspicious, having worked with sheriffs and boards of county commissioners,had known the intricacies of Georgia politics and as the equipment was moving in, she examined the boxes and found Talmadge's name stamped on some of the boxes, and the Klu Klux Klan name stamped on some of the boxes, so that she immediately decided that this group, small group, had been sent in to spy on the Southern Regional Council and to try to get something on them. But nothing came of it. In fact, Guy didn't feel any pressure at all. [at least, he expressed no anxiety.]
Well, the people you were working with, were they in the same line politically as the people who were in the Southern Regional Council?
Some were and some were not.
You had a wider spectrum?
Yes. One of the men * in public welfare
who was head of the state correctional home for boys at Milledgeville,
Georgia, was very much allied with the Talmadge group and might even
have been in the Klu Klux Klan. * William Ireland
Well, were there any people more to the left than you on the . . .
Yes, the treasurer of the Conference was elected in '46 and was, we learned later . . . well, he was not a card carrying member. His wife was a card carrying member of the Communist Party and was a leader in the Communist Party. But he never demonstrated in any of our meetings, nor in any of his behavior that he was a CP. You know, there were some members who were permitted to be members without carrying a card and so, he was in this high category.
Do you remember his name?
Yes, I remember quite well, Floyd Hunter, who later ran on the Progressive ticket against Russell for the United States Senate, and that was when we were quite sure, [about his affiliations] but in the meantime . . .
But you didn't know when he was on the Board that he was?
I was a little suspicious, because sometimes he would come up . . . his
office was . . . he was the director of the Social Planning Council and
he would come up (his office was on second floor and mine was on third)
and
So, you knew him again here?
I knew him. Before he came, I had a telephone call from him in Atlanta. He said, "I have been admitted to the graduate school for a degree in Sociology. Do you have any objection to my coming?"
So, he knew that you knew?
Yes. I said, "Floyd, why would I have any objections to your coming?" And he said, "Well, I'm not coming if you oppose it." I said, "Of course, I'm not going to oppose your coming. You've been admitted by the Graduate School. The Graduate School is the only agency in this university who can stop a person from coming. After all, you must remember that this is the United States of America." He came.
Was he still active when he was here?
I think so. I do not know [as a matter of Fact.] We studiously avoided him, so that I was not aware of his activities. But he was supported by the head of the Sociology Department, who had worked with him in a study of health and welfare conditons in Atlanta. And I do not know whether Gordon Blackwell was aware of his associations in Atlanta or not. I rather expect that he was not aware.
Gordon Blackwell was then head of . . .
Head of the Sociology Department and our neighbor. The only information that I had about his activities [in Chapel Hill] came through the Blackwells and of course, Guy was still on the faculty of the Sociology Department, although Floyd did not take any of Guy's work.
Well, we talked a little bit last time about . . .
[END OF TAPE 1, SIDE B]
[START OF TAPE 2, SIDE A]
Do you want to go on and talk about the Georgia Conference?
Very briefly, I would like to say that permission from the Board of the Council to participate in any community activities that I wanted, that they would consider this to be a part of my routine work, because they felt that by my participating in a great many community activities, I spread the news of the needs of health and welfare in the state. So, I was active in the local council of churches and the Churchwomen United. And in the state council, I went with Mrs. Tilly to set up a series of conferences on social and economic needs throughout the state. And we would take a panel of say, three or four, and visit many places in Georgia.
Now, would you take social workers.
Yes, it would be social workers, economists, professors from Emory. And we would have a panel, and these meetings would usually be held in Methodist Churches, because that was her contact, her entreé. And she would call district meetings of the Woman's Society of Christian Service and these panelists would speak. We would always have some Negro in the group, so that it was bi-racial; and we had no difficulty at all until we arrived in Gainesville, and the pastor of the church, when he saw the panel come in and saw Frankie Adams, who was a social worker in the [Futton County] Department of Public Welfare, went to Mrs. Tilly and said, "You cannot have your meeting here."
Did you leave?
No, Mrs. Tilly said, "My meeting has been scheduled. The Woman's
Society is being called and is coming in from the district. Some of them
are bringing black members with them." In nearly all of these
meetings, the congregation was interracial. "They are bringing
black members with them and I would not embarrass them by telling them
that we could not have the
Meaning the Methodist Church at large.
Right. Then Mrs. Tilly got a copy of the Discipline and found the section that says that the Church is to serve all mankind, both black and white, and encourages local churches to invite black members to their workshops. And we began this meeting with a preliminary statement made by Mrs. Tilly, and there was by that time a rather good audience that had assembled and there were five or six black persons in the group . . .
Now, were these members of local churches? *
* Black members had their own churches and were assigned to the
Central Jurisdiction. There was cooperation across
jurisdictional lines.
Yes, members of local churches.
How did that happen, was it common?
As long as Mrs. Tilly had anything to do with it, all her meetings were bi-racial.
But I mean on the local level, these people . . .
She encouraged members. She visited practically every Methodist Church in the state of Georgia and encouraged spreading the Gospel, this was Home Mission, "You must communicate with the black members."[in the Methodist church].
Now, what was her title?
At this time, she was simply Southeastern [Jurisdictional] Chairman of Christian Social Relations. That was the only title that she had, as far as I know, although she had various [other] responsibilities.
But she was on the Board of the Georgia Conference?
Yes. She was on the Board of the Georgia Conference. And I read from the
Discipline, after she had made her introductory remarks, saying
"This is a meeting sanctioned by the Methodist Church. And I am
going to ask Dr. Johnson to read from the Discipline, which gives us the
sanction to hold this meeting." The pastor of the church was
fuming on the front seat. She said, "After Dr. Johnson has read
from the Discipline, I'm going to ask the very fine pastor
of this wonderful church to lead us in prayer."
What could they do, they were absolutely over a barrel.
We held our meeting, and it was a very good meeting. Excellent
participation and we were talking about social and economic issues
facing the United States with special reference to Georgia. We had a man
from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. There was usually one who came
along with us from the U.S. Bureau of Labor, with the regional office in
Atlanta. And he could cite chapter and verse and make it very
interesting, to show the needs in Georgia. This we did. Then Mrs. Tilly
was instrumental in getting a conference on rural health organized in
Georgia. We had a big conference in, the First Methodist, I believe, in
Atlanta. Very well attended by many people throughout the state, and we
organized the Georgia Rural Health Conference and I was made the
executive secretary of the Conference. So the work was administered from
our office, and we helped with getting through the legislation, getting
through the matching funds for Hill-Burton. It was the implementation of
the Hill-Burton Act. And in that connection, we conferred with Governor
Ellis Arnold as to the best techniques to be used, and he suggested. He
said, "I guarantee you that if you get groups of people coming
here to the public hearings when the debate occurs on the floor, if you
will fill the galleries with people from all over the state, you will
get matching funds passed." Then he turned to some of the
committee members and said, "How many times did you come here
to public hearings to get good roads?" And one of them said,
"A hundred at least." He said, "All right,
come a hundred times for your rural health program and I guarantee you
that you will get it passed." The first session of the
legislature, he got the matching funds established. I also wrote the
publicity in behalf of the bill, because I was trained in journalism
too, so I handled that very easily. All this went out of my office.
Who in Albany came . . .
The Director of the Department of Public Welfare, the county director and
her board supporting her. First, I went to talk to her board. They had a
board meeting to get their support in behalf of a juvenile court. Then,
the pastor of the Presbyterian Church, who was a very popular man in
Albany, and the editor of the newspaper [Mr. McIntosh], who was also
greatly beloved. We got their assistance and got the minister to chair
the meeting to establish it. The city fathers and the county board of
commissioners said that it was against the law to establish the juvenile
court, that if Albany wanted, if the county wanted, a special juvenile
court, a special act of the legislature would have to be passed in order
to get the court set up and that that would take two years. This was in
the winter of '47. I said, "I doubt seriously that this is
true, but I will check with the attorney general and find out."
Eugene Cook was the attorney general at that time and although he was
thought to be a strong Talmadge man, I felt that he would be honest with
me in interpreting the law. I went to see him and talked over the
situation and he said, "There is no reason at all. There is no
law that prevents Albany from having a juvenile court if Albany wants a
juvenile court. All they have to do is to finance it, appropriate the
funds and set up the machinery." I said, "Well, will
you write out an opinion on this for me so that I could have it to read
in Albany?" "Yes,"he said, he would, and he
wrote me a very fine statement. I said, "Will you talk to
anyone by telephone if you are telephoned? Because I have been told that
the superior court judge had talked to you and you had said that it was
against the law." He said, "Oh no, that's not
true." I said, "If he calls you, will you talk to him
and tell him what you have told me?" "Yes,"
he said, "I will." So, we had a large community
meeting in
That's incredible.
So, we ended with the approval of a juvenile court.
It was established.
Yes.
Was it the first one?
No, Macon had a juvenile court and I had been asked to come
Now, were most of the children who were repeaters black?
Most of them were, yes. There were always of course, some whites, because
there were more whites in the population than blacks. But the situation
arose whereby the policemen on the beat, on the corner near my office
building would bring delinquent girls or boys up to me and say,
"Now Dr. Johnson, I want you to do something with this
girl." And I would usually have a conference with her and then
call one of the private agencies, either Family Service or Child Welfare
or if they would not be able to do anything or want to do anything for
the child, then I would call the Social Service Index, which had an
index of all the resources in the community, and by working with the
director, we would make some referal. Of course, this was not my
responsibility, I should not have done any of this, because the
professional social workers would have said that I was exceeding my
jurisdiction, [and] this was bad social work. But I wanted to do
something for
Was this again a power thing so that they could keep control?
Yes. I think so. Well, I think that is all that I will want to say about what was extremely interesting work, and I enjoyed it very much.
Well, did you feel like you were treading a thin line between what you could get through and . . . the interracial aspects of it just really amaze me, that that much was possible at that time.
Oh yes, it was. I have often said, and then the idea was formed in my
mind when I was doing research for Racial Ideology and
then it was confirmed by actual experience on the line in Atlanta, that
in the United States, we were basically far more liberal than our
practice and laws indicated. [In] the basic philosophy of the rights of
man, and the Declaration of Independence, we were committed in founding
our nation to the respect of the individual and the enhancement of the
possibilities of the individual. So here was this basic [political]
philosophy, and the churches reinforce this philosophy. But the power
structure, to use Floyd Hunter's words, the power structure was
constantly intervening, because they felt some threat. The threat of
labor [for example]. If low income people demanded more wages, then the
profits for industry would be less, and all of this [fear] went into
formulating the attitude of the upper classes for the lower classes. I
said that it was failure of leadership at the top, that if the leaders
had been liberal and honest and fair, that the little man who votes
would have gone along and accepted it, because it was part of their
basic philosophy of the
Well, maybe one reason that Atlanta has a fairly good record as far as civil rights is concerned, is because they were blessed with good leaders, more than the rest of the state.
I think that this is true. Yes, I think that.
Not that they have such a perfect record, but a tolerable record.
I Found it so easy to get very liberal programs through. For example, in Albany. Here was this man who had come to break up the meeting and to see to it that no juvenile court was organized in Albany, completely about-facing when attention was called to him. He was praised and called a Christian. Completely about-facing.
Are these the tactics that Mrs. Tilly excelled in?
Oh yes. Yes indeed. She taught me a great deal.
What did she do?
She, in the last year that we were there, I don't recall if it was the
winter of 1947, or the fall of 1946, she came to me and said,
"Now, I no longer have any funds from the Southeastern
Jurisdiction of the Methodist Church to carry on my work." And
she said, "I've used all of Mr. Tilly's funds." She
never referred to him by any other term except "Mr.
Tilly," which was the proper southern way. No woman ever
referred to her husband by his proper name, it was always "Mr.
Tilly," or"Mr. So-and-So." So, she said,
"I cannot ask Mr. Tilly to help me anymore. He's getting old.
He's retired and our retirement income is limited and I simply cannot
ask him to finance my activities anymore. I want to be on the staff of
the Southern Regional Council. Won't you ask Guy? He needs a woman [on
the staff] and since you are not going to serve in that capacity, won't
you ask him to employ me? And I will work for very little. All I want is
just a little money and the privilege of carrying on the work that I
have been doing for so many years." So, I talked to Guy about
it. And Guy said, "Well, I'll think about it. I'll
When did she die?
She died about two years ago. And in the meantime, had had a very serious fall and her health was really very delicate, although she was an amazing person who pushed herself on and on. But she fell and had a very serious hip injury from which she made herself recover enough to walk in a shamble and very, very slowly. And the last time that I saw her was in Atlanta at a Southern Regional Council conference and she was just barely moving along.
But she did . . .
Continue on the staff. Perhaps she resigned the last few months of her life, I've never asked.
Was she very old?
Yes, she was in her eighties. She was probably eighty-five or eighty-six.
Well, that is old.
Yes.
Well, one other question about her work. Now, she had started her work on the Commission for Interracial Cooperation?
Yes. She probably had been on the Board, I'm not sure of that.
And then worked for Association of Southern Women, under Jessie Daniel Ames?
Yes. And as I said, did the leg work for that organization and was the
one who made the contacts. Because, Mrs. Ames had a very limited
contact. She worked chiefly in Atlanta and had a very limited contact
with the [numerous] leaders in the South. She probably knew the men
better than she did the women. And if she had a conference of women, it
was usually women
I see. Well, the Association of Southern Women for the Prevention of Lynching was not an interracial group, as I understand.
No, that's true. It was white women, because it was felt that the problem was with the whites and the whites had the power to prevent a lynching, whereas the blacks did not.
Right. But Mrs. Tilly, the majority of her work was interracial, then.
Yes.
I mean, she followed the CIC on through and then this work she was doing in welfare with you was interracial.
Yes, this is true. Although always she was aware that she could not succeed if the committees she was working with or the groups she was talking to, or the panels that she took to talk to groups of people in Georgia or elsewhere were predominantly Negro. It had to be predominantly white with a token black, or maybe two blacks.
What was her relationship with the black women she was dealing with?
With the black leaders, very good. She worked with Mrs. Martin Luther King, Sr., she worked with the director of the Harriet Tubman branch of the Y. Always, you had a very able black woman who was director of what was called "the Negro group" of the Y, which was located in the Negro community . . . with the social workers, Frankie Adams, for example, in social work. She knew all of the key black women in Atlanta and in Georgia and elsewhere in the South.
And this was the same group of black women that you were mainly in contact with?
Yes.
And was this the same group that the Southern Regional Council worked with?
Yes, for the most part. Yes, this is true.
Well, there was real opposition to the kinds of things that Guy was doing?
Oh yes.
You talked about going to Glenn Memorial and speaking there and . . .
Oh yes, this is true. There was strong opposition. Or Eugene Talmadge would not have been elected governor.
Right. Well, how did it fit together, the opposition and the people who were allied?
I asked a leading social worker in Savannah why it was that most of the influential people in Savannah were supporting Talmadge instead of Carmichael for governor? She said, "I'm going to support Talmadge." I said, "You are? Why?" "For the same reasons that the members of my Board are supporting Talmadge."
Her Board in Savannah?
Yes, her Board in Savannah. She was director of the Department of Public
Welfare. She said, "Because we think that economic stability
will be maintained in Georgia if Talmadge is elected rather than
Carmichael. We do not think that Carmichael has the backing of the
Southern Bell Telephone Company, the Trust Company of Georgia, the
railroad, all the big economic interests, the mills".
(although, you know, I think that Carmichael was a mill owner. I know
that Ellis Arnold was a lawyer for the mill in Newnan.). "And
that is the reason. We think that it is important for Georgia to be
maintained strong economically and we think that we can suffer through a
Talmadge regime without the threat of an economic depression. Remember,
the war is over and we don't know what is going to happen after the war
is over. We may have an economic collapse. And we do not think under
Talmadge it will, and after all, Talmadge is a charitable man. He is a
leader in his church. He is a humanitarian. He is not a wicked man. This
is only a political tactic that he is using to get in. He doesn't hate
Negroes. He has paid for the college
Was his reason economic stability?
Yes.
Now, where did you fit politically? Were you involved in politics? Could you afford to be?
I could not afford to be, and was not very much . . . I would go to small group meetings, closed meetings, and say, "I'm doing this not as Director of the Georgia Conference on Social Welfare, but as Guion Johnson, very much interested in a liberal regime in Georgia and I will give you the names of key leaders and I will help you in that way . . . "
For Carmichael?
Yes, for Carmichael. And I soon found that I knew more key leaders than
the top management in the Carmichael campaign. "I will give you
names of key leaders, but I cannot have any publicity." Then, I
opened the Atlanta Constitution [one morning] and saw
a full page ad with names, oh, at least it looked like a thousand names
endorsing Carmichael, and here was my name in the group. And I had not
been asked permission for my name to be used, and I was very much
distraught, because I did not know what my Board would do. We were not
supposed to engage in politics. I could promote social and economic
issues for the health and welfare of the state, but I could not
participate in any political activity. I did not have one word, none of
them said anything.
Were they supporting him also?
I doubt it. I would guess that most members of my Board were supporting Talmadge. A few spoke outright in his behalf, in Carmichael's behalf, but most of them . . .
Was Carmichael a real liberal?
Probably not. He was not an Ellis Arnold liberal, but he had been chosen by Ellis Arnold to succeed him as the most liberal of the potential candidates. He had very little political experience, I think. That's my recollection.
Now, when Arnold was in, did you have anything to do with him other than . . .
The rural health, that was the only . . .
The only time that you were . . .
The only time I participated. As a matter of fact, the Director of the
State Department of Public Welfare asked me to come to see him once and
said, "Now, we put you in here in this job and remember, we
don't want you to meddle in politics." And he was taping the
interview we had, and I was not at all aware or suspicious of taping at
that time, but he moved his microphone over near me. He didn't know that
my voice was so strong that it would carry.
I wanted to ask about the Southern Regional Council, what kinds of woman's work was going on. Mrs. Tilly said that they needed a woman, was she the only one?
Actually, there was not any program aimed directly at women. Guy had
employed, at the suggestion of Josephine Wilkins, Margaret Fisher, who
had been working in some kind of war program and wanted to get out of
that work and into an area dealing more directly with economic and
social issues. And he thought that she would conduct women's activities.
We knew immediately that when Mrs. Ames was so distraught, thinking that
I was going to take her job, that it would be extremely unwise for me to
have anything to do with the work, and that this would just add,
complicate any problem that Guy might have. So, I stayed away, almost
never went to the office. But Margaret Fisher was not interested in
directing any concentrated program for women, and there
Now, you didn't, or did you, directly support the work of the Southern Regional Council in you own work?
No, I . . .
How did you support . . .
Just by it being known that I was Guy's wife. That was the only way. I did not want to be put in the position of or jeapordize my own usefulness by promoting the Southern Regional Council. I felt that my best way, the best way to promote the Southern Regional Council was to demonstrate my own humanity and care for people and concern for the welfare for all mankind and to let my personal integrity and concern show, rather than by mentioning the Southern Regional Council as an organization that you ought to support. No, mine was entirely an indirect support and then I learned a great many things about the power structure throughout the state, which I would pass on to Guy, which gave him insight into situations. And would know who was undermining the program, who would counter attack. In this way, I was useful.
Do you think you filled some of the void for not having . . .
Oh, I don't think that I made any contribution at all to the Southern
Regional Council. 1
1 At one time, SRC helped me in a very real way. I was Chairman
of the Social Studies Committee of the Atlanta Branch of AAUW,
and the Committee was interested in (footnote continued in next
page)goodwill for the group through the many personal friendships that I
formed, and