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Authors: J. Anthony Lukas
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the leading spokesperson for the “white backlash” then believed to be sweeping Boston and other Northern cities. Her bland refrain, “You know where I stand,” was generally interpreted—in light of her fierce opposition to school desegregation—as a not so veiled declaration of bigotry. National commentators and news magazines had quickly identified the Hicks-White race as a critical test of the racial climate in America’s cities, and Kevin White’s victory, though narrow, was seen as a triumph for racial enlightenment.
Since then, the Mayor had done his best to live up to that image, naming several blacks to important posts, pledging more low-income housing for the heavily black South End, announcing plans to hire twenty-five black police cadets. When the Kerner Report was issued on March 1, White promptly declared war on white racism, calling for a “profound and massive change” in public attitudes.
But during his first three months in office the Mayor had been preoccupied less with black alienation than with white disaffection. For Kevin White was even then pointing toward the 1970 governor’s race, and he remembered the 1966 race, in which the Mayor of Boston, John Collins, bidding for the U.S. Senate, lost twenty-one of the twenty-two wards in his own city. With that statistic in mind, White had drawn quite a different conclusion than most people from his victory over Mrs. Hicks the previous November. To him, the margin of only 12,429 out of 192,673 votes seemed less a triumph for racial enlightenment than an ominous sign of continued estrangement in the city’s white working-class neighborhoods, where Collins had been most soundly rejected and from which Mrs. Hicks drew her greatest support. It was those white neighborhoods which held the key to his political future and it was in them that his greatest energies had been expended. So—despite his bold pronouncements—White had given little thought to the plight of Boston’s blacks, had spent little time in the black community, and knew few blacks well. He was ill prepared to deal with a major racial confrontation—which, at 3:00 a.m. on April 5, is what Boston appeared to be facing.
The Mayor felt utterly powerless, but he didn’t think he should leave theoffice. At 6:00 a.m. he stumbled to the same couch on which he had spent the subzero night of January 11, pulled a blanket over his head, and, to the wail of police sirens, fell into a troubled sleep.
He woke at nine to eerie silence. The sirens which had sounded in the night were stilled; someone had shut off the police radio; the phones had stopped ringing. Where the hell was everybody?
Then, shortly after nine, the first call of the morning came—from the black Councilman, Tom Atkins. “Kevin,” said an agitated Atkins, who had been up most of the night patrolling Roxbury’s streets, “something terrible is about to happen.”
Atkins had just received a call from a black disk jockey named James Byrd, known to his fans as “The Early Byrd.” In addition to his duties on WILD, Boston’s soul-music station, Byrd was the New England representative for rhythm-and-blues star James Brown, who was scheduled to hold a concert that very night at the Boston Garden. But Byrd told Atkins that the Garden, concerned about more violence, was canceling the concert. It didn’t take long for Atkins to realize what would happen, and now he sketched it in graphic terms for the Mayor.
“It’s too late to cancel it; the word won’t get around in time. There’ll be thousands of black teenagers down at the Garden this evening, and when they find those gates are locked they’re going to be pretty pissed off. King’s death and Brown’s cop-out will get all mixed up together and we’ll have an even bigger riot than last night’s—only this time it’ll be in the heart of downtown.” They should not only reinstate the concert, Atkins said, they should get a television station to carry it live, then
Since then, the Mayor had done his best to live up to that image, naming several blacks to important posts, pledging more low-income housing for the heavily black South End, announcing plans to hire twenty-five black police cadets. When the Kerner Report was issued on March 1, White promptly declared war on white racism, calling for a “profound and massive change” in public attitudes.
But during his first three months in office the Mayor had been preoccupied less with black alienation than with white disaffection. For Kevin White was even then pointing toward the 1970 governor’s race, and he remembered the 1966 race, in which the Mayor of Boston, John Collins, bidding for the U.S. Senate, lost twenty-one of the twenty-two wards in his own city. With that statistic in mind, White had drawn quite a different conclusion than most people from his victory over Mrs. Hicks the previous November. To him, the margin of only 12,429 out of 192,673 votes seemed less a triumph for racial enlightenment than an ominous sign of continued estrangement in the city’s white working-class neighborhoods, where Collins had been most soundly rejected and from which Mrs. Hicks drew her greatest support. It was those white neighborhoods which held the key to his political future and it was in them that his greatest energies had been expended. So—despite his bold pronouncements—White had given little thought to the plight of Boston’s blacks, had spent little time in the black community, and knew few blacks well. He was ill prepared to deal with a major racial confrontation—which, at 3:00 a.m. on April 5, is what Boston appeared to be facing.
The Mayor felt utterly powerless, but he didn’t think he should leave theoffice. At 6:00 a.m. he stumbled to the same couch on which he had spent the subzero night of January 11, pulled a blanket over his head, and, to the wail of police sirens, fell into a troubled sleep.
He woke at nine to eerie silence. The sirens which had sounded in the night were stilled; someone had shut off the police radio; the phones had stopped ringing. Where the hell was everybody?
Then, shortly after nine, the first call of the morning came—from the black Councilman, Tom Atkins. “Kevin,” said an agitated Atkins, who had been up most of the night patrolling Roxbury’s streets, “something terrible is about to happen.”
Atkins had just received a call from a black disk jockey named James Byrd, known to his fans as “The Early Byrd.” In addition to his duties on WILD, Boston’s soul-music station, Byrd was the New England representative for rhythm-and-blues star James Brown, who was scheduled to hold a concert that very night at the Boston Garden. But Byrd told Atkins that the Garden, concerned about more violence, was canceling the concert. It didn’t take long for Atkins to realize what would happen, and now he sketched it in graphic terms for the Mayor.
“It’s too late to cancel it; the word won’t get around in time. There’ll be thousands of black teenagers down at the Garden this evening, and when they find those gates are locked they’re going to be pretty pissed off. King’s death and Brown’s cop-out will get all mixed up together and we’ll have an even bigger riot than last night’s—only this time it’ll be in the heart of downtown.” They should not only reinstate the concert, Atkins said, they should get a television station to carry it live, then
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