Eye for an Eye: The Role of Armed Resistance ... - Freedom Archives

powerful moral force which would to defeat racist violence and attitudes . The
competing point of view saw organizing around voting rights, not direct action in
public institutions, as the primary focus of SNCC's political work . This point of
view was articulated early on by SNCC activists Chuck McDew, Tim Jenkins,
Chuck Jones, and later on Bob Moses . This group saw the priority of SNCC's
activity should be the massive registration of Black voters in Southern states in
which the voting rights ofAfrican descendants were denied . This group believed
nonviolence should be used as a tactical weapon by organizers for protection .
These activists, similar to the leadership of SCLC, believed the image of Black
organizers with weapons would not encourage Federal intervention and garner
support from white liberals for the Civil Rights movement.10
In SNCC's early years, no debate took place within the national leadership
over the issue of nonviolence. While it is possible that some SNCC workers
carried weapons in the early years of the organization, it definitely wasn't public,
and no serious debate about carrying weapons took place within the national
leadership. In local chapters, some young activists were indifferent to nonvio-
lence, others openly challenging the concept as a strategy and philosophy. In
Nashville, where philosophical nonviolence was reputed to be most entrenched,
student activists debated the methods of nonviolence versus self-defense . The
"Young Turks" of the Nashville student movement protected nonviolent demon-
strators from white attackers in that city.' ` On a few occasions in the early years
some SNCC workers were armed or advocated use of force for self -defense."
Some SNCC and CORE activists also came in contact with local Move-
ment activists or supporters who participated in armed self-defense . Most prac-
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