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

turn followed a different posture than that of COFO . To gain the demands of the
Movement, the boycott of white, particularly segregationist, enterprises was the
primary tactic . Armed self-defense again would served as a vehicle to protect the
Movement, its leaders and institutions . The nature of armed resistance at this
stage took on a different character than the before. Previously Mississippi Move-
ment activists and supporters functioned as a "civilian militia," participating in
armed defense on an ad hoc basis in times ofemergency or when information was
provided concerning a particular threat . In the years following Freedom Summer,
the function of armed defense was often placed in the hands of a paramilitary
group whose role in the Movement was the protection of Movement leaders,
demonstrations and the Black community in general. In addition with the eleva-
tion of the boycott strategy, activists organized a coercive force which could
harass or punish violators of the boycott and Black collaborators with the white
power structure .
The ascendance ofthe leadership of Charles Evers, the boycott organizing
of NAACP activist Rudy Shields, and the development of the Deacons for De-
fense and Justice in Louisiana were closely related to the development of para
military organization in the Mississippi Movement. This chapter examines the
relationship of Evers's leadership, Shields organizing, and the influence of the
Louisiana Deacons in the practice of armed resistance in the Mississippi Move-
ment. We will also examine how these new developments were expressed in local
campaigns for civil and human rights .