Citizens' Committee

Citizens’ Councils were white-supremacist organizations that mobilized opposition to desegregation in the American South. Their role in the fight over James Meredith’s admission to the University of Mississippi shows how resistance to civil-rights rulings was organized locally—and how enforcing those rulings ultimately required federal intervention.

Formation and Purpose

The first Citizens’ Council was formed in Indianola, Mississippi, in 1954 to fight desegregation in the South. The councils offered organized opposition to changes that challenged the region’s system of racial segregation. Their activity placed them within a wider struggle over whether court rulings and federal civil-rights measures would be put into practice.

Resistance at the University of Mississippi

In 1962, after a long legal battle, federal courts ruled that James Meredith, a young Black Air Force veteran, had to be admitted to the University of Mississippi, commonly called Ole Miss. The Citizens’ Councils orchestrated opposition to implementing the ruling. Mississippi governor Ross Barnett publicly rejected court-ordered desegregation on television on September 13, declaring that state universities would close rather than desegregate.

After negotiations between Barnett and President John F. Kennedy and Attorney General Robert Kennedy in Washington, the federal government decided to enforce the ruling. U.S. marshals were to bring Meredith to Oxford on a designated day. White supremacists began organizing in anticipation, and on September 30, the day before Meredith was due to appear, marshals entered the campus and surrounded the main administration building. A crowd of about 2,500 gathered to protest; a riot followed. The marshals used tear gas and came under fire.

Federal Enforcement and Aftermath

By 10:00 p.m. that night, federal troops had been sent into Oxford to restore order. The force eventually reached 20,000 troops and 11,000 National Guardsmen, and 300 people were arrested. Meredith stayed on campus under the protection of U.S. marshals and 300 soldiers, endured death threats, and eventually graduated.

The episode illustrates the limits of local enforcement when local power resisted desegregation. Earlier, federal legislation enfranchising Black Southerners had gone unenforced because southern elites and the Democratic Party controlled local law enforcement, with the federal government willing to accept the arrangement. As Black people rose against the southern elite, that support for Jim Crow crumbled. In Oxford, the federal government’s deployment of marshals and troops made the difference between a court ruling on paper and Meredith’s admission in practice.