Masters Theses

Date of Award

8-1997

Degree Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts

Major

History

Major Professor

Cynthia Flemming

Committee Members

James Cobb, Stephen V. Ash

Abstract

The National Council of Churches organized the Delta Ministry in 1964 to participate in the Civil Rights struggle in Mississippi. The Ministry leaders came south with the goals of providing direct relief for the poor, reconciling the black and white communities to one another, and developing the black community politically and economically. As the Ministry staff began working in Mississippi, local whites rejected and attacked the Delta Ministry. The second goal, bringing the black and white communities together peacefully, was nearly impossible at this stage.

The Delta Ministry served as a secondary civil rights organization that worked with other groups such as the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and the Mississippi Freedom Democrat Party. In their first two years of existence, the Ministry staff concentrated on political objectives such as voter registration. By 1966, they were increasingly adding economic projects to their agenda. Though some of these projects like Freedom City failed. Ministry leaders continued to believe that blacks needed economic power to achieve equality.

The Delta Ministry, like the Civil Rights movement in general, experienced successes and failures. They succeeded in helping register thousands of Mississippi blacks and in helping desegregate public places. I lowever, the organization could not bring significant economic poAver to the black community. In this respect, the Delta Ministry is the Civil Rights movement writ large.

All of the Delta Ministry's victories came primarily because they endeared themselves to poor blacks in Mississippi. Ministry staff identified with poor blacks, responded to their needs, helped blacks to help themselves, and stood alongside the oppressed in their troubles. The Delta Ministry serves as an example of what the 1960s Civil Rights movement accomplished and as a model for other groups to emulate in order to finish the revolution for equality.

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