H. Shelton Smith - "This South Under God" (October 25, 1959)

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	(soft music)	0:03
-	You will find the text	0:31
	of the sermon of this morning	0:35
	in Paul's letter to the Galatians 6:7	0:38
	"be not deceived,	0:49
	"God is not mocked,	0:53
	"for whatever a man saweth,	0:57
	"that he also shall reap."	1:01
	About 10 days ago,	1:07
	the famed John Brown's raid of 1859	1:12
	was accorded a Centennial celebration.	1:19
	That celebration, constitutes	1:26
	the prologue to the coming to national celebration	1:31
	on the 100th anniversary of the American Civil War.	1:38
	Hardly a week now passes that does not see the appearance	1:48
	of some new book	1:55
	reviewing some particular figure	1:58
	involved in that great disaster.	2:00
	Lincoln and Davis,	2:06
	Grant and Lee,	2:10
	these and other Statesman and Military figures of that day	2:13
	are receiving fresh scrutiny	2:21
	and are being discussed widely.	2:25
	Seemingly, we can hardly wait	2:29
	for act one, the Shelling of Sumter to come.	2:35
	Now why I asked you,	2:45
	are we so restlessly nervous to embark upon	2:49
	what was for America its most tragic conflict.	2:55
	Well of course the conventional answers immediately arise	3:01
	for one thing	3:11
	that was such a fateful war,	3:15
	that it will always make an appeal	3:21
	to the American heart.	3:27
	For Lincoln, it was the fatal union.	3:31
	For Jefferson Davis,	3:37
	it was the fate of a region	3:40
	bent upon establishing a separate nation	3:43
	and maintaining it for a million slaves.	3:48
	Then of course, there is the appeal	3:55
	of the spectacular, dramatic, the heroic	4:01
	and in this sphere	4:08
	I could go on almost indefinitely discussing those aspects,	4:09
	of that great carnage.	4:15
	Those Robin Hoods of the cavalry,	4:18
	Phil Sheldon and Gipps Stuart.	4:23
	Always fiLe the imagination of the red blooded youth.	4:29
	For heroism, gallantry, sacrifice; the sacrificial spirit,	4:39
	one cannot exceed in appeal that terrible charge	4:48
	known as Pickett's Charge on Cemetery Ridge.	4:54
	Then of course,	5:02
	one will be greatly fired	5:04
	who takes the last phase of the great struggle	5:10
	watching grant relentlessly	5:15
	crushing the forces of the Army of Virginia,	5:20
	those terrible haze seven days wilderness fights	5:27
	when northerners and southerners	5:35
	burned to death, not knowing where they were.	5:40
	And Chancellorsville when Jackson was shocked	5:47
	by his own men.	5:53
	And then Abel Maddix	5:56
	when this tall and gallant dignified the rules before	5:59
	the powerful stumpy general	6:09
	and there's the end.	6:14
	Now this celebration is of course going to relive many	6:18
	of those experiences,	6:25
	but there's another reason I think	6:29
	that must be added to those I've given for our nervous	6:32
	and restless desire to get the Centennial	6:38
	on the road as it were.	6:43
	It lies the fact my friends	6:47
	that the American people both north and south today,	6:51
	are feeling the tug at the bottom of that conscience	6:58
	of the same human issue,	7:03
	which tore this union apart.	7:07
	Undoubtedly we of the south	7:11
	are in the midst of one of the great decisive next steps	7:15
	in the breakdown and remolding of what we've called	7:22
	the Southern way of life.	7:27
	In the midst of this situation,	7:36
	we are troubled	7:40
	and people are troubled irrespective of the side they take.	7:43
	Thus, there is common agony, common concern.	7:50
	Now I want to talk about this group concern today,	8:02
	there may be some of you here	8:11
	who might wish me to deal with a more pleasant theme	8:13
	as for example the Garcias symbolism of this chapel.	8:18
	If that'd be such here this morning may I remind you	8:26
	that a sermon has not been devoted to this theme	8:31
	for at least two years or three indeed	8:35
	all the occasional side passes	8:42
	have been made from this pulpits.	8:47
	But more important is the fact that	8:51
	more southerners our troubled in conscience,	8:57
	agonizing and conscience today over this one question	9:03
	than any other.	9:08
	One reason why we do not like to discuss it in public is	9:11
	that we are sold, tortured in the privacy of our hearts.	9:17
	When I grew up,	9:24
	the Negro question was not discussable	9:26
	that is in the pulpits,	9:30
	but the homes were gagged with it.	9:33
	Now I believe my friends	9:38
	that this psychic difficulty of ours	9:41
	can be overcome in some major at least,	9:44
	if we acknowledge this as a great issue,	9:48
	as a great burden and set our faces to deal with it.	9:52
	Now in speaking of the progress	9:58
	as the certain years of the Negro,	10:01
	I want to say that here is progress and advancement	10:06
	are wrapped up with a rapidly changing advancing self.	10:11
	I am certain myself that the south	10:19
	is in one of the great fluid periods	10:21
	in which decisions are extremely decisive on many fronts	10:25
	and willing to leave the south is changing	10:32
	and I think of many forces involved	10:35
	but there are three seemed to me	10:39
	to highlight this transformation.	10:42
	One of course is the great movement	10:46
	of country people into urban centers,	10:50
	losing albeit slowly,	10:54
	the full ways of the countryside	10:56
	taking on the full ways of the city.	11:00
	Here we are in the midst	11:05
	of one of the most dramatic urbanizing processes	11:06
	known in American history.	11:11
	The south has never had up to now a city of a million souls.	11:13
	Yet by 19 and 75,	11:19
	at least half dozen such centers	11:22
	will be in existence in all probability	11:25
	here in the south land.	11:28
	This urbanization has enormous implications	11:31
	for our changing life.	11:38
	Then of course, along we sided and partly	11:41
	as a causative factor in it	11:44
	is the development of mass industry.	11:47
	One who moves from Dallas Texas to Richmond, Virginia,	11:51
	will be moving through a great arc	11:58
	that is alive with industry.	12:01
	Industry is developing in the south land more rapidly	12:05
	than it ever developed in any other portion of the west	12:09
	or the old east.	12:14
	This industrialization is acting as a great	12:16
	social cement mixer.	12:21
	People are learning new ways,	12:24
	indeed they're giving up many of the personal inemesis	12:28
	of the countryside and absorbing into their systems	12:31
	the same kind of impersonal frost characteristics	12:35
	of the great cities of the west and east.	12:40
	My friends, if there were no rules in our midst whatever	12:44
	the south would inevitably be radically changing	12:49
	what we call our Southern way.	12:55
	Then of course, do not forget the fact of the federal dollar	12:58
	since the advent of the new deal,	13:03
	millions and billions have been poured into the south land.	13:06
	Look at the TVA,	13:10
	the great reconstructive projects on the coast,	13:12
	the superhighways, look at the money being poured in	13:15
	for human aid for example,	13:20
	76% of all the money for the needy in North Carolina	13:22
	comes from the Federal Treasury.	13:26
	Now it's interesting to me	13:31
	that the people who talk about State's rights	13:32
	and the light do not want	13:35
	to return to the old days	13:38
	when States rights really were significant,	13:40
	their palms are open	13:43
	to the federal dollar everywhere, everywhere.	13:45
	So I say the south is rapidly changing	13:51
	under the impact of these three forces.	13:57
	Now the Negro is a participant in this process.	14:00
	He's gaining in wealth.	14:05
	He is becoming a significant businessman,	14:09
	a banker, an insurance man.	14:16
	He is accumulating a residuum of wealth,	14:20
	such as most white people didn't know	14:24
	at the opening of this century.	14:27
	Also the American Negro	14:30
	is participating in the cultural elements,	14:32
	education, lifter tour, the arts	14:35
	all that goes to make up a humane	14:39
	and well-rounded existence.	14:44
	Now this Negro is under this process,	14:47
	acquiring a new self image.	14:54
	An image which spurns the old image	14:58
	made in the age of uncle Tom.	15:02
	Now I know we white people of the south say	15:06
	"I know the Negro, I know the Negro,"	15:10
	my friends, the Negro that you and I know	15:15
	is the vanishing kitchen maid	15:21
	and the docile yard man,	15:25
	the aunt Mary and the uncle George helping hand.	15:29
	How many of you know the new college spread Negro?	15:36
	I mean, know him in terms	15:47
	of the ordinary ways of life	15:54
	coming into direct contact with him	15:55
	from day-to-day,	15:57
	I dare say very few.	16:01
	And yet this cultivated refined, rising,	16:07
	brown skinned person	16:11
	is participating in our culture,	16:17
	building lovely homes	16:20
	with beautiful apartments within,	16:23
	rearing his children,	16:26
	to appreciate all the things	16:29
	that you college men and women appreciate.	16:31
	Now, when this young college bread humane dignified person	16:36
	presents himself before a public park,	16:47
	a playground, a tennis court,	16:54
	a library or a public school,	16:59
	he rightfully expects the same treatment there	17:04
	that you would wish for yourself, nothing less	17:10
	and yet, here is the rub.	17:15
	These young people find themselves in snare,	17:21
	in a set of mechanisms designed to frustrate them.	17:27
	And the device things	17:37
	are all traceable ultimately to one, one postulate;	17:38
	the inferiority of the brown-skinned American.	17:45
	The inferiority of this person,	17:52
	now this vital dogma	17:58
	is a legacy of the old south, the slave south.	18:03
	In the 40s and 50s, politicians, lawyers, doctors,	18:13
	educators, journalists and preachers hammered home	18:31
	this demonic dogma of human inferiority,	18:40
	go search our library if you doubt that.	18:44
	And then sowing to that kind of when,	18:52
	we reaped the whirlwind of a Civil War	18:58
	in hell we lifted up our eyes.	19:05
	Now that old, now the slave system,	19:09
	the chapel slave system,	19:14
	perished in the infernal of the war,	19:16
	but that old vital legacy of human inferiority	19:21
	rises up again like Ben coast ghost	19:27
	to study stuff here in mid century,	19:30
	here in mid century.	19:38
	Now, God knows that this ghost must be dealt with,	19:44
	but we prefer to deal with pleasanter things often.	19:54
	Now as a matter of fact,	19:59
	let's be realistic,	20:01
	look at the fruit of this old dogma today,	20:03
	I could take you through many situations,	20:07
	but look at the time and the energy	20:11
	that we are spending here in the south	20:14
	on ways to prevent desegregation in our public schools.	20:18
	Now the instrument which bids fair	20:26
	the lasts longer than any other in the Federal Courts	20:28
	is what we now call the Pupil Placement Act,	20:31
	the Pupil Placement Plan.	20:38
	Be not deceived, God is not mocked.	20:45
	That instrument was not erected	20:51
	on any other basis far than that of human inequality	20:59
	for the Negro,	21:03
	it was just painted indiscrimination,	21:05
	it was born in the known intent,	21:13
	to avoid the complete fulfillment	21:21
	of the Federal Court decision of 1954.	21:24
	Now you say this is a fair instrument,	21:34
	yes it's fair on its face,	21:38
	but significantly it gets token results.	21:42
	(preacher coughing)	21:48
	We're speaking of token integration today,	21:52
	now token obedience to law	21:57
	is a new thing under the sun.	21:59
	Suppose for example,	22:03
	I paid my Federal and State Income Tax on a token basis,	22:05
	what would you think of me?	22:11
	And what would the law do to me?	22:13
	Or suppose you used to get out on the car,	22:16
	out on the highways, these super highways and speed up	22:20
	on all places except two or three points	22:25
	and observe them all token me?	22:28
	What would we think of you?	22:33
	Yet my friends here we are, be not deceived	22:36
	this instrument like the old literacy test	22:44
	was designed and you know it to prohibit	22:48
	the full development of law here in our midst.	22:52
	Now, one of the aspects that should especially concern us	23:03
	who worked in church related institutions,	23:08
	is the fact that these institutions	23:14
	in many instances at least	23:19
	are taking advantage of their independence status	23:23
	and allowing the state supporting universities and colleges	23:28
	to carry the bowl in desegregating Southern education.	23:33
	Now these independent church related colleges	23:41
	are receiving from the Federal Government	23:45
	increasingly large sums of money, for educational purposes	23:47
	and thus in effect they are Quayside Public institutions,	23:54
	should not therefore these institutions	24:00
	off which duke is apart, feel responsibility	24:04
	to abate the general requirements	24:11
	such as university of North Carolina has to obey.	24:15
	But that was a deeper reason my friends for this obedience,	24:20
	it lies in the fact,	24:25
	that where is the State University is called secular.	24:29
	We of the church related institution	24:34
	their an allegiance we say to Jesus Christ.	24:38
	This is our higher allegiance.	24:47
	And by the same token,	24:51
	God all mighty sermons us	24:53
	as church related institutions	24:56
	to rise and be obedient.	24:59
	How long shall we wait?	25:07
	How long shall we wait?	25:13
	There is a sobering consciousness	25:19
	that comes over me almost leading	25:22
	at times to despair.	25:26
	It is this	25:29
	that the church related colleges	25:32
	of the south by and large	25:34
	may be the last refuge of educational segregation.	25:38
	This would be shared tragedy	25:47
	if the church colleges,	25:51
	which professed the equality	25:53
	of all sons before all mighty God	25:54
	were to be the last defender	25:57
	of this infernal dogma of human inferiority.	26:00
	May I warn you and myself	26:10
	with those stern words, they must profit.	26:16
	Are you not like the Ethiopians to me, Said the Lord,	26:22
	this is a relevant word	26:32
	because the significance of that warning is	26:34
	that God knows no respecter of persons.	26:37
	Yay know, even though the white skin persons,	26:41
	God knows no respecter persons,	26:44
	and as much as you've done it,	26:51
	under one of the least to me,	26:52
	you've done it on to me.	26:57
	We who take refuge	27:04
	in a segregated education	27:08
	in a church related college	27:12
	should remember that we,	27:15
	in a real sense, shame our heavenly father	27:21
	and dishonor our Christ,	27:33
	who we profess to serve.	27:39
	If we sold to the wind of racial arrogance,	27:45
	we will surely reap the whirlwind of social tension	27:50
	of periodic violence.	27:55
	And what is more,	27:58
	we feel surely be robbed	27:59
	of the finer fruits of a humane and ethical culture.	28:02
	This south, like the nation of which this is a part	28:12
	is irrevocably under God	28:19
	and be not deceived.	28:25
	God is not mocked.	28:29
	For whatsoever we southerners sow	28:32
	that we should also reap	28:37
	what? Or what?	28:45
	Sell the harvest to be.	28:52
	The Lord bless you and keep you.	29:03
-	You keep recording on.	30:07
-	Yeah.	30:10
	(indistinct)	30:17
-	Well I used to work.	30:22
-	So this is long that's long enough to get.	30:26
-	Now you watch this thing talking to a microphone.	30:34
-	Well, it's going to say, oh, eight revolves and all,	30:39
	when you're talking,	30:40
	that means that it's receiving the sound, right.	30:42
-	Yeah, that's what I'm saying.	30:44
	You have to have it move up so that they almost,	30:48
	at the general level of whatever the person is say.	30:52
-	It would almost touches these roads, optimally.	30:55
-	Keep talking.	30:59
-	I don't know what to say.	31:00
	What is it supposed to look like when it does.	31:01
-	Say something? Now.	31:04
-	If I say anything,	31:06
	what's this is it last the way it's supposed to say okay.	31:07
-	Like that so you get to keep on.	31:18
-	And that's coming.	31:21
	So we're co-hosts, right?.	31:22
-	Yeah.	31:24
	Okay now, goodnight.	31:25

Item Info

Title:

H. Shelton Smith - "This South Under God" (October 25, 1959)

Permalink:

https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r45q4wn0n

Date:

October 25, 1959

Speaker:

Smith, H. Shelton

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Duke University. Chapel

Identifier:

UA.17.01.0003 RR-0082
ref5363_dtn
uachapelsermaud
duke:627963
dcrau002112
ark:/87924/r45q4wn0n
6a5dd2ee-f1da-473d-a0a8-d1778677eada

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Duke Chapel Recordings

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North Carolina
Durham (N.C.)

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The Duke University Chapel Recordings were transferred to the Duke University Archives beginning in 1970.

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H. Shelton Smith - "This South Under God" (October 25, 1959)

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