The Carolina Times brought news and analysis of Confederate commemoration from around the country to its audience in Durham, North Carolina. Their editorials were marked by a strong anti-Confederate stance. Catching the zeitgeist of emerging Cold War paranoia, a Times editorial in 1951, “Displaying Flags of Our Former Enemies,” warned readers to be more concerned about the enemies of America within their own neighborhoods than those in the Soviet Union.[1] The piece pointed out that “the Confederacy actually did attempt to overthrow the government of the United States by force while the Soviet Union, thus far, is only reported to be wishing to do so.”[2] They used this background of rising anxiety as a pretense to call for the removal of all Confederate flags—and even a federal ban.[3] While the popularity of Confederate flags may seem like a “fad,” they wrote, “during these times of national peril… citizens ought to avoid even the appearance of disloyalty.”[4]
In another op-ed, the Times brought attention to a memorialized slave market in Fayetteville, which they called “a relic of the south’s traffic in human flesh and blood.” After a bombing attack on the market, the Times wrote that it would “no doubt be restored to its former status by the Daughters of the Confederacy or some other southern organization,” seeing how “dear” it was to “feeble-minded southerners.” Clearly, they had no qualms about offending a white Southern audience . The authors speculated that perhaps “some young white southerner…who would like to remove from the hearts of their elders this last trace of that most shameful period in American history” committed the bombing, but the culprit was never reported.[5]
In a defiant 1961 editorial titled “Why the South Celebrates Its Defeat,” the Times diagnosed the exuberant centennial celebrations of the Civil War among white Southerners as “the South’s effort to appease the pangs of a guilty conscience” and “justify the thousands of wrongs perpetrated against its Negro people.”[6] However, the author noted, “the raging will not move the thorn from their flesh nor the guilty stains from their conscience.”[7] Instead, white Southerners must confess their sins and make “an about-face in their failure to do unto others as they would have others do to them.”[8]
The Times published two articles in 1970 about Black students in Louisiana combatting the presence of Confederate flags in their schools. The first article, published May 30, covered a discrimination charge brought by Black students in Covington, LA against their school. The students argued that the flag was a symbol of slavery and discrimination. They contended that its display in the principal’s office and at school events contributed to a school culture designed to make Black students feel unwelcome. The students also argued that Black students were intentionally excluded from “most activities of the school.”[9]
The second article, published on November 14, detailed a dispute at Francis T. Nicholls Senior High School in New Orleans. Black students had begun leading demonstrations, attempting to pressure the school into abandoning the display of Confederate flags during school parades, sporting events, and in the principal’s office. They also objected to the band’s uniform, which was based on the CSA military uniform.[10] The school itself was named after a Confederate general and the school’s nickname was “the Rebels,” another point of contention for Black students. Like their peers in Covington, the Black students complained that these symbols were part of a racist culture at their school, alleging that Black female students had been entirely excluded from the recent Homecoming court.[11] In December of that year, 75% of the student body voted to change the school mascot from the Rebels to the Bobcats. In the 1990s, the school name was changed to Frederick A. Douglass High School.[12]
In 1971, the Times reported on a petition filed by the ACLU with the Supreme Court on behalf of a Black student from Tennessee. Charles Caldwell, a student at Lebanon Tennessee High School, was removed from the school band for walking out of a pep rally when the band played “Dixie.” His mother, a teacher’s aide at the school, joined him and was subsequently fired. The ACLU argued that these punishments violated the First Amendment protection of freedom of expression and the 13th and 14th Amendment rights of racial equality. The Times made clear that they saw this as an issue of the “right of black students in newly integrated Southern schools to refuse to honor symbols of racial inequality.”[13]
The Carolina Times issued its final edition in April of 2020. But its powerful voice speaking out against Confederate commemoration shows its commitment to its motto: “The Truth Unbridled.”[14]
Olivia Haynie
Please cite as:
Haynie, Olivia. “‘Symbols of Racial Inequality’: The Carolina Times Covers Flag Controversies in the Late Civil Rights Era.” False Image of History: Perspectives on Confederate Commemoration from the Black Press (online). Fall 2024 Edition. Schaefer, Donovan O., ed. URL = https://falseimage.pennds.org/essay/“symbols-of-racial-inequality”-the-carolina-times-covers-flag-controversies-in-the-late-civil-rights-era/.
References
Carolina Times. “[Black Students [sic] Right to Oppose Inequality Upheld by ACLUF](https://newspapers.digitalnc.org/lccn/sn83045120/1971-02-06/ed-1/seq-12/).” February 6, 1971.
Carolina Times. “Charges Discrimination in Covington, La.” May 30, 1970.
Carolina Times. “Displaying Flags Of Our Former Enemies.” September 8, 1951.
Carolina Times. “Fayetteville’s Old Slave Market.” October 31, 1953.
Carolina Times. “School Supt. Settles Nichols School Spat.” November 14, 1970.
Carolina Times. “Why the South Celebrates Its Defeat.” July 29, 1961.
DigitalNC. “The Carolina Times (Durham, N.C.).” digitalnc.org. https://www.digitalnc.org/newspapers/carolina-times-durham-nc/?news_year=2020#.
Perry, La’Shance. “Rebels met with revolution: The 1970s battle for change at Francis T. Nicholls Senior High School.” veritenews.org, February 3, 2023, https://veritenews.org/2023/02/03/the-1970s-rebellion-at-francis-t-nicholls-high-school/.
Carolina Times. “Displaying Flags Of Our Former Enemies.” ↩︎
Carolina Times. “Displaying Flags Of Our Former Enemies.” ↩︎
Carolina Times. “Displaying Flags Of Our Former Enemies.” ↩︎
Carolina Times. “Displaying Flags Of Our Former Enemies.” ↩︎
Carolina Times. “Fayetteville’s Old Slave Market.” ↩︎
Carolina Times. “Why the South Celebrates Its Defeat.” ↩︎
Carolina Times. “Why the South Celebrates Its Defeat.” ↩︎
Carolina Times. “Why the South Celebrates Its Defeat.” ↩︎
Carolina Times. “Charges Discrimination in Covington, La.” ↩︎
Carolina Times. “School Supt. Settles Nichols School Spat.” ↩︎
Carolina Times. “School Supt. Settles Nichols School Spat.” ↩︎
Perry, “Rebels met with revolution: The 1970s battle for change at Francis T. Nicholls Senior High School.” ↩︎
Carolina Times. “[Black Students [sic] Right to Oppose Inequality Upheld by ACLUF](https://newspapers.digitalnc.org/lccn/sn83045120/1971-02-06/ed-1/seq-12/).” ↩︎
DigitalNC. “The Carolina Times (Durham, N.C.).” ↩︎