home / art gallery / creative pieces / links

Mr. Smith Goes to Washington

Jerome Smith strode to the White House in his faded denim overalls. He walked up the White House steps slowly, passing men in suits everywhere, not knowing what to expect or what was going to happen in today's meeting. When he entered the house, he wiped the salty sweat from his forehead with an old handkerchief he had in his pocket. He looked around for James Baldwin, who had set up this meeting with one of the Kennedys. Bystanders may have mistaken him for a child that was lost in the Nile Valley. In reality, though, Smith was simply a young men who felt he should not have to dress any special way to impress government officials.

Baldwin approached Jerome after he was through talking with some congressmen in a room filled with different businessmen who held important positions. Baldwin, a small man with an energetic step and a winking smile, paused to let Smith finish his conversation. Smith had stopped to speak with a white-haired custodian who was sweeping the floor, her back bent forward from years of bending and lifting. Baldwin knew such conversation was important to Jerome, who believed he owed the average worker as much respect--probably more--as he would give to a president or senator. Finally Baldwin and Smith shook hands. Baldwin thanked him for coming to the meeting and asked about the sit-ins and picketing that were still going on in New Orleans and across Louisiana and Mississippi.

Jerome paused suddenly in the conversation. The men in suits caught his eye as if they were a fine chocolate woman with thick thighs. These men caught his eyes because he felt as if he was being watched like a hawk in the sky. Heads turned to see a young man not wearing a suit and tie for an important meeting. But for Jerome, this meeting was no more important than a soap opera that is watched on a daily basis.

Baldwin interrupted Smith's glare and escorted him to the meeting room. Everyone in the waiting area returned to their conversations as Baldwin and Smith walked up the lightly waxed wooden stairs. The meeting took place May 24, 1963. Baldwin organized the meeting because there was a need to discuss black alienation and the role the government should play in making sure America lived up to the words of its democratic promise. He had addressed some of these issues in "Letter from a Region in My Mind," an essay published by The New Yorker.

When Baldwin and Smith entered the room filled with congressmen and Attorney General Robert Kennedy (the president's brother), Smith took his seat as if he were at home. In fact, Smith wished he were back in New Orleans. The only reason he had come up north was to see a specialist who could help him deal with the head injury he suffered when he was beaten simply for asking for fair and equal treatment for all citizens.

The meeting continued for a little while. Smith grew more and more impatient with too much polite talking that he knew came against a background of no action. Baldwin, recognizing Smith's impatience, tried to direct the conversation towards Smith. His large, frog-like eyes and his writer's ear for all sides of a situation let him know that the meeting was not working for Smith and that Kennedy better listen soon or not at all. Realizing that Smith had willingly gone through extreme pain for his cause and wanting to prove a point to Kennedy, asked Smith if he would consider going to war for his country.

Smith leaped out of his chair and shouted, "Never! Never! Never!" Everyone in the room was stunned and quiet as Jerome picked up the chair he had knocked down. The men had already eyed cautiously the young man with informal dress, intense eyes, and a heavily bandaged head. He actually looked like a soldier hero home from the war. In fact, that's what he was. But instead of fighting for the government in Vietnam, he was fighting for the people in McComb, Mississippi. That was where he had had his head bashed in.

Once he started speaking, Smith did not stop easily. The polite talk had been too much for him, especially given what he had fought through in the Deep South. These men seemed unaware of the situation. They had no sense of urgency. Smith did, though. He raised his voice like someone giving a speech to factory workers, not someone sitting around a conference table. Jerome spoke with anger when he described two white boys and how they beat him.

As the meeting continued to almost three hours, the pacifist, Ghandian Smith interrupted the meeting one last time. He stated in a tired voice that he was nauseated to have been at this meeting. In slow, measured tones, he said that more than the beatings by white racists, this meeting had given him a strong urge to renounce his non-violence. If being beaten, watching co-workers murdered were not enough to move these officials to act, what would?

Smith then directed his comments directly to Robert Kennedy. He questioned Kennedy's manhood. He wondered how his wife could even be with a man who would assume such a position of power and responsibility and not do all in his power to end the terrorism and injustice that raged across our land and was supported by leaders. He claimed that a real man would have himself and his children on the front lines. Instead of sending them to some separate school, they should be right there, learning shoulder to shoulder with poor black children--if not in Mississippi then at least right here in Washington, D. C.

With that Smith left the meeting. Baldwin, listening intently like all good writers do, knew for sure that if justice did not come soon, next time would come fire.

-- Charles Johnson

home / art gallery / creative pieces / links