He Risked His Life Filming This Mississippi Senator's Plantation In 1964

senator easton has never done nothing for nobody for not in this county because the people on senate eastern plantation is just as poor as i am and he hadn't done anything for them and he hadn't done anything for nobody else that's poor in sunflower county and i've been right here in sunflower county since i was two years old you are watching a documentary that was on national television in 1964. i'm david hoffman filmmaker i think you're going to find this really interesting it's about this guy james eastland senator james easton a devout segregationist who really believed negroes were inferior now the guy who shot this who was a colleague of mine he took a great risk at doing this going down to mississippi and shooting the people who were on james eastlands plantation this quote from james eastland will give you a sense of what he thought quote i have no prejudice in my heart but the white race is the superior race and the negro race and inferior race and the races must be kept separate by law another quote from eastland there was a youth hostel being set up in his state and it was integrated which he did not like is what he said you've inserted the thin end of the wedge by allowing the stinking n-word into such a fine hotel nice guy he was one of those senators who in world war ii said that the negroes should not be fighting in the war because they are inferior fighters and he was against giving them any support when they returned home as you probably know the black soldiers returning home didn't get the same support from the government that white soldiers got really unfair and james easton was one of the key guys in that so who's james eastland well his grandparents our great-grandparents were slave holders and they had a big plantation and james eastland still had that plantation a cotton growing plantation and on the plantation were these crappy little houses and he had the sharecroppers live in those houses for free he said for life very generous well i think he might have nice about that because he told me to stay there as long as i want to stay in that house i'm in he's as long as i live as long as i won't stay in the house i could stay there so the film you're about to see made in 1964. lyndon johnson is the president he is a dixiecrat democrat like james eastland only he supports a voting rights act which is before congress at the time when this is being filmed james eastland and the other dixiecrat democrats are totally against this among the issues in this new legislation are food stamps which james eastland is against and so you're about to see something filmed on his blood station my colleague and a cameraman walked onto the implantation he would have been killed if eastland had caught them he could shoot him and he interviewed the sharecroppers so before i show you the film one of the sharecroppers who speaks is became famous fannie lou hamer she was one of the founders of the mississippi freedom democratic party an alternative party to the dixiecrat democrats in the state of mississippi and she and the other people speaking in this video are unafraid to speak out i think they were unbelievably courageous given what james eastland could have done to them in washington senator eastland represents his neighbors in a fashion that some find confusing a staunch opponent of government handouts he did nevertheless support his colleague senator stennis who proposed a bill authorizing a 25 million dollar emergency measure to feed hungry people it died in the house the senator still thinks and speaks for the folks back home he has publicly declared that negroes living on his plantation working or not have a home for life one of his neighbors is negro activist fannie lou hamer one of the founders of the mississippi freedom democratic party to her the senator's generosity has a hollow ring senator easton has never done nothing for nobody for not in this county because the people on senate eastern plantation is just as poor as i am and he hadn't done anything for them and he hadn't done anything for nobody else that's poor in sunflower county and i've been right here in sunflower county since i was two years old within sight of the busy cotton gin she has supplied with her labor in these fields mrs irene taylor lives with her family of nine hers is one of the few remaining tenant shacks that grace the senator's plantation well i think he might have nice about that because he told me to stay there as long as i want to stay in that house i'm in he's as long as i live as long as i won't stay in the house i could stay there and any kind of help that uh he said that if i need a marksman children kind of sickness he'll help me sometimes some of senator eastland's tenants left the plantation to talk with reporter nick cotts they came to talk about hunger but water and electricity and the minimum necessities kept creeping into the conversation in the society of indebtedness the food bill is the last bill you know you have to pay tax on that money what you borrow you know any money you borrow is two bills on a dollar you know that in other words when you borrow money from senator easton you've got to pay an interest yeah i had plans on tell us about that go all the way through and tell us how that works yeah see when i borrow it just like i borrowed thirty dollars well i'm about to pay two bills on every one of them dollars i bought it from here so they're not getting anything free if they loan the money they might have to pay that double instead of just paying maybe 10 percent on the dollar they're not giving them anything the elderly are at the bottom of the poverty class mr edwards here shares quarters with two people who are not even related to him medical expenses consume their meager incomes for the old food stamps are a distant dream who stamps all right if he's able to buy cosa they say we'd have to pay 28 and they give us 22 which would make 50. tell us about what your family is going to eat until you get more well there is some tom greens and some cornbread all i know because i don't have anything here and i don't have no money to buy nothing weird i don't have no job i have been trying to get one but i can't and the boy he i needs money not for him he finished in school i got to pay that money off of him you know in school and he's graduating from high school to go trying to go to college do you feel that your seven children are getting enough food to eat right now this week no i don't think they are he can't he you know he can't use the food if he doesn't have the money to buy the stamp it mike would give him dignity if you know if he had something he could do and then you know had enough money that he could buy the stamps but he can't hold up his head in dignity if he got to go up there and listen to people telling me well you better have some money you better get you a job because you you won't get to stand for three dollars next month because that's happening too we find that a lot of poor people say they can't afford stamps they don't realize they have been spending a lot more money for food than it would take them to get the food stamps and it takes education to reach them and then of course it takes nutrition education to teach them what to buy and when and how to prepare it so they'll get a maximum benefit from it charlie edwards generation may wander at the ways of washington but it's too old to make any demands but when mr edwards looks at doddsville through the eyes of his son returning from vietnam it's a different point of view i think he'll have some of what he he need i think he'll have a good home to live in i think he'll have bathrooms in his house i think he ought to have everything that a full man could have especially when he didn't went up against what's going on in vietnam so i think so myself if i had to go to vietnam i think if i went and took all the punishment you know everything happened to me while i was in vietnam and then come back home and couldn't have a decent bed to lay down in and not a decent job i don't think i feel like ever going back north 12 for my country i wouldn't feel like this was my country not special for my party for me i feel like it's for the other fellow state of me when i think about that and how hungry people are in the south then it make me a little sick to say how can they spend all that much money in another country and really not doing nothing at home see i think charity began at home and then spread abroad mississippi is a small state and a poor one federal funds and federal programs can help to change that the food stamp plan was announced as a program to feed the hungry but the people it has failed are those who have no money every evening as the federal work day ends the men and women who read the reports from doddsville head home for their dinner the question of how to feed the hungry must still go with them you

Channel: David Hoffman

Views: 1,293,376

Keywords: senator James Eastland, senator Eastland, David Hoffman filmmaker, Dixiecrat, Mississippi Democrats, segregationist, black veterans, Mississippi freedom Democratic Party, 1960s, 1960s politics, voting rights bill, food stamps Bill, Lyndon Johnson, Democratic Party history, American political history, 1964 Democratic convention, sharecroppers, Eastland plantation, Mississippi history, civil rights, fanny lou hamer

Id: TvSgUXStGJ8

Length: 10min 10sec (610 seconds)

Published: Wed Feb 17 2021

Reddit Comments

[u/COL_D]

I have never seen this! Thank you for posting!

[u/[deleted]]

What has changed in Sunflower County besides the names?

[u/oaklpoint]

Would he be storming capitol today??

[u/imiv_ax]

50-60 years ago and they still had PLANTATIONS ? No wonder we're still seeing all this racism bullshit. .