Interview with Stokley Carmichael

How did you feel then?


Well, you know, I had been around SNCC for a while. He was not the first, what I had seen die and had seen those much closer to me die, and, ah, certainly had not become immune to death but I'd certainly known that in no way was it to stop or slow down my work. If anything it was to intensify my work. So, I was deeply, ah, sorry about his death. But only sorry that he was the one who had to go but then I had to analyze it, someone had to go, and, ah, unfortunately it was him. Ah, it, ah, tightened, ah, my sense of responsibility and insured me even more of the correctness of SNCC's position on the relationship of White workers. This effect would be felt deeper in SNCC later on in its time. But it was one of those things which came to affect those of us in SNCC in Alabama staff so strongly that our position was correct, that to bring White workers in, was just in fact to court their death. And, ah, ah, slow down the, ah, the process of building up a strong nationalist force.