Robeson County and the Lumbee Tribe

The Lumbee people in southeastern North Carolina originated from various Native American groups which were greatly impacted by conflicts and infectious diseases dating back to the period of European colonization. Those who survived these disruptions grouped together as a homogeneous community.^[1] Culturally, this group was not particularly distinct from proximate European Americans; they were mostly agrarian, and shared similar styles of dress, homes, and music. They also spoke English and were mostly Protestants. Their identity was rooted in kinship and shared location.^[2] Through intermarriage, they acquired some white and black ancestry.^[3] In 1830, the United States government began a policy of Indian removal, forcibly relocating traditional-living, "tribal" Native American populations in the American South further west.^[4] Native Americans in Robeson County, North Carolina, owing to their assimilation into Euro-American culture, were not subject to removal.^[5] However, from this point on they were increasingly subject to racial discrimination.^[5][6]

In 1835 the Constitution of North Carolina classified the eastern Carolina Native Americans as "free persons of color". Under this system they were denied the right to vote, bear arms, or attend white schools.^[1] During the American Civil War, the Confederate States Army conscripted them for labor, though some resisted, leading to the Lowry War. In 1885, following Native Americans' refusal to attend black schools, the state of North Carolina recognized this group as Croatans and established a separate school system for them.^[7] This tripartite segregation was unique in the American South, though whites generally regarded both the Native Americans and blacks as "colored".^[8] Some other county facilities were separated for "Whites", "Negroes", and "Indians".^[9] In 1913 the North Carolina General Assembly reclassified the Indians as Cherokees.^[10]

Hundreds of Native Americans from Robeson County fought for the United States during World War II in white units (blacks were segregated into different outfits). Many returned with a willingness to pursue social change.^[11] Some of them, especially the war veterans, disliked Robeson County's segregation.^[12] Other leaders lobbied for the adoption of a unique name to identify their group.^[10] In the early 1950s, some led by minister D. F. Lowry formed an organization, the Lumbee Brotherhood, to unite the community. The chosen name, "Lumbee", was derived from the Lumber River, which ran through Robeson County. Lowry and his supporters argued that this was a suitable label, since the community had its origins in various indigenous groups but all resided near the river.^[10][13] In 1952 the name Lumbee was approved by the Native Americans in a referendum, and the following year the General Assembly formally recognized the label.^[10] In 1956 the United States Congress formally extended partial recognition to the Lumbee Tribe, affirming their existence as an indigenous community but disallowing them from use of federal funds and services available to other Native American groups.^[14] By 1958 Robeson County had a triracial population consisting of approximately 40,000 whites, 30,000 Native Americans (including Lumbees and Tuscaroras), and 20,000 blacks.^[15]

Ku Klux Klan activity

In 1954 the United States Supreme Court issued its decision in Brown v. Board of Education, ruling that racial segregation in public schools was unconstitutional. The ruling sparked a significant amount of pro-segregation activity among whites in the South, who formed various groups to oppose integration.^[16] It also led to a resurgence in Ku Klux Klan (KKK) activity. The Klan was a white supremacist and nativist movement which sought to defend racial segregation. It had different formal organizational incarnations, but all groups generally espoused white supremacy and a commitment to Protestant Christianity.^[17] The KKK was historically violent, and by the 1950s Klan violence was looked down upon by North Carolina officials.^[18] There had been a Klan presence in Robeson County in the early part of the decade before it was forced out under pressure from District Solicitor Malcolm Buie Seawell and the federal government.^[19]

In 1956 James W. "Catfish" Cole, a former member of the U.S. Klans, organized a new Klan chapter called the North Carolina Knights. With Cole leading them as their "Grand Wizard", they held their first rally in the small Robeson County community of Shannon, where Cole defended segregation.^[20] He was able to use segregationist rhetoric to grow his following throughout the following year.^[9] He also began promoting the Klan in the town of Monroe in Union County, where black civil rights activists were seeking to end segregation in public facilities. In October 1957 Cole's group attacked a National Association for the Advancement of Colored People member's house in the town, but were repelled by gunfire from armed black activists led by Robert F. Williams.^[21][22] In early 1958 Cole refocused his efforts on upholding segregation in Robeson County.^[9] He hoped to use this campaign to shore up support for his organization.^[18]

On January 13, 1958, Cole and several Klansmen invited local journalist Bruce Roberts to cover their itinerary for the evening in Robeson. In St. Pauls, they burned a cross near the home of a Native American woman who was dating a white man.^{[lower-alpha 1]} They also burned a cross in Lumberton, near the home of an Indian family that had recently moved into a white neighborhood. Cole informed Roberts that he was planning a large Klan rally the following Saturday night somewhere in or near the town of Pembroke, the center of Robeson's Lumbee community, where he would condemn the "mongrelization" of the races.^[24]

Roberts reported on the events and the planned rally in the January 14 edition of the Scottish Chief, the newspaper of the small town of Maxton. Nearby publications quickly repeated the story. Cole hoped the rally would attract hundreds or thousands of Klansmen. Rumors circulated that Robeson gun stores were selling large quantities of ammunition on Tuesday, raising fears of a violent confrontation.^[24] One Klansman went into the offices of the Scottish Chief and the Lumberton Post to ask them to advertise the rally.^[25] They also posted fliers to display their intentions.^[18] To further publicize the event, Cole and other Klansmen drove throughout the county in a truck outfitted with a loudspeaker, broadcasting their plans. The loudspeaker announcements infuriated the Lumbee community.^[18][24]

Fearing violence, Robeson County Sheriff Malcolm McLeod went to Cole's home in South Carolina and pleaded with him to suspend the rally, but Cole refused,^[26] telling him, "It sounds like you don't know how to handle your people. We're going to come show you."^[18] Unable to find someone willing to lease him land in Pembroke, Cole rented a small cornfield from a white farmer who lived near Hayes Pond.^[24] Hayes Pond was a former mill pond located along Big Shoe Heel Creek, south of Maxton,^[27] approximately 10 miles (16 km) from Pembroke.^[24] Maxton Chief of Police Bob Fisher, who was opposed to the Klan's presence, sent letters to state and federal authorities to ask for their assistance,^[28] while the town board of commissioners passed a resolution condemning the Klan and denouncing the rally.^[29]

At a barbershop in Pembroke, a group of Lumbee men met and suggested confronting the Klansmen in Maxton so that they would not disturb their town.^{[21][lower-alpha 2]} Other Lumbees discussed the situation in the local Veterans of Foreign Wars Hall.^[18] Accounts of how organized the Lumbees were in their response vary. In the 1960s anthropologist Karen Blu interviewed several Lumbee participants, and none mentioned the names of any leaders in this effort. She wrote that "one man" who was cited as a leader by the press was frequently criticized by her respondents for apparently professing that role.^[31] According to local activist Willa Robinson, black people who worked in the same businesses with Klansmen and were familiar with the KKK gave the Lumbees intelligence about the meeting.^[32] National news organizations such as the Associated Press, United Press International, and the International News Syndicate crafted reports printed in North Carolina and across the country which spoke of potential violence at the rally.^[33]

Reactions

The local black community was pleased with the results of the clash, while the white community was relieved.^[54] North Carolina Governor Luther H. Hodges responded to the incident by calling Sheriff McLeod and Pembroke Mayor J. C. Oxendine to assure them of his help if the situation required it. He then released a statement to the public, condemning the Ku Klux Klan as a violent group^[55] and stating that responsibility for the disorder "rests squarely" on Klan leaders.^[46] Other white observers—both locally and nationally—had mixed feelings about responsibility, expressing sympathy for the Lumbees' actions but suggesting that Cole's First Amendment rights may have been violated.^[46] Mayor Oxendine received telegrams, letters, and phone calls of approval from Native and non-indigenous Americans from around the United States. Alabama Governor Jim Folsom issued a statement reading, "The white man has mistreated the Indian for 400 years. This is one time I'm glad to see and hope the Indians continue to beat the paleface."^[56]

The day after the failed rally, large North Carolinian newspapers such as The News and Observer and The Charlotte Observer ran stories on the clash.^[36] Most were favorable to the Lumbees and portrayed the Klansmen as antagonists. Initial reports in state and national newspapers were melodramatic and portrayed the Lumbees using stereotypes associated with Western Plains Indians.^[57] The Santa Fe New Mexican misidentified the Lumbees as part of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians.^[58] The local media in Robeson County did not publish on Sundays, thus it was not until later in the week that the Scottish Chief and The Robesonian released their reporting.^[33] Their stories covered the affair and preceding events in detail and avoided the use of caricatures, treating the Lumbees as they did other community residents.^[59] On January 23 the Scottish Chief issued an editorial titled "Setting the Record Straight," which criticized the national sensationalism, saying, "all too frequently news mediums are searching for a colorful angle to a story and in doing so stretch or add to the facts."^[60]

Local editorials sided with the Lumbees, framing the clash as a conflict between locals and outsiders, though the editorial board of The Robesonian downplayed local discontent with segregation, proclaiming there was "no racial rift" between Native Americans and whites in Robeson County.^[61] Editorial pieces from around the United States ridiculed the Klan for their behavior. The Anti-Defamation League reported that the affair "sent a ripple of laughter clear across the country."^[42] Reflecting on the national praise for the Lumbees' actions at Hayes Pond in contrast to the muted response to the armed black resistance to the KKK in Monroe in 1957, Robert Williams wrote, "The national press played up the Indian-Klan fight because they didn't consider this a great threat—the Indians are a tiny minority and people could laugh at the incident as a sentimental joke—but no one wanted Negroes to get the impression that this was an accepted way to deal with the Klan."^[62]

Legal proceedings

On January 20 Sheriff McLeod declared that he would seek the arrest of Cole for the disorder. The following day a Robeson County grand jury indicted Cole, Martin, and others unknown to the state for inciting a riot. Cole, who was by then in South Carolina, posted bail, declared his intent to fight extradition back to North Carolina, and said he would host a new rally, saying, "It will be the greatest rally the Klan has had. I expect there will be more than 5,000 Klansmen there and probably more. Klansmen all over the South are pretty upset."^[63] This never occurred.^[64] Cole was eventually extradited with the permission of the South Carolina governor and held on bond.^[65]

On January 23, Martin was tried for the drunkenness and weapons charges^[64] before the Recorder's Court in Maxton by Judge Pro Tem Lacy Maynor, the second Native American in Robeson County to ever be elected to a judgeship. Martin denounced the Klan for abandoning him in the field and vowed that he would leave the organization.^[47] Maynor thought that the circumstances of the situation were "tragic"^[66] and gave Martin a suspended 60-day sentence and a $60 fine.^[64] In his sentence the judge told him, "You have helped to bring about nationwide advertisement to a people who do not want that kind of advertisement—who only want to create a community that would be an asset to our nation. If your organization had something worthwhile to offer, we would be happy to have you. But the history of your organization proves that it has nothing to offer".^[66]

Cole and Martin both faced the riot charges in the Robeson County Superior Court in Lumberton.^[46] Cole argued in his defense that he had legally rented the field, had a right to hold a rally, and that the Lumbees had provoked the situation while McLeod had provided inadequate security. The prosecutors argued that the Klan had aggravated public sentiment by burning crosses in the county and employing inflammatory speech, billed the rally as a public event (thus it was not a private meeting), and that, according to statements made by Martin, had encouraged Klansmen to bring weapons with them.^[64] About 350 Lumbees sat in the gallery during the trial. The prosecutor asked the jury, "Gentlemen, you had better stop this. If you don't, there will be more bloodshed."^[46] He then pointed to the audience and said, "If you think you can take [any] Kluxer [...] and drive that crowd around, you've got another think a-coming".^[46] In March, the jury found Martin and Cole guilty.^{[64][lower-alpha 4]} The judge delivered Cole the most stringent sentence of 18–24 months incarceration, while Martin was given a lesser punishment.^[46] Cole appealed his case and was freed on bond pending its reconsideration.^[68]

Impact on the Ku Klux Klan

Cole never organized another public rally in Robeson County after the incident.^{[46][lower-alpha 5]} In the wake of Cole's and Martin's arrests as well as some disagreements about organization finances, some members of the North Carolina Knights split off and created their own Klan chapters.^[70] Cole attempted to rebrand his organization as a militant, "fighting outfit", and used this to recruit new members across the state with some success.^[68] Throughout North Carolina, Klan leaders told their members to expect armed resistance to their work and prepare themselves accordingly.^[55] In early 1959 Cole was arrested in South Carolina for posing as a private investigator and shortly thereafter lost his appeal in North Carolina for the riot charge and was imprisoned.^[71] His incarceration curtailed Klan recruiting and though the North Carolina Knights elected a new grand wizard to replace him, coordinated policing by the State Bureau of Investigation and other agencies—encouraged by Hodges—led to a decline in Klan membership.^[72] North Carolina KKK organizations later resurged in the mid-1960s.^[73] In 1966, Klansmen declared their intent to hold another rally at the same field near Maxton,^[74] provoking the ire of Lumbees.^[75] State authorities received reports of Lumbees stockpiling weapons, and a superior court issued an injunction, prohibiting the meeting.^[74] Klan challenges to the order were dismissed.^[76] North Carolina Knights Grand Dragon Bob Jones told the press, "We want to ally with the Indian and see he gets some civil rights from the government. The Indians have never had an ally and if we're going to give civil rights to the Niggers, we're going to give them to the Indians."^[74] Simeon Oxendine was dismissive of these remarks, saying, "I don't think Jones is in a position to give anything to anyone. I think the constitution gives us our rights,"^[74] and the Native Americans in the county were unreceptive to the invitation.^[77]