Pioneering Feminists of the Civil Rights Movement

 

Early Life

The tenth of twelve children, Lulu was born in Elmo, Texas, in1900  to Henry Madison, a landowner, and Easter Madison, a domestic worker. Lulu received her early education in Elmo and Terrell public schools. Following her high school graduation, she attended Butler College for one year, and then transferred to Prairie View A&M College, where she received a bachelor’s degree in English in 1928 . In that same year, she married a prominent Houston businessman, Julius White, who had a significant amount of liquid capital, was a longtime member of the NAACP, and had funded and served as plaintiff in several white primary cases. This marriage had both its advantages and disadvantages. Initially unable to find a teaching job in the Houston Independent School District because of her husband’s involvement in civil rights, Lulu White, eventually, secured a position in Lufkin, Texas. After teaching school for nine years, she resigned her post and became an activist with the NAACP in the struggle to eliminate the Texas white Democratic primary elections. While working for the NAACP, she served in the capacities of director of youth council, field worker, and acting president of the Houston chapter (7).

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Early Political Activism

Between 1940  and 1943 , as black Texans, especially those in Houston, began to prepare for what they hoped would be the final  assault on the white primary, the need for more money, members, and workers became apparent. Consequently, in the fall of 1942 , the executive board of the Houston chapter of the NAACP voted to set a goal of five thousand members for its upcoming membership drive. Many thought this goal was unrealistic, but they quickly changed their minds as they witnessed the enthusiasm generated by the Smith v. Allwright case (7). Moreover, The NAACP, while trying to fulfill its objective and reach its goal, needed an executive secretary to handle the day-to-day operations of the branch in order to free the president of some responsibilities. A number of factors led to White's selection as the first full-time salaried secretary of the Houston branch. These factors are: increased activities, increased political awareness, and an increase in emphasis on membership. Lulu Bell White was  the first female in the South to hold such a post (7).

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Given her previous experiences, Lulu White was ready for the challenge. Exuberant upon hearing the news that she would become executive secretary, she exclaimed in a letter to the national executive secretary, Walter White: “Give me five years, and I’ll be darned if I do not give you 5 ,000  members in Houston. I won’t be a bit surprised if you . . . move your headquarters here (7).” True to her words, in six years Lulu White moved the organization from the brink of ruin to the pinnacle of success in terms of racial advancement. She transformed the NAACP from a fledging organization into one that was second in size only to the group in Detroit, and from a civil rights organization that dealt with legal issues to one that also employed direct action (7).

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NAACP

In the spring of 1943 , Lulu White began the most remarkable period of her public life. In this unique position, she understood her centrality in the movement that was gripping the state because she was now a formal primary leader with a title and power. In many instances in the civil rights movement, women had power without title or title without power, and rarely did one have both. Her social location within the movement as a member of two marginalized groups, black and female, enabled her to be an effective purveyor of public consciousness, racial identity, and group solidarity (7).

 

Furthermore, Driven by a determination to destroy the constitutional basis of Jim Crow and empowered by the movement’s activities, more often than not White operated in “free spaces” without any clear standard of conduct. For instance, during her first year as secretary, White made good on her promise that she would not fit the conventional mold of executive secretary, and as a result, many of her followers, who had been members of the NAACP for decades and who looked upon the organization as an elite club, soon found White overturning traditions (7).

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White concentrated a great deal of her effort on recruiting new members and on starting new chapters in cities. She defied tradition by going to both churches and nightclubs to get new members, but, also, continued the legalistic strategy used by the NAACP in the past to secure civil rights for blacks. White employed a more direct form of protest by boycotting, picketing, demonstrating, and simply “raising hell” in order to achieve her objectives (7).

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Protests with NAACP

In 1943, White led an NAACP boycott against Weingarten’s grocery that resulted in the dismissal of one of the store’s security guards who had struck a black customer, while another protest led to the establishment of Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) units in some of the city’s black high schools. An NAACP-led demonstration made it possible for blacks to attend a production of Porgy and Bess at the Houston Music Hall and to be seated on the floor level. Lulu White also staged solo demonstrations to try on women’s apparel in department stores (7).

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Leader of NAACP

Lulu White’s boldness created the movement’s culture for the elimination of the white primary. If the movement were to succeed, it needed risk taking, passion, and spontaneity. The movement needed mobilization of people and resources, as well as money and institutional backing. Yet central to any mobilization effort is its leadership. One of the things that the movement sorely needed was a professional leader who had the time, resources, and energy to bridge, expand, and transform the techniques needed to encourage people to join the NAACP. The movement, therefore, had found that leader in Lulu White (7).

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She was able to keep the association healthy via membership and fundraising mainly through her association and work with individuals. White’s role in helping to build the NAACP might be better understood by looking at it as the transcending of leadership wherein leaders engage and create new “leader-followers.” By engaging ministers and presidents of civic, political, professional, educational, labor, and women’s groups early in her career, the executive secretary was able to establish a “leader-followership.” Enjoying herself immensely as she went about creating new branches and reviving old ones, White told Ella Baker, a national fieldworker, “I get a big kick out of these people wanting branches. So, I say get as many as fifty and you may have your own and they start hustling for members (7).”  This kind of infectious charisma and knowledge of how to “sell” the NAACP enabled White to develop the loyal following so necessary to the movement in the 1940s. Moreover, Lulu White and her colleagues: were effective organizers because  they knew their followers and how to motivate them. They, also, were able to identify potential local leaders and inspire them to action (7).

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Women's Group

Her work with Women’s group provided a powerful resource for recruitment and mobilization. Lulu White had developed a leader-followership among women’s groups before she became executive secretary, and she capitalized on this network. Many of the women who became leaders in the fight against the white primary were individuals who were members of the same social club, women’s organization, or church as Lulu White. They had risen to positions of formal leaders, community organizers, or mobilizers mainly through their ability to network. When asked by White to join the membership campaign, they applied the same networking techniques. For example, the right to vote was discussed at meetings of the Metropolitan Council of Negro Women and the Art, Literary, and Charity Club. These women cast a wide recruitment net, inducing others to join the movement, especially those who found it difficult to join the NAACP or had other options or priorities (7).

 

Assault on White-only Democratic Primary Election

In anticipation of a favorable Supreme Court decision in the NAACP’s final assault on the white primary, White mounted a pay-your-poll tax campaign. When victory came for blacks in Smith v. Allwright  (1944 ) she hailed it as a second emancipation, but was quick to urge blacks to get involved in politics. One of White’s greatest concerns from 1944  to 1948  was how to get blacks into the political system that had come open as a result of Smith v. Allwright . The success of the NAACP in overturning the primary law launched a new era in both black politics and Democratic Party elections. Probably more than any other Texan of her time, Lulu White argued that a strong black voice was needed to shape governmental policies at local and state levels in the 1940s and 1950s (7).

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Black Participation

To ensure black participation in the movement for social change, she urged blacks to assume greater roles in the political lives of their communities, to learn about political techniques and organizations, and to prepare for future leadership positions. She argued convincingly that those who understood the movement for social change had to identify with it fully and must interpret it to others. She was successful in urging blacks to vote and seek office (7). Against the policies of the NAACP, she also: conducted voter registration seminars, helped select candidates, and aided in drafting campaign platforms. She was instrumental in getting Lee Haywood Simpson to run as the first black for city council in 1946 and Erma Leroy to run as the first black female for state representative in 1948 (7).

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Post NAACP

Many individuals who viewed White as a radical, must have felt relieved when she resigned as Executive Secretary of the Houston Chapter of the NAACP in June 1949. However, White continued to organize, to demonstrate, and to attack discrimination in city establishments, but most especially she continued to push for blacks to enter into electoral politics.  In 1949, she formed a Chat-an-Hour Coffee Club, a women’s group that set aside an hour each week to discuss how they could get blacks into the political system. By 1955, the year when Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to a white passenger on a Montgomery city bus, thereby gaining credit for starting the modern civil rights movement, Lulu White had already established a Political Action Committee (PAC) to get the most qualified black men and women to run for office (7).

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White remained active activist in the black community until her death on July 6, 1957.

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Bibliography

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