Unpromising forecast for North Carolina due to loss of local and white political solidarity
Lake takes a pessimistic view of North Carolina's political and regional future. He blames the population expansion of North Carolina cities on the destruction of local community bonds. Lake also criticizes compromising state legislators who abandon their political base in order to pander to largely black electorates, and counts the passage of the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday as an example. He instead advocates that whites vote along racial lines. In Lake's estimation, the decline of local community intimacy and white political solidarity leads to a bleak future for North Carolina.
Citing this Excerpt
Oral History Interview with I. Beverly Lake Sr., September 8, 1987. Interview C-0043. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007) in the Southern Oral History Program Collection, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Full Text of the Excerpt
- CHARLES DUNN:
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Where do you see North Carolina going in the future?
- I. BEVERLY LAKE:
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Well, it's always impossible to look very far into the future.
I think that North Carolina will continue to develop as an industrial
state. New industries, which you and I cannot now perceive, will be
developed as the result of inventions which we've never
dreamed of. I am concerned about the growth of many of our North
Carolina communities. I think we're about bursting at the
seams. I know we are in Raleigh, and I know we are
in Wake Forest. The little town of Wake Forest today is a delightful
place to live, or I wouldn't live in it. I have fine
neighbors. The trouble is today that the Town of Wake Forest is about
three times as large as it was when I was growing up. Consequently. I do
not know a third of my neighbors, whereas I used to know practically
everybody in town, white and black. That is a disadvantage, in my mind,
of the development of this little community, and I think in the
development of Raleigh. I went to Raleigh to practice in 1929. Within, I
think, three months I had at least a speaking acquaintance with every
lawyer in Raleigh because Raleigh was very small. We would meet each
other on the streets, cafeteria for lunch, and we knew who we were. That
carried over into our clashes in the court. We respected each other, and
we liked each other. Of course, we had some we liked better than others.
Today, there are so many lawyers in Raleigh, they haven't the
faintest idea who's in the next office. They don't
know each other. They don't know how to deal with each other
in the courtroom which we knew how to do. Now to me the changes in the
legal profession have taken, and I like to say, all the fun out of
practicing law. Now, I use fun in the broad sense, pleasure. I think
that there is not today the former close relationship and concern
between the average lawyer and the average client. They don't
know each other as individuals. I'm sure, the more I observe,
that that is probably even more true of the medical profession. My very
dear friend--my present wife's former husband,
George Mackie, who died about twenty years ago--was genuinely
beloved by all the people in this area, country
and town, a great doctor. He had the opportunity to go up and be one of
the "Main Line" Philadelphia social doctors, and he
would have done well up there and prospered greatly. He preferred to be
a country doctor in North Carolina. The people in this area remember him
as "The Great and Beloved Physician." Now, there is a
man who was a real success, who left his son a heritage which will never
rust or fade away. I should like to be remembered somewhat comparably.
I don't know where North Carolina's heading. With
all due respect to the members of the last Legislature. I thought the
performance of the Legislature was a disgrace. I have a letter sent to
me by a friend from a man who was prominent in politics in North
Carolina and still carries a great deal of weight. The man to whom that
letter was sent was critical of the Legislature for making the birthday
of Martin Luther King a state holiday. I also think it's a
disgrace to have a state holiday for a man of deplorable character like
Martin Luther King. It bothers me. This former legislator and prominent
lawyer was defending that action. He said, "I think it was
disgraceful to make Martin Luther King's birthday a holiday
in North Carolina. But I must remember that the eastern counties of
North Carolina politically lie in the hands of the Negro block vote. Any
legislator from eastern North Carolina who had not voted for that would
not have been re-elected." I don't think
that's right. Now this man said the remedy is,
"You've got to get the white people out to vote as
white people." Now that's different from my position
originally. But you see, you're in
danger of racial crisis and discord. It's not gone.
- CHARLES DUNN:
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No sir.
- I. BEVERLY LAKE:
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And he said, "You've got to be elected." I
say that I was ashamed of that statement. A man who has held high office
in North Carolina said that he would vote contrary to his moral
principles and his belief as to what's good for North
Carolina in order to be re-elected to the Legislature. Now, when
we've got legislators who are imbued with that philosopy of
politics, I am concerned for the future of our State and the happiness
of our people of both races.