Well, what I remember was that there was in the election, my
understanding was, and Dr. Brooks can clarify this, that the top
vote-getter or top vote-getters would be put on the board of elections,
would be put to the board of elections. Well, and of course, if you won
the vote you would anyway. But anyway, there was some kind of
understanding that there would be additional persons put on the, excuse
me, the board of education, as an outcome of that election. Well, it
didn't happen, and the board of elections put persons, excuse me, the
board of education had persons on that board that were not
representative of the vote of the county. We'll put it that way. They
were representative of the full vote, and therefore won, but the people
of the county, as I recall, had really elected Harvey Lowry and Dr.
Brooks, but because of double voting their votes were canceled out,
their winning, and the vote went to another person, an African-American
and a Native American.
So then somewhere along there, about in there, Sim Oxendine had also
run, and maybe it was before then or right after then, and he was
defeated. So Sim, and I, and Hughes Oxendine went to Governor Morgan's
office, excuse me, to Attorney General Morgan's office. That was about
1970, along in there. We just talked to him earnestly about the
injustice of double voting. At that time, I don't know, Sim might have
initiated
Page 7at his defeat—probably Dr. Brooks' defeat
came in '68—and it's probably '70 when Sim was defeated. I'm not sure.
But anyway, there was perhaps a suit that may have been initiated then.
I'm not certain. Perhaps not. It may be in the document that I've
written.
Anyway, the Attorney General got a reading and a response, and it was
declared that double voting was legal and was just. That was the legal
opinion of the state. Then we went to the federal district court in
Raleigh, and that was the opinion of the federal court. So then, of
course, an appeal was made and it was taken to the Fourth Circuit Court
of Appeals.
Well, during all of this time, during the early '70s, a lot was
happening to fortify this whole commitment to empower the people. We
wrote a grant for a Lumbee Caucus to the United Methodist Church, the
Commission on Religion and Race, and then helped the Black community,
urged them to do the same, and provided the proposal that had been
written, the application for the Indian Caucus, so the Black Caucus
could be formed. Then the Reverend Dr. Jimmy Cummings wrote the grant
for the Black Caucus, and there was formed a Black Caucus and a Lumbee
Caucus, both of United Methodist funding, and essentially made up of
United Methodist leadership: Adolph Dial, Herman Dial, and in the Lumbee
Caucus, and Mr. Willie Locklear from the Ashpole community, Hilton
Oxendine from the Lumberton community, and there were others that were a
part of it, myself and Mr. Harbert Moore out of the Prospect community
as well as Adolph. So that was the Indian Caucus. Then the Black Caucus,
Jimmy Cummings, and Oscar Graham, and Robert Fairly, and Preston Jones,
and others made up the Black Caucus.
So the direction of the Indian Caucus and somewhat also of the Black
Caucus was voter registration, political empowerment. That funding came
in '71, and from '71 until
Page 8'96 we received grants in
succession, and we received a total, the two entities received a total
of $97,000 from the Methodist Church to do voter registration. During
that time we registered 11,400 Native Americans and Blacks. Now, the
majority of that number was Native American, and I don't remember the
breakdown but it was more like a 65/55 or something like that, or a
seven and forty-four, more like 7,000 and 4,400 probably. But anyway,
there were quite a few more Native Americans registered than there were
Blacks. We also registered a number of whites during that time, but the
significant fact was we feel like we empowered the people to bring about
change that was necessary and had not been brought about by the
empowerment of the vote.
Now during this time of '70 to '76, along in there, there was the strong
input of Mr. Harbert Moore, and Harbert was an Indigenous Community
Developer of the United Methodist Church. He was the first Indigenous
Community Developer, Native American Community Developer, in the United
Methodist Church, I believe. This came trough the Women's Division of
our United Methodist Church. He worked hard for the breaking of double
voting and for voter registration.
Then we had other very strong players in this whole process and that was
Judge Dexter Brooks. Dexter was a law student during that time at the
University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. One of his professors was
Barry Nakell. Barry then became involved as an act of gratis and love
for justice, he became involved in the whole issue of breaking double
voting. He became the attorney for the procedure, and to my knowledge he
got no money for what he did, nor did Dexter. So they kept us abreast of
the Voting Rights Act. They worked for the redistricting and all that
had to be done there to work for improved districting for better
representation of ethnic people. And then worked with
Page 9us to gain voting registrars, roving registrars, being sure that we
had persons who could register people at schools and elsewhere beyond
their own precinct. That was a quite a concern, seeing all that happen.
One day we were asking, there was Herman, and Adolph, and Harbert, and
different ones of us there, and we were before the board of elections.
They had us there with a transcriber as if we were before the court, a
transcriber there for our being there that day. We were appealing for
this roving registrar just so we could get more people registered. Well,
we were denied that day, but as we came back, one of the persons, I
won't give you his name, we stopped at the Old Foundry Restaurant, and
this person said, "I can understand now why people riot and why there
are fires." He was so frustrated that we had done the legal thing, the
right thing, and we had appealed for something that was just and fair,
and we were denied.
Well, you perhaps know the history, that most of the registrars
throughout the county at that time and during the early '60s, and into
the '60s, were the dominant race, were Caucasian. Often they were farm
owners, and the people that worked for them often were Native American
or Black, and people often felt intimidated to go even to the house.
Well, they had to go to the house to get registered. As well as that,
for a while there was the literacy test. There are all of these ways of
denying and discouraging people from participating in the political
system. So these were revolutionary days because the system was being
opened, wide open.
Brenda Brooks, Howard Brooks' late wife, she was one of our key
registrars. She worked with a passion. She became a roving registrar.
She wanted to see her people
Page 10empowered, wanted to
see Black people empowered also, but particularly her Indian people.
Then we had Mrs. Lady Strickland. That's Brother Homer, attorney Homer's
mother, and mother of W. D. Strickland. She was a registrar. These are
people that, oh, they registered with a passion. They would go to church
events. They would go to any kind of event they could to get people
registered to vote.
So over this period of time all of these things were happening, and as I
said, in the double voting finally, after working our socks off in the
legislative caucus rooms in Raleigh, going there time after time,
pleading for them to break double voting legislatively, we finally
decided we'd do a march.
So about 1974, along in there, it's in the document, we marched on
Raleigh. Got a permit. Brenda, I think, went up and got the permit for
us. We got our permit. There were policemen up on the roof, and here we
came.
That morning we had a prayer meeting. We met at Stan Jones' skating rink
there across from the old town hall of Pembroke. That morning we had
prayer, Blind Cleve Jacobs was there to march, and James Woods, and
others. Mr. Early Maynor met us up there. He was the Executive Director
of the Indian Commission, I think, at that time. Well, anyway, Mr.
Foster Jacobs, a saint of God from the Sandy Plains Church. We had some
wonderful people up there. Oh my, I forget the gentleman's name. Brother
Isaiah. I think preacher Isaiah. I think he was there that day. Isaiah.
What's his last name, preacher Isaiah?