In anticipation of such a crisis, he had studied the performance of Alabama authorities during the Freedom Rides. Concluding that their chief error had been to permit violence, which drew publicity and forced federal intervention, he had lectured his officers on how to enforce the race laws without nightsticks or guns. To the City Commission, Pritchett announced that he had instructed his men to make no arrests under the segregation laws themselves, which were vulnerable to legal attack, but to defend segregation under laws protecting the public order. He said he had put the entire Albany
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