Parting the Waters: America in the King Years 1954-63

by Taylor Branch

Friday, December 16, brought the first morning in a week without marches or arrests. The Albany Movement leaders found that the spirit of the mass meeting was difficult to preserve. Their people were in jail, losing jobs. Reaching for a settlement, they sent through their negotiators the mildest four-part proposal they could tolerate: (1) free, unfettered use of the bus and train facilities by Negroes beginning thirty days hence; (2) acceptance by the city of property bonds instead of cash, which would enable those already out of jail to get refunds, and would make it possible to secure the release of the others; (3) appointment by the city of a biracial commission to discuss, without precondition, other aspects of segregation in Albany; (4) a permanent moratorium on demonstrations. As time dragged on without a response to this package, fears grew that it was so weak as to encourage the whites to filibuster in the hope that the Albany Movement would collapse.