MORE HAS BEEN WRITTEN about the role of oratory in the movement than about the role of organizing. Historian David Garrow contends that the real emergence of a sustained, widespread movement in the South can be traced in many respects to SNCC’s decision in the summer of 1961 to create a cadre of locally based, full-time, grass-roots organizers, marking the first time that indigenous activists had such day-to-day assistance available to them.
