Reporters on the Job
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Birth of a Civil Rights Movement? Correspondent Susan Sachs started following France's nascent black civil rights movement (see story) several months ago. In her story, she describes a meeting in Paris between a visiting Edgar Chase III, a visiting African-American business professor from Dillard University in New Orleans, La., and about 20 members of the rights group.
"The session reminded me of what I imagine must have gone on in Mississippi in the 1960s. What surprised me, and I think Professor Chase, was how eager the people were to protest, and embrace the American civil rights movement as a model," she says.
Susan's perception of the event, held in a Paris government office after hours, was that the professor had come to give a prosaic speech about the history of his university and family. "He was suddenly drawn into a vigorous nuts-and-bolts discussion about the US civil rights movement. They asked, 'Tell us how you did this?' and 'How did you make these organizational links?' "
She recalls that one of the French participants said, "If we do these marches or call for boycotts, people will be angry." "The professor replied: 'Yes, you will make people uncomfortable.' They loved that," says Susan.
The energy and enthusiasm of those attending the meeting appeared to crystallize something for the group's leadership, she says: "It was time to take a stand and shake things up."
David Clark Scott
World editor
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FIRST IN 522 YEARS:
Moira Cameron (center) will become the first female to guard the Tower of London where the Crown Jewels have been stored since the 1300s. The guards or "yeoman warders" are nicknamed Beefeaters for the rations of meat given to them in medieval times.
SANG TAN/AP
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