As festival again honors Du Bois, ‘controversial’ exhibit on display
On April 15, 1956, radio broadcaster Sidney Roger sent a telegram to Southern novelist William Faulkner, telling him that W.E.B. Du Bois was challenging him to a debate about civil rights in the wake of the lynching of 14-year-old Emmett Till and the acquittal of his suspected killers by a white jury in Mississippi.
Faulkner replied that a debate would be a “waste of breath” unless Du Bois agreed that the pace of the civil rights movement required “patience and moderation,” given the steady stream of dangerous upheaval.
