Doing No Good

THE NORTH

The City of Brotherly Love last week joined Harlem, Brooklyn, Rochester, Elizabeth, Jersey City and Dixmoor on the list of places where race riots have steamed up the North's long, hot summer. And Philadelphia's violence was even more senseless than most. The blame could not even be placed on both races, since the riot was all-Negro and it was unprovoked by any incident that could conceivably be considered a' civil rights violation.

Philadelphia has worked hard to eliminate friction between Negroes and police. It is one of the few cities with a civilian review board to handle complaints of police brutality. It assigns officers who patrol Negro areas to work in teams, with one white and one Negro cop in each red squad car. Yet when one such team answered a nighttime complaint that a car was blocking an intersection in a neighborhood near Temple University in North Philadelphia, where some 400,000 of the city's 600,000 Negroes live, the trouble began.

The Looting. At the car, the officers found a Negro married couple quarreling. To clear the intersection, they tried to pull the woman, Mrs. Odessa Bradford, 34, out of the driver's seat. She kicked and punched them. A crowd of Negroes began to gather. Negro James Nettles, 41, jumped the officers from behind. One cop reached the police car radio, shouted two words into the mike: "Assist officer." That brought every available cruiser in the area. Nettles and Mrs. Bradford were led into a police wagon--but the riot was on.

Negroes hurled bricks and bottles from rooftops, smashed the windows of the police cars. Rioters ran through the streets, shattered virtually every storefront window in a four-square-mile area. Looters dashed into the stores, grabbed racks of clothing, cases of liquor, groceries, furniture--anything they could move. They overturned cars, set fires, burned down a hat shop. Burglar alarms rang constantly.

Negro Leader Stanley Branche stood on a box at a street corner, used a bullhorn to plead: "Please go home. Please go home. This is doing us no good." The mob answered with hoots, threw stones, bricks and bottles at him, hit him in the leg. Philadelphia N.A.A.C.P. President Cecil Moore shouted: "Come out of that store! Quit looting that store!" A woman climbed atop an overturned refrigerator to yell: "Black man, do you hear me? Cecil has nothing to tell you. I'm a black woman. Let them take me."

The leaders' pleas had no effect as a hooting, looting mood dominated the streets. A woman leaned against a shoe store, tried to trade a bag of shoes she had pilfered for more desirable loot that others carried. Two women dragged large boxes behind them. Said one to the other: "Let's get home before this stuff gets broken." The area of narrow three-story tenements was strewn with broken glass, nude mannequins, disabled cars, police and fire vehicles.

Prepared for More. Every cop in the city was ordered to duty, some 1,400 of them sent into the riot area. Under strict orders not to shoot or to use riot trained police dogs, they moved against the mob with billy clubs. Some 150 people, including 35 police, were injured. About 165 rioters were arrested.

Yet next day more mobs formed, and Negroes continued to slip inside stores, rush out with merchandise. Mayor James Tate invoked an 1850 law to ban everyone not on a valid, pressing errand from the streets in a 125-block area. Some 300 state troopers also stood by. Some semblance of order was restored, but officials were prepared for more violence at any moment.

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