Clive Webb

Special Relationships: mixed-race couples in post-war Britain and the United States

ABSTRACT This article uses a transatlantic lens to reassess interracial relationships in 1950s Britain. Although mixed-race couples in this country suffered serious discrimination, Britain appeared relatively progressive to African Americans on the other side of the Atlantic engaged in a struggle for recognition of their constitutional rights. In contrast to the United States, there were no laws in Britain that prohibited interracial marriage. The British also appeared more open to public discussion of relationships that crossed the colour line including the production of several films that focused attention on this controversial subject. This apparently more inclusive attitude towards gender and race relations provided an inspirational model to African Americans in their fight for equality.

Mexican Perspectives on Mob Violence in the United States

Second to African Americans, no ethnic or racial group in the United States suffered more at the hands of lynch mobs than did Mexicans. From the signing of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848, to the last known lynching of an alleged Mexican criminal in 1928, American mobs executed thousands of Mexicans, though the precise number will never be known. Although they endured widespread oppression, Mexicans were not passive victims of mob violence. On the contrary, they implemented numerous strategies of resistance, ranging from promotion of legislative reform to armed self-defense and retaliatory violence.

The Price of Whiteness: Jews, Race, and American Identity

The Price of Whiteness: Jews, Race, and American Identity. By Eric L. Goldstein. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006. xii, 307 pp.

Reluctant partners: African Americans and the origins of the special relationship

29.95, isbn 0-691-12105-2.)

Unraveling the special relationship: British responses to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy

This article assesses the overwhelmingly negative reaction of African Americans to the speech delivered by Winston Churchill in Fulton, Missouri, in March 1946. It shows that black intellectuals and activists fervently opposed the Anglo-American alliance championed by the former prime minister because they believed it a cynical attempt to buttress an exploitative overseas empire that Britain could no longer afford. African Americans considered Churchill a racist intent on preserving white global hegemony and suppressing the democratic aspirations of people of colour. Despite their initial optimism about the Attlee government elected to power in July 1945, they became almost as mistrustful of the Labour Party as they did the Conservatives. In demonstrating how African Americans considered the Anglo-American alliance to be a means of propagating white racism, the article provides a new perspective on grassroots resistance to the Special Relationship, emphasising tensions between diplomatic elites and ordinary citizens.

Brotherhood, betrayal, and rivers of blood: Southern segregationists and British race relations

This article contributes to the scholarly literature on Anglo-American relations in the 1960s by investigating elite and grassroots British responses to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in Dallas, Texas, on 22 November 1963. Most historians working on this topic regard the early years of the decade as a high point in the evolution of the so-called “special relationship” between the two countries – an association epitomized by the broadly productive working relationship between Kennedy and Prime Minister Harold Macmillan. They also tend to assume that ordinary Britons’ stunned reaction to the slaying betokened broad popular support for the youthful president as well as the cold war superpower to which their country shared close elite ties. While there was certainly much admiration for Kennedy among politicians, reporters, entertainers, and ordinary members of the public, many Britons were by no means enamored of either the president or the United States. As this article reveals, elements on the left and right of the political continuum in Britain were openly critical of Kennedy’s foreign and domestic policies. The president’s faltering response to the African American civil rights movement, for example, was widely criticized by members of the UK’s own nascent Afro-Caribbean community as well as progressive whites. When the British government sought to mark Kennedy’s passing by creating a national memorial (in part to demonstrate the strength of the special relationship), the underwhelming popular response to its ambitious fund-raising campaign uncovered a wide seam of grassroots opposition to the late president, his family and the United States. There is, to date, a troubling absence of scholarship on anti-Americanism in postwar Britain. This essay highlights the need for further research in this area.

Jim Crow and Union Jack: Southern segregationists and the British far right

Brent: “I thought you had a good enlightened borough council. After all, they have invited me.”

Delaying the Dream: Southern Senators and the Fight against Civil Rights, 1938-1965. By Keith M. Finley. (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2008. xii, 340 pp.

This essay examines some of the complex relationships that developed between British and American extreme right movements in the 1960s, especially those linked to the Ku Klux Klan. Webb’s analysis explores relationships that formed at this time between the American Ku Klux Klan of this era, and British groups. The essay highlights how interaction between British and American racist cultures were linked to other organisations, including the National States Rights Party and the Racial Preservation Society. Finally, it highlights the significance of Enoch Powell in America, showing how a British figure could influence American politics. Webb’s essay offers an important examination of interactions that allowed the race politics of the American South to impact on British protagonists, and vice versa.

40.00, ISBN 978-0-8071-3345-3.)

Delaying the dream: Southern senators and the fight against civil rights, 1938-1965. By Keith M. Finley. (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2008. xii, 340 pp.

Counterblast: How the Atlanta temple bombing strengthened the civil rights cause

40.00, ISBN 978-0-8071-3345-3.)