The Man They Love to Hate

For the first time in history, South Carolina Negroes voted freely last week in the Democratic primary; by evening of election day nearly 35,000 had cast their ballots. To old families in the mansions along Charleston's historic Battery, as to most South Carolinians across the state, this was sacrilege. But proud Charleston spent its bitterness on the cause, rather than the effect of this enormous social change. It charged it all up to cold-eyed, 68-year-old Federal Judge J. Waties Waring.

Antique Grandeur. Judge Waring was one of Charleston's own. He was born of an old and honored family; he married a Charleston girl. He was appointed to the bench January 1942 on the recommendation of the late Senator "Cotton Ed" Smith. Until he was 65, he abided by the insular mores of Charleston's first families and devoted himself to the dusty grandeur of Charleston's traditions.

Three years ago, after 32 years of marriage, he and his wife got a Florida divorce (South Carolina has no divorce laws). The judge married a Connecticut woman. He was instantly ostracized. He did not take it well. Charleston lawyers complained that he grew more vituperative and irascible month by month. But as time wore on, he also grew more liberal in his opinions. His onetime friends did not consider the possibility that an elderly man might gain a new and deeper understanding of justice and the law. They whispered that he was "out to get his revenge."

Last July they were sure of it. Judge Waring ordered the Democratic Party to open its enrollment books to Negroes and permit them "full participation in party affairs." He went even further. When a white man, Senatorial Candidate Alan Johnstone, rose to protest, the judge had him forcibly ejected. He told the crowd of Negroes who jammed his courtroom: "It is a disgrace when you have to come . . . and ask a judge to tell you how to be an American."

He was jeered and denounced. When lightning struck a house next to his summer cottage on Sullivan's Island beach, its owner nailed up a neatly lettered sign: "Dear God, He Lives Next Door." Every man entered in South Carolina's senatorial race vilified him during the campaign. Congressman L. Mendel Rivers sought to institute impeachment proceedings against him, cried: "Unless he is removed . . . there will be bloodshed. He is now in the process of extracting a pound of flesh from the white people of South Carolina because, through his own actions, he has been ostracized from their society."

New Dignity. Last week there was no bloodshed. South Carolina's Negroes voted quietly. Their votes did not change the result--all the favorites, including blue-blooded, well-heeled U.S. Senator Burnet R. Maybank of Charleston, won handily. Whatever South Carolina thought last week, history might remember crusty, umbrageous Judge J. Waties Waring as a man of cool courage.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.