Synopses & Reviews
"Clearly and closely analyzes the actions and motivations of one of the segregationist South’s most formidable institutions. Based on archival source materials, this is an original and important addition to our expanding knowledge of the mechanics of southern resistance to desegregation and the development of modern conservatism."--George Lewis, University of Leicester
In 1956, state Senator Charley Johns was appointed the chairman of the newly formed Florida Legislative Investigation Committee, now remembered as the Johns Committee. This group was charged with the task of unearthing communist tendencies, homosexual persuasions, and anything they saw as subversive behavior in academic institutions throughout Florida. With the cooperation of law enforcement, the committee interrogated and spied on countless individuals, including civil rights activists, college students, public school teachers, and university faculty and administrators.
Today, the actions of the Johns Committee are easily dismissed as homophobic and bigoted. Communists and Perverts under the Palms reveals how the creation of the committee was a logical and unsurprising result of historic societal anxieties about race, sexuality, obscenity, and liberalism. Stacy Braukman illustrates how the responses to those societal anxieties, particularly the Johns Committee, laid the foundation for the resurgence of conservatism in the 1960s. Braukman is considered and nuanced in her stance, refusing a blanket condemnation of the extremism of a committee whose influence, even decades after its dissolution, continues to be felt in the culture wars of today.
Stacy Braukman is an independent scholar and coauthor of Gay and Lesbian Atlanta.
Synopsis
“Braukman's research is meticulous, and her ‘page-turner’ narrative offers a window into the past as one contemplates today’s social, cultural, and political hatreds. A must read.”—Choice
“In what started as a crackdown on pro-racial integration factions in Florida’s colleges, gay students and professors quickly became the targets of a years-long hunt to eliminate ‘sexual deviance’ in the state’s public classrooms. . . . Braukman examines the effect the crackdown had on Florida’s universities and the wider civil rights movement for blacks and gays.”InsideHigherEd.com
“Provides a valuable genealogy of right-wing, anti-gay, and anti-progressive organizations?how they grew and gave birth to similar organizations.”—Gay and Lesbian Review
“What makes Communists and Perverts Under the Palms a penetrating read is not only its chronicling of a microcosm of the fight against civil rights, but its implications for how that fight is still waged by cultural conservatives today. . . . It is one of the best, and the most important, books of the year.”—Lambda Literary
Today, the actions of the Johns Committee are easily dismissed as homophobic and bigoted. Stacy Braukman reveals how the creation of the committee was a logical and unsurprising result of historic societal anxieties about race, sexuality, obscenity, and liberalism.
About the Author
Stacy Braukman is an independent scholar and coauthor of Gay and Lesbian Atlanta.