Initial Broadcast Date: January 23, 1972
30 minutes -- Color
Black Journal will investigate the fatal shooting of two black students at Southern University’s Baton Rouge, LA campus. Students and faculty members and Louisiana Governor Edwin W. Edwards will appear on the program.
Sherriff’s deputies were called to the University to subdue a student demonstration against the school’s administrative policies. A bi-racial commission, appointed by the Attorney General of the state later reported that Leonard Douglas Brown and Denver A. Smith, both 20, were killed when a live shot gun shell was loaded into a deputy’s gun instead of a tear gas shell.
Herbert Harris, a campus activist, who was standing next to the two slain students when they were shot, believes the shots were intended for him. Harris recalls on the program: “I was standing between them, as I went down, they (sheriff’s deputies) fired … I believe they were shooting at me, they pointed out seven people they considered leaders.”
Guards barred the Black Journal crew from interviewing certain campus leaders, and seven militant leaders were kept off the University campus through a court injunction following the incident.
In addition, several faculty members were fired by the administration on the grounds that they were “too closely involved” with some of the demonstrating students.
Now, Louisiana state officials are considering merging the predominantly black school with Louisiana State University as a means of curbing black student demands in the future, the program notes.
“Black Journal” is a production of WNET New York.
Executive producer: Tony Brown
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