OR WE'LL ALL HANG SEPARATELY

We Shall Overcome"" came from the Highlander Folk School with the 1960 sit-in leaders, both the product of a unique establishment that was, in effect, the South's first freedom school. Since 1932 ""a stopping place for traveling liberals and a meeting place for southern radicals"" (including the author), Highlander has withstood Tennessee's legal prosecutions, FBI harassment, charges of communism and total destruction of its plant. From early participation and follow-up visits, Mr. Bledsoe recounts the history of the school and its founder, egalitarian Southerner Myles Horton -- the dramatic incidents, conduct of workshops, effect on participants. The title reflects Bledsoe's belief that ""It is up to all of us who reject the establishment to hang together. Otherwise we'll hang separately."" Throughout its involvement in organizing labor and, later, in advancing civil rights, the school has sought to achieve a cohesive pluralism; this is still the author's ideal. Highlander, and Horton, have been over-investigated and under-reported; here they appear to advantage.