“radicals tried their hardest and simply couldn’t get anyone to show up” i don’t believe this for one second.
Protests and political ground games are interesting by their effectiveness or ineffectiveness. Atlanta in 2014 Dem Nunn had a highly visible, well funded, well organized ground game. I predicted she would lose in a close race to Republican Perdue.
My co-workers and neighbors, mostly Black working class and dependable Dem voters, in 2010 told me they were angry that their health insurance premiums went up, their deductibles went up, their coverage went down.
They said they would not vote for Nunn ‘to teach those politicians a lesson.’ I didn’t believe them. But the election results showed that the Dems massive GOTV effort could not overcome voters personal experience. Perdue won and it wasn’t even close.
In IL I had the same experience. Sometimes my ground game was extremely effective because the candidate or issue was with me, or at least neutral. But when the establishment put up an anti-Hispanic Republican for governor, I couldn’t get anyone to vote for him.
The same with the 6os and 70s protests I was in. Success of the protest depended on the issue and personalized enemy as well as the organizing effort.
The biggest personalized enemy during the late 60’s protests was the Vietnam draft.
;^)