Hough Riots Remembered
By Dr. Zachery Williams
Historical Memory:
Beginning on this date in 1966 and extending for six days until July 23rd, one of the most damaging urban rebellions occured in the Hough neighborhood of East Cleveland, Ohio. Known as "Rough Hough," or "the jungle," at the time, unrest due to continuing deplorable social conditions of underdevelopment and poverty, culminated into a tenderbox of frustration, pain, anger, and cries for self-determination.
The following statistics record the aftermath:
1) 4 dead
2) 30 Critically injured
3) 240 fires
4) 30 arrested
5) continuing resentment
6) Millions in property damage
Needless to say, the more things change, the more things stay the same. Not much has changed in East Cleveland and one wonders if Americans, locally or nationally, can truly come to grips with the terror and unresolved legacy of its nation's racial past.
In 1966, one panel charged to investigate the riot, argued that "communists," were responsible for the massive uprising. Another, found that socio-environmental factors, not the least of which were racism (social, environmental) were really to blame. The latter explanation was closer to the fact of the matter.
Forty years later, Hough residents and East Clevelanders have yet to recover from this tragedy. The greater tragedy, however, is the neglect of the residents of this section of the city-their broken, yet dignified humanity still impervious to the view of so many around them. Before there was Katrina, there was Hough. After Katrina, there still remains poverty in Nawlins and there still remains lingering inequality in Hough/East Cleveland.
To gain more insight into contempary remembrances of the riot, click on the following link to NewsChannel 5(http://www.newsnet5.com/video/9531420/index.html) and watch a video narrated by anchor Leon Bibb. Also, know that the Cleveland Call an Post (Acclaimed Black Newspaper) is doing a 2 Full-page spread on the anniversay of the riot.
Other background information on the Hough community and the riots of 1966, go to the following links:
1) http://www.nhlink.net/ClevelandNeighborhoods/
2) http://www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hough_Riots
Considering the situation in the Middle East and the Hough anniversary-closer to home- the old Negro spiritual is perhaps applicable as we remember and never forget:
"God showed Noah, the rainbow signWon't be water, but-Fire next time..."
Perhaps James Baldwin was prophetic in the writing of his monumental 1963 The Fire Next Time. I wonder, though, if anybody listened.....
In Remembrance,
The Intellectual Pragmatist
-- Dr. Zachery Williams
Department of History
University of AkronAkron, OH 44325
330-972-2402mailto:330-972-2402zrw@uakron.edu
"Of all of our disciplines, history is best qualified to reward our research"
Malcolm X
Tuesday, July 18, 2006
Thursday, June 22, 2006
Clock of Inequality in U.S. Continues to Turn Backward
Rebellion Stalls Extension of Voting Rigths Act
By CARL HULSE
Published: June 22, 2006
WASHINGTON, June 21 — House Republican leaders abruptly canceled a planned vote to renew the Voting Rights Act on Wednesday after a rebellion by lawmakers who said the civil rights measure unfairly singled out Southern states and unnecessarily required ballots to be printed in foreign languages.
The reversal represented a significant embarrassment for the party leadership, which had promised a vote to extend the act, the 1965 law that is credited with ending rampant discrimination at the polls and electing black officeholders throughout the South. Early last month, House and Senate leaders of both parties gathered on the steps of the Capitol in a rare bipartisan moment to celebrate its imminent approval.
But just hours before the vote was to occur Wednesday, lawmakers critical of the bill mutinied in a closed morning meeting of House Republicans, raising sufficient objections to prompt the leadership to pull the bill indefinitely.
Several lawmakers said it was uncertain whether a majority of Republicans would back the legislation without the changes sought by critics, and under the House leadership's informal rules no bill can reach a vote without the support of a majority of the Republicans.
"A lot of it looks as if these are some old boys from the South who are trying to do away with it," said Representative Lynn Westmoreland of Georgia, who said it would be unfair to keep Georgia under the confines of the law when his state has cleaned up its voting rights record. "But these old boys are trying to make it constitutional enough that it will withstand the scrutiny of the Supreme Court."
Despite the resistance, the Republican leadership issued a statement pledging to move ahead quickly with a vote once Republicans were given additional time to work out their differences.
"While the bill will not be considered today, the House G.O.P. leadership is committed to passing the Voting Rights Act legislation as soon as possible," the leadership said in the statement.
Democrats and civil rights groups expressed strong disappointment in the change of plans, particularly given what appeared to be a bipartisan consensus to push ahead before major elements of the law expire in the middle of next year. The renewal would be for 25 years.
"We fear that pulling the bill could send the wrong message about whether the bill enjoys broad bipartisan support and that delaying consideration until after the July 4 recess could give those with partisan intentions space and time to politicize the issue," said Representative Melvin Watt, a North Carolina Democrat who is the chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus.
Democrats said they were holding their political fire to some degree in the interests of winning passage of the measure, but they predicted it could become a significant political issue if the fight dragged on too long.
The delay marked the second time in days that House Republicans had pulled back on legislation. On Tuesday, the leadership announced it would hold hearings this summer on immigration policy before trying to negotiate legislation that differs from the Senate.
President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act into law in August 1965 after a string of violence in Southern states resulting from deep resistance to voting by blacks. The law instituted a nationwide prohibition against voting discrimination based on race, eliminated poll taxes and literacy tests, and put added safeguards in regions where discrimination had been especially pronounced. Those included a requirement for the Justice Department to review any proposed changes to voting procedures to judge if they would be discriminatory.
That "preclearance" requirement would be retained for the nine states entirely covered by the law, most of them in the South, and parts of seven others. But Mr. Westmoreland and other Southern Republicans said their states have made great strides in voting access for members of minority groups, while some of the most recent irregularities have taken place in places exempt from the requirement.
"The hanging chads down in Florida, that jurisdiction is not covered," he said.
Advocates of the act say the history of discrimination in the covered states justifies their special status and that leaders who believe their jurisdictions should be exempt can apply to "bail out" through a federal review.
"The fact of the matter is that you have a small group of members who have hijacked this bill, and many of these individuals represent states that have been in violation for a long time," said Nancy M. Zirkin, deputy director of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights. "We believe these individuals do not want the Voting Rights Act reauthorized."
The Republican leadership of the House and the Senate decided earlier this year to proceed speedily with the renewal to put to rest fears that Republicans intended to let it expire next year, and to try to make political inroads with minority groups. If the act is allowed to expire, Democrats will almost certainly accuse Republicans of trying to turn the clock back on civil rights.
But Southern lawmakers, mainly from Georgia and Texas, continued to push their objections, with some suggesting the House hold off action pending a Supreme Court ruling on a Texas redistricting case.
A new problem arose as some Republicans, already caught up in a fight over immigration policy, began raising questions about a requirement for bilingual ballots in cases where political jurisdictions meet a certain threshold for citizens who struggle with English.
Representative Steve King, Republican of Iowa, has pushed a proposal to eliminate that plan, arguing that naturalized citizens should have had to prove English proficiency as part of their citizenship test and that American-born speakers of other languages are entitled to assistance at the polls.
"There is no need to print ballots in any language other than English," Mr. King said Wednesday.
But the leadership did not allow him to offer the provision, angering some Republicans. Lawmakers and aides said that Representative F. James Sensenbrenner Jr., the Wisconsin Republican who is the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, also left Wednesday's meeting without answering questions about the bill, angering others. In the resulting tumult, the leadership decided to delay the vote.
By CARL HULSE
Published: June 22, 2006
WASHINGTON, June 21 — House Republican leaders abruptly canceled a planned vote to renew the Voting Rights Act on Wednesday after a rebellion by lawmakers who said the civil rights measure unfairly singled out Southern states and unnecessarily required ballots to be printed in foreign languages.
The reversal represented a significant embarrassment for the party leadership, which had promised a vote to extend the act, the 1965 law that is credited with ending rampant discrimination at the polls and electing black officeholders throughout the South. Early last month, House and Senate leaders of both parties gathered on the steps of the Capitol in a rare bipartisan moment to celebrate its imminent approval.
But just hours before the vote was to occur Wednesday, lawmakers critical of the bill mutinied in a closed morning meeting of House Republicans, raising sufficient objections to prompt the leadership to pull the bill indefinitely.
Several lawmakers said it was uncertain whether a majority of Republicans would back the legislation without the changes sought by critics, and under the House leadership's informal rules no bill can reach a vote without the support of a majority of the Republicans.
"A lot of it looks as if these are some old boys from the South who are trying to do away with it," said Representative Lynn Westmoreland of Georgia, who said it would be unfair to keep Georgia under the confines of the law when his state has cleaned up its voting rights record. "But these old boys are trying to make it constitutional enough that it will withstand the scrutiny of the Supreme Court."
Despite the resistance, the Republican leadership issued a statement pledging to move ahead quickly with a vote once Republicans were given additional time to work out their differences.
"While the bill will not be considered today, the House G.O.P. leadership is committed to passing the Voting Rights Act legislation as soon as possible," the leadership said in the statement.
Democrats and civil rights groups expressed strong disappointment in the change of plans, particularly given what appeared to be a bipartisan consensus to push ahead before major elements of the law expire in the middle of next year. The renewal would be for 25 years.
"We fear that pulling the bill could send the wrong message about whether the bill enjoys broad bipartisan support and that delaying consideration until after the July 4 recess could give those with partisan intentions space and time to politicize the issue," said Representative Melvin Watt, a North Carolina Democrat who is the chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus.
Democrats said they were holding their political fire to some degree in the interests of winning passage of the measure, but they predicted it could become a significant political issue if the fight dragged on too long.
The delay marked the second time in days that House Republicans had pulled back on legislation. On Tuesday, the leadership announced it would hold hearings this summer on immigration policy before trying to negotiate legislation that differs from the Senate.
President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act into law in August 1965 after a string of violence in Southern states resulting from deep resistance to voting by blacks. The law instituted a nationwide prohibition against voting discrimination based on race, eliminated poll taxes and literacy tests, and put added safeguards in regions where discrimination had been especially pronounced. Those included a requirement for the Justice Department to review any proposed changes to voting procedures to judge if they would be discriminatory.
That "preclearance" requirement would be retained for the nine states entirely covered by the law, most of them in the South, and parts of seven others. But Mr. Westmoreland and other Southern Republicans said their states have made great strides in voting access for members of minority groups, while some of the most recent irregularities have taken place in places exempt from the requirement.
"The hanging chads down in Florida, that jurisdiction is not covered," he said.
Advocates of the act say the history of discrimination in the covered states justifies their special status and that leaders who believe their jurisdictions should be exempt can apply to "bail out" through a federal review.
"The fact of the matter is that you have a small group of members who have hijacked this bill, and many of these individuals represent states that have been in violation for a long time," said Nancy M. Zirkin, deputy director of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights. "We believe these individuals do not want the Voting Rights Act reauthorized."
The Republican leadership of the House and the Senate decided earlier this year to proceed speedily with the renewal to put to rest fears that Republicans intended to let it expire next year, and to try to make political inroads with minority groups. If the act is allowed to expire, Democrats will almost certainly accuse Republicans of trying to turn the clock back on civil rights.
But Southern lawmakers, mainly from Georgia and Texas, continued to push their objections, with some suggesting the House hold off action pending a Supreme Court ruling on a Texas redistricting case.
A new problem arose as some Republicans, already caught up in a fight over immigration policy, began raising questions about a requirement for bilingual ballots in cases where political jurisdictions meet a certain threshold for citizens who struggle with English.
Representative Steve King, Republican of Iowa, has pushed a proposal to eliminate that plan, arguing that naturalized citizens should have had to prove English proficiency as part of their citizenship test and that American-born speakers of other languages are entitled to assistance at the polls.
"There is no need to print ballots in any language other than English," Mr. King said Wednesday.
But the leadership did not allow him to offer the provision, angering some Republicans. Lawmakers and aides said that Representative F. James Sensenbrenner Jr., the Wisconsin Republican who is the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, also left Wednesday's meeting without answering questions about the bill, angering others. In the resulting tumult, the leadership decided to delay the vote.
Has The Legacy of Black Power Faded for U.S. Blacks?
Commentary: How Sad is It that Blacks in the Diaspora Appreciate ‘Black Power’ – and We Don't?
Thursday, June 22, 2006
By: Gregory Kane, BlackAmericaWeb.com
Now that the 40th anniversary of Stokely Carmichael’s changing the direction, tempo and agenda of the civil-rights movement by chanting the phrase “Black Power!” in Greenwood, Mississippi has passed with scarcely a notice from black folks, perhaps it’s time to evaluate black power’s successes and failures.
I’ve visited two places outside the United States where black folks told me that the black power movement here had an impact there. One was Grenada, where Maurice Bishop and Bernard Coard were leaders in the New Jewel Movement that ousted Prime Minister Eric Gairy from power in 1979.
Bishop was one of the attendees at the Rat Island Black Power Conference in 1970. When he became prime minister of Grenada after Gairy’s ouster, Bishop and the NJM introduced several progressive programs in the country before the Marxist government imploded in 1983.
When I visited Brazil two years ago, blacks there told me how they were inspired by the black power movement in the United States. I got to see that inspiration in action at the Federal University in Bahia, the blackest province in a country and home to over 80 million people of African descent.
Scores of black students, faculty and administrators stood outside a building on the university campus, holding signs expressing support for affirmative action. But these black folks weren’t talking about the kind of affirmative action black folks in the United States advocate. Here, black Democrats talk about things like having a “critical mass” of “underrepresented minorities” at elite universities, then look you in the eye and say they aren’t talking about quotas.
Black folks in Brazil weren’t having any of that hypocrisy. They didn’t just ask for quotas in the university’s schools for medicine, industrial chemistry and dentistry. They demanded quotas. They said the dreaded q-word by name. Except in Portuguese it’s a c-word: cotes.
They got their cotes too -- inspired by black folks in the United States who, 38 years earlier, had started a movement that went international.
So I wasn’t completely surprised when I saw brothers in Brazil giving each other the black power handshake I’d seen in the United States a few years after Carmichael’s black power speech in 1966. I wasn’t surprised to see a Brazilian brother at the demonstration for quotas wearing a Malcolm X T-shirt either.
I compared that Afro-Brazilian to some young black men here in the United States. Yes, some young black men -- a dwindling number, it seems -- might wear a Malcolm X T-shirt on occasion. More common is one that reads “Stop Snitching.” Or one with a picture of not Malcolm X or Marcus Garvey, but either John Gotti or Tony Montana on it (Heaven forfend someone should produce a T-shirt with Carmichael’s picture on the front.).
What can you say to those nitwitted brothers who wear T-shirts with white mobsters on them? Gotti is the real-life organized crime boss who died in prison. Montana is the fictional protagonist of the 1983 movie “Scarface.” There’s an old saying black folks have that’s true about “Scarface:” it’s destroyed more black folks’ minds than bad wine, especially young black men.
A wealth of black heroes to choose from, and these guys wear T-shirts depicting white gangsters. What can you say to them? Nothing. The suckas would probably shoot you.
But thank heavens some black folks in the world appreciate the history of our black power movement, because Lord knows we don’t. That may explain why, when I was in Salvador de Bahia, Brazil, I saw a scene I’ve yet to see duplicated in the United States.
Public schools in Salvador are predominantly black and worse than they are in America. Black folks in Salvador told me there are no math, chemistry or physics teachers in Salvador public schools.
But on one weeknight, I went to a classroom at the Steven Biko Cultural Institute, which black folks in Salvador set up to empower themselves and saw a classroom full of at least 50 students, who’d come after work to study the math, chemistry, physics and other subjects they didn’t get in public schools. Their goal was to pass the entrance exam at the Federal University.
Compare how black folks in Bahia solved one problem that resulted from poor education -- by organizing their own to empower their own -- with how black Democrats handle it here: by finding the nearest Republican to blame.
But that’s a topic for next week’s column: how today’s black Democrats have spurned the legacy of black power and failed black folks on the crucial matter of education.
Thursday, June 22, 2006
By: Gregory Kane, BlackAmericaWeb.com
Now that the 40th anniversary of Stokely Carmichael’s changing the direction, tempo and agenda of the civil-rights movement by chanting the phrase “Black Power!” in Greenwood, Mississippi has passed with scarcely a notice from black folks, perhaps it’s time to evaluate black power’s successes and failures.
I’ve visited two places outside the United States where black folks told me that the black power movement here had an impact there. One was Grenada, where Maurice Bishop and Bernard Coard were leaders in the New Jewel Movement that ousted Prime Minister Eric Gairy from power in 1979.
Bishop was one of the attendees at the Rat Island Black Power Conference in 1970. When he became prime minister of Grenada after Gairy’s ouster, Bishop and the NJM introduced several progressive programs in the country before the Marxist government imploded in 1983.
When I visited Brazil two years ago, blacks there told me how they were inspired by the black power movement in the United States. I got to see that inspiration in action at the Federal University in Bahia, the blackest province in a country and home to over 80 million people of African descent.
Scores of black students, faculty and administrators stood outside a building on the university campus, holding signs expressing support for affirmative action. But these black folks weren’t talking about the kind of affirmative action black folks in the United States advocate. Here, black Democrats talk about things like having a “critical mass” of “underrepresented minorities” at elite universities, then look you in the eye and say they aren’t talking about quotas.
Black folks in Brazil weren’t having any of that hypocrisy. They didn’t just ask for quotas in the university’s schools for medicine, industrial chemistry and dentistry. They demanded quotas. They said the dreaded q-word by name. Except in Portuguese it’s a c-word: cotes.
They got their cotes too -- inspired by black folks in the United States who, 38 years earlier, had started a movement that went international.
So I wasn’t completely surprised when I saw brothers in Brazil giving each other the black power handshake I’d seen in the United States a few years after Carmichael’s black power speech in 1966. I wasn’t surprised to see a Brazilian brother at the demonstration for quotas wearing a Malcolm X T-shirt either.
I compared that Afro-Brazilian to some young black men here in the United States. Yes, some young black men -- a dwindling number, it seems -- might wear a Malcolm X T-shirt on occasion. More common is one that reads “Stop Snitching.” Or one with a picture of not Malcolm X or Marcus Garvey, but either John Gotti or Tony Montana on it (Heaven forfend someone should produce a T-shirt with Carmichael’s picture on the front.).
What can you say to those nitwitted brothers who wear T-shirts with white mobsters on them? Gotti is the real-life organized crime boss who died in prison. Montana is the fictional protagonist of the 1983 movie “Scarface.” There’s an old saying black folks have that’s true about “Scarface:” it’s destroyed more black folks’ minds than bad wine, especially young black men.
A wealth of black heroes to choose from, and these guys wear T-shirts depicting white gangsters. What can you say to them? Nothing. The suckas would probably shoot you.
But thank heavens some black folks in the world appreciate the history of our black power movement, because Lord knows we don’t. That may explain why, when I was in Salvador de Bahia, Brazil, I saw a scene I’ve yet to see duplicated in the United States.
Public schools in Salvador are predominantly black and worse than they are in America. Black folks in Salvador told me there are no math, chemistry or physics teachers in Salvador public schools.
But on one weeknight, I went to a classroom at the Steven Biko Cultural Institute, which black folks in Salvador set up to empower themselves and saw a classroom full of at least 50 students, who’d come after work to study the math, chemistry, physics and other subjects they didn’t get in public schools. Their goal was to pass the entrance exam at the Federal University.
Compare how black folks in Bahia solved one problem that resulted from poor education -- by organizing their own to empower their own -- with how black Democrats handle it here: by finding the nearest Republican to blame.
But that’s a topic for next week’s column: how today’s black Democrats have spurned the legacy of black power and failed black folks on the crucial matter of education.
Debate Continues Over Renewal of Voting Rights Bill
Republicans Postpone Vote to Renew Voting Rights Act, Senate May Follow Suit
Thursday, June 22, 2006
By: Laurie Kellman, Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) - House Republican leaders on Wednesday postponed a vote on renewing the 1965 Voting Rights Act after GOP lawmakers complained it unfairly singles out nine Southern states for federal oversight.
"We have time to address their concerns," Republican leaders said in a joint statement. "Therefore, the House Republican Leadership will offer members the time needed to evaluate the legislation."
It was unclear whether the legislation would come up this year. The temporary provisions don't expire until 2007, but leaders of both parties had hoped to pass the act and use it to further their prospects in the fall's midterm elections.
The statement said the GOP leaders are committed to renewing the law "as soon as possible."
The four-decade-old law enfranchised millions of black voters by ending poll taxes and literacy tests during the height of the civil rights struggle. A vote on renewing it for another 25 years had been scheduled for Wednesday, with both Republican and Democratic leaders behind it.
The abrupt change of plans in the House could affect the renewal in the Senate, where an identical bill was set for consideration next week by the Senate Judiciary Committee, according to Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa.
"There's less pressure to do it if the House is not doing it," Specter said in a telephone interview.
The shift came after a private House GOP caucus meeting earlier Wednesday in which several Republicans also balked at extending provisions in the law that require ballots to be printed in more than one language in neighborhoods where there are large numbers of immigrants, said several participants.
"The speaker's had a standing rule that nothing would be voted on unless there's a majority of the majority," said Rep. Lynn Westmoreland, R-Ga., who led the objections. "It was pretty clear at the meeting that the majority of the majority wasn't there."
The legislation was approved by the Judiciary Committee on a 33-1 vote. But despite leadership support, controversy has shadowed the legislation 40 years after it first prohibited policies that blocked blacks from voting.
Several Republicans, led by Westmoreland, had worked to allow an amendment that would ease a requirement that nine states win permission from the Justice Department or a federal judge to change their voting rules.
The amendment's backers say the requirement unfairly singles out and holds accountable nine states that practiced racist voting policies decades ago, based on 1964 voter turnout data: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia.
Westmoreland says the formula for deciding which states are subject to such "pre-clearance" should be updated every four years and be based on voter turnout in the most recent three elections.
"The pre-clearance portions of the Voting Rights Act should apply to all states, or no states," Westmoreland said. "Singling out certain states for special scrutiny no longer makes sense."
The amendment has powerful opponents. From Republican and Democratic leaders on down the House hierarchy, they argue that states with documented histories of discrimination may still practice it and have earned the extra scrutiny.
"This carefully crafted legislation should remain clean and unamended," Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., who worked on the original bill, which he called "the keystone of our national civil rights statutes."
By his own estimation, Westmoreland says the amendment stands little chance of being adopted.
The House also could bring up an amendment that would require the Justice Department to compile an annual list of jurisdictions eligible for a "bailout" from the pre-clearance requirements.
That amendment, too, has little chance of surviving floor debate.
Other efforts to chip away at the act have faltered under pressure from powerful supporters.
One such measure, sponsored by Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, sought to strip a provision that requires ballots to be printed in several languages and interpreters be provided in states and counties where large numbers of citizens speak limited English.
However, Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., called that logic an effort to mix the divisive debate over immigration reform with the Voting Rights Act renewal. Three-fourths of those whose primary language is not English are American-born, he said.
Thursday, June 22, 2006
By: Laurie Kellman, Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) - House Republican leaders on Wednesday postponed a vote on renewing the 1965 Voting Rights Act after GOP lawmakers complained it unfairly singles out nine Southern states for federal oversight.
"We have time to address their concerns," Republican leaders said in a joint statement. "Therefore, the House Republican Leadership will offer members the time needed to evaluate the legislation."
It was unclear whether the legislation would come up this year. The temporary provisions don't expire until 2007, but leaders of both parties had hoped to pass the act and use it to further their prospects in the fall's midterm elections.
The statement said the GOP leaders are committed to renewing the law "as soon as possible."
The four-decade-old law enfranchised millions of black voters by ending poll taxes and literacy tests during the height of the civil rights struggle. A vote on renewing it for another 25 years had been scheduled for Wednesday, with both Republican and Democratic leaders behind it.
The abrupt change of plans in the House could affect the renewal in the Senate, where an identical bill was set for consideration next week by the Senate Judiciary Committee, according to Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa.
"There's less pressure to do it if the House is not doing it," Specter said in a telephone interview.
The shift came after a private House GOP caucus meeting earlier Wednesday in which several Republicans also balked at extending provisions in the law that require ballots to be printed in more than one language in neighborhoods where there are large numbers of immigrants, said several participants.
"The speaker's had a standing rule that nothing would be voted on unless there's a majority of the majority," said Rep. Lynn Westmoreland, R-Ga., who led the objections. "It was pretty clear at the meeting that the majority of the majority wasn't there."
The legislation was approved by the Judiciary Committee on a 33-1 vote. But despite leadership support, controversy has shadowed the legislation 40 years after it first prohibited policies that blocked blacks from voting.
Several Republicans, led by Westmoreland, had worked to allow an amendment that would ease a requirement that nine states win permission from the Justice Department or a federal judge to change their voting rules.
The amendment's backers say the requirement unfairly singles out and holds accountable nine states that practiced racist voting policies decades ago, based on 1964 voter turnout data: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia.
Westmoreland says the formula for deciding which states are subject to such "pre-clearance" should be updated every four years and be based on voter turnout in the most recent three elections.
"The pre-clearance portions of the Voting Rights Act should apply to all states, or no states," Westmoreland said. "Singling out certain states for special scrutiny no longer makes sense."
The amendment has powerful opponents. From Republican and Democratic leaders on down the House hierarchy, they argue that states with documented histories of discrimination may still practice it and have earned the extra scrutiny.
"This carefully crafted legislation should remain clean and unamended," Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., who worked on the original bill, which he called "the keystone of our national civil rights statutes."
By his own estimation, Westmoreland says the amendment stands little chance of being adopted.
The House also could bring up an amendment that would require the Justice Department to compile an annual list of jurisdictions eligible for a "bailout" from the pre-clearance requirements.
That amendment, too, has little chance of surviving floor debate.
Other efforts to chip away at the act have faltered under pressure from powerful supporters.
One such measure, sponsored by Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, sought to strip a provision that requires ballots to be printed in several languages and interpreters be provided in states and counties where large numbers of citizens speak limited English.
However, Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., called that logic an effort to mix the divisive debate over immigration reform with the Voting Rights Act renewal. Three-fourths of those whose primary language is not English are American-born, he said.
Wednesday, June 21, 2006
Where Do We Go From Here?: Debate Continues Over MLK Jr's Papers
Atlanta’s Former, Current Mayor Trying to Buy MLK Papers at Auction
Tuesday, June 20, 2006
By: Sherrel Wheeler Stewart, BlackAmericaWeb.com
The famed Sotheby’s auction house at York Avenue and 72nd Street in New York will place the archives of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. on display for nine days beginning this Wednesday, June 21, and already the collection has stirred a flurry of calls from potential bidders and others who want to make certain the treasures end up in a good home, said David Redden, vice chairman of Sotheby’s.
“All things sold here have special significance, but the King collection goes way beyond because it really does speak to the soul of America,” Redden told BlackAmericaWeb.com. “These are not just documents of the past, but sacred relics. The papers are qualitatively important to our history and our culture.”
The papers, which include everything from sermon notes to a draft of King’s Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech, are expected to bring $15 million to $30 million -- money that will go to the estate of the slain civil rights leader.
Redden, who will serve as auctioneer for the bidding, expects the sale on June 30 to be completed within six or seven minutes. Just last week, Sotheby’s auctioned a Revolutionary flag that sold for $12 million, Redden said.
The King collection includes more than 7,000 handwritten documents from King, a Nobel Peace Prize winner who inspired a movement that changed America’s view of race and the world’s view of America.
Clayborne Carson, director of the Martin Luther King Jr. Paper’s Project at Stanford University, is well acquainted with the documents in the King collection. In 1985, Coretta Scott King, wife of the civil rights icon, selected Carson to edit the King papers, which included publishing volumes of his work.
While people are most familiar with King’s life as a civil rights leader, the collection gives a look at King the minister. He wrote hundreds of sermons and kept notes on index cards, Carson said. He wrote letters to friends, activist and ministers across the country and around the world.
Carson said he is surprised that the King collection has not been acquired before now.
“The best solution would have been for the Library of Congress or the National Archives to acquire the collection,” Carson told BlackAmericaWeb.com. It would have happened several years ago had it not been for “short-sighted squabbling” and concerns about the price, Carson said.
Sotheby’s has discussed the auction of the collection with the King family for about nine years, officials said.
“Millions of dollars went to the Nixons for the Nixon papers. Nixon was a public official and those documents should have been given away, but the family received millions and there was no public outcry.
“For some reason, even though the Kings own this valuable property, some think the family should just give it all away, Carson said.”
In 2000, the government agreed to pay former President Richard Nixon’s estate $18 million for his presidential papers, tape recordings and other materials. The family had asked for $35 million 25 years of interest, which would have brought the total to about $200 million, according to documents on file with the U.S. Justice Department.
Carson said potential bidders might include institutions such as the Smithsonian or the New African American Museum.
And it is reported that former Atlanta Mayor Andrew Young and current Mayor Shirley Franklin are working to put together a group to acquire the collection and keep it in Atlanta.
"I've been talking to a lot of people," Young said in an Associated Press article. "There are a number of people trying to find ways to get a group together. But, if you can do it, you can best do it if it's kept quiet."
Efforts by BlackAmericaWeb.com to reach Young and Franklin were unsuccessful. But Franklin told the Associated Press: "It's accurate to say that the King papers in Atlanta and the capital city of the South would be a slam dunk -- if we could figure it out."
Lawrence Mamiya, a professor of religion and Africana studies at Vassar College said regardless who acquires the collection, it is important that the documents are accessible.
“I hope the papers are kept together in one collection, and I hope that an academic institution or library gets them,” Mamiya told BlackAmericaWeb.com. In the 1960s he was a member of the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee and admired King and his teachings. “If the papers are acquired by a wealthy individual, that person may not make them assessable.”
Carson said that because scanned versions of the King papers are available through his project at Stanford, the collection will continue to be available to scholars, and additional volumes of King’s works will be published, regardless of what happens at the auction.
“There always has been a mystique about saying, 'I have the originals,'” Carson said. But there is no need to fear that “a part of history would be lost forever.”
Tuesday, June 20, 2006
By: Sherrel Wheeler Stewart, BlackAmericaWeb.com
The famed Sotheby’s auction house at York Avenue and 72nd Street in New York will place the archives of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. on display for nine days beginning this Wednesday, June 21, and already the collection has stirred a flurry of calls from potential bidders and others who want to make certain the treasures end up in a good home, said David Redden, vice chairman of Sotheby’s.
“All things sold here have special significance, but the King collection goes way beyond because it really does speak to the soul of America,” Redden told BlackAmericaWeb.com. “These are not just documents of the past, but sacred relics. The papers are qualitatively important to our history and our culture.”
The papers, which include everything from sermon notes to a draft of King’s Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech, are expected to bring $15 million to $30 million -- money that will go to the estate of the slain civil rights leader.
Redden, who will serve as auctioneer for the bidding, expects the sale on June 30 to be completed within six or seven minutes. Just last week, Sotheby’s auctioned a Revolutionary flag that sold for $12 million, Redden said.
The King collection includes more than 7,000 handwritten documents from King, a Nobel Peace Prize winner who inspired a movement that changed America’s view of race and the world’s view of America.
Clayborne Carson, director of the Martin Luther King Jr. Paper’s Project at Stanford University, is well acquainted with the documents in the King collection. In 1985, Coretta Scott King, wife of the civil rights icon, selected Carson to edit the King papers, which included publishing volumes of his work.
While people are most familiar with King’s life as a civil rights leader, the collection gives a look at King the minister. He wrote hundreds of sermons and kept notes on index cards, Carson said. He wrote letters to friends, activist and ministers across the country and around the world.
Carson said he is surprised that the King collection has not been acquired before now.
“The best solution would have been for the Library of Congress or the National Archives to acquire the collection,” Carson told BlackAmericaWeb.com. It would have happened several years ago had it not been for “short-sighted squabbling” and concerns about the price, Carson said.
Sotheby’s has discussed the auction of the collection with the King family for about nine years, officials said.
“Millions of dollars went to the Nixons for the Nixon papers. Nixon was a public official and those documents should have been given away, but the family received millions and there was no public outcry.
“For some reason, even though the Kings own this valuable property, some think the family should just give it all away, Carson said.”
In 2000, the government agreed to pay former President Richard Nixon’s estate $18 million for his presidential papers, tape recordings and other materials. The family had asked for $35 million 25 years of interest, which would have brought the total to about $200 million, according to documents on file with the U.S. Justice Department.
Carson said potential bidders might include institutions such as the Smithsonian or the New African American Museum.
And it is reported that former Atlanta Mayor Andrew Young and current Mayor Shirley Franklin are working to put together a group to acquire the collection and keep it in Atlanta.
"I've been talking to a lot of people," Young said in an Associated Press article. "There are a number of people trying to find ways to get a group together. But, if you can do it, you can best do it if it's kept quiet."
Efforts by BlackAmericaWeb.com to reach Young and Franklin were unsuccessful. But Franklin told the Associated Press: "It's accurate to say that the King papers in Atlanta and the capital city of the South would be a slam dunk -- if we could figure it out."
Lawrence Mamiya, a professor of religion and Africana studies at Vassar College said regardless who acquires the collection, it is important that the documents are accessible.
“I hope the papers are kept together in one collection, and I hope that an academic institution or library gets them,” Mamiya told BlackAmericaWeb.com. In the 1960s he was a member of the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee and admired King and his teachings. “If the papers are acquired by a wealthy individual, that person may not make them assessable.”
Carson said that because scanned versions of the King papers are available through his project at Stanford, the collection will continue to be available to scholars, and additional volumes of King’s works will be published, regardless of what happens at the auction.
“There always has been a mystique about saying, 'I have the originals,'” Carson said. But there is no need to fear that “a part of history would be lost forever.”
Renewal of the Voting Rights Bill Essential
House of Representatives Set to Vote on Renewal of the Voting Rights Act
Tuesday, June 20, 2006
By: Sherrel Wheeler Stewart, BlackAmericaWeb.com
The U.S. House of Representatives will vote Wednesday on the reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and some congressional and civil rights leaders fear attempts will be made to water down the law that protects the voting rights of minorities and women.
“This legislation has bi-partisan support, and we had hoped it would be passed as-is without amendments,” Rep. Artur Davis, D-Alabama, told BlackAmericaWeb.com. Because the bill was not placed on the suspension calendar, it will now be debated in the House in regular order and there could be an attempt to weaken some of the provisions of the act, Davis said.
The greatest debate is expected over the “pre-clearance” issue in Section 5, which requires governments in certain Southern states to clear with the U.S. Department of Justice any changes to their voting system, including changes of jurisdiction.
Already, some Congressmen from Georgia and Texas have argued that their states should be excluded from that requirement because of progress made in the election of black officials.
But Janice Mathis, southern regional director for Rainbow/PUSH, said most black officials elected in recent years have come from majority black districts and that there has not been enough progress made to begin excluding states currently covered in the Voting Rights Act.
She said this week’s report out of Georgia on the number of registered voters who do not meet the voter ID requirement on new laws is an example of why the reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act is so crucial.
A state analysis released on Monday showed that more than 675,000 registered Georgia voters still lack the most common photo ID used to cast a ballot such as a driver’s license or a non-driver identification card, according to the Associated Press.
“This is merely leaning toward totalitarianism," Mathis told BlackAmericaWeb.com. "They don’t want everyone to have a say so in government."
Mathis said a disproportionate number of blacks, poor whites and other minorities could be excluded from the right to vote in the upcoming July 18 primary and the November general election.
“This is a critical time for Georgia voters,” Mathis said. “An incumbent Republican governor will defend a seat in the governor’s mansion, and the legislative seats are on the ballot. We still need all of the protections guaranteed in the Voting Rights Act.”
At least 150 lawmakers have signed on as sponsors of H.R. 9, the Fannie Lou Hamer, Rosa Parks and Coretta Scott King Voting Rights Act Reauthorization and Amendments Act of 2006, but Davis said still there are about 10 Southern Democrats and 72 Southern Republicans who have not signed on.
“Some of those members could possibly attempt to make amendments that would weaken the legislation,” Davis said. If they are successful, they could still say, ‘I voted for the Voting Rights Act reauthorization,’ but as a practical matter, it would be stripped of content, Davis said.
“All of us would welcome a political reality in which the political process was never manipulated to disadvantage voters who are in the minority in their communities,” Davis said. “That is not the case. The election process continues to be abused -- through redistricting schemes, absentee ballot fraud, last minute changes of polling locations and outright restrictions on registration for some eligible voters.”
Ted Shaw, president of the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund, said the Voting Rights Act reauthorization is the most significant legislation to come before Congress in many years.
“We are hoping that the bi-partisan support that brought the legislation this far will propel it through Congress,” Shaw told BlackAmericaWeb.com.
“At a time when America is trumpeting democracy around the world, we can not afford to undermine democracy at home,” Shaw said.
After the reauthorization is passed in the House, the Senate must also take up the matter.
Supporters are hoping that it can gain full approval this summer; however, they acknowledge there may be significant obstacles if the legislation faces difficulty in the House. The summer session will be cut short because of an election year, and it is possible that House and Senate versions of the reauthorization may not come together before adjournment, Davis said.
Civil Rights organizations are encouraging constituents to call their representatives in Congress at (202) 224-3121 to show support for the reauthorization.
“Sections of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 expire in 2007,” Shaw said. “We must pass the reauthorization this year.”
Tuesday, June 20, 2006
By: Sherrel Wheeler Stewart, BlackAmericaWeb.com
The U.S. House of Representatives will vote Wednesday on the reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and some congressional and civil rights leaders fear attempts will be made to water down the law that protects the voting rights of minorities and women.
“This legislation has bi-partisan support, and we had hoped it would be passed as-is without amendments,” Rep. Artur Davis, D-Alabama, told BlackAmericaWeb.com. Because the bill was not placed on the suspension calendar, it will now be debated in the House in regular order and there could be an attempt to weaken some of the provisions of the act, Davis said.
The greatest debate is expected over the “pre-clearance” issue in Section 5, which requires governments in certain Southern states to clear with the U.S. Department of Justice any changes to their voting system, including changes of jurisdiction.
Already, some Congressmen from Georgia and Texas have argued that their states should be excluded from that requirement because of progress made in the election of black officials.
But Janice Mathis, southern regional director for Rainbow/PUSH, said most black officials elected in recent years have come from majority black districts and that there has not been enough progress made to begin excluding states currently covered in the Voting Rights Act.
She said this week’s report out of Georgia on the number of registered voters who do not meet the voter ID requirement on new laws is an example of why the reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act is so crucial.
A state analysis released on Monday showed that more than 675,000 registered Georgia voters still lack the most common photo ID used to cast a ballot such as a driver’s license or a non-driver identification card, according to the Associated Press.
“This is merely leaning toward totalitarianism," Mathis told BlackAmericaWeb.com. "They don’t want everyone to have a say so in government."
Mathis said a disproportionate number of blacks, poor whites and other minorities could be excluded from the right to vote in the upcoming July 18 primary and the November general election.
“This is a critical time for Georgia voters,” Mathis said. “An incumbent Republican governor will defend a seat in the governor’s mansion, and the legislative seats are on the ballot. We still need all of the protections guaranteed in the Voting Rights Act.”
At least 150 lawmakers have signed on as sponsors of H.R. 9, the Fannie Lou Hamer, Rosa Parks and Coretta Scott King Voting Rights Act Reauthorization and Amendments Act of 2006, but Davis said still there are about 10 Southern Democrats and 72 Southern Republicans who have not signed on.
“Some of those members could possibly attempt to make amendments that would weaken the legislation,” Davis said. If they are successful, they could still say, ‘I voted for the Voting Rights Act reauthorization,’ but as a practical matter, it would be stripped of content, Davis said.
“All of us would welcome a political reality in which the political process was never manipulated to disadvantage voters who are in the minority in their communities,” Davis said. “That is not the case. The election process continues to be abused -- through redistricting schemes, absentee ballot fraud, last minute changes of polling locations and outright restrictions on registration for some eligible voters.”
Ted Shaw, president of the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund, said the Voting Rights Act reauthorization is the most significant legislation to come before Congress in many years.
“We are hoping that the bi-partisan support that brought the legislation this far will propel it through Congress,” Shaw told BlackAmericaWeb.com.
“At a time when America is trumpeting democracy around the world, we can not afford to undermine democracy at home,” Shaw said.
After the reauthorization is passed in the House, the Senate must also take up the matter.
Supporters are hoping that it can gain full approval this summer; however, they acknowledge there may be significant obstacles if the legislation faces difficulty in the House. The summer session will be cut short because of an election year, and it is possible that House and Senate versions of the reauthorization may not come together before adjournment, Davis said.
Civil Rights organizations are encouraging constituents to call their representatives in Congress at (202) 224-3121 to show support for the reauthorization.
“Sections of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 expire in 2007,” Shaw said. “We must pass the reauthorization this year.”
Donna Brazile on Politics
Democracy Must be Won Here at Home
By Donna Brazile
The Democratic Strategist
President George W. Bush's main foreign policy goal is to spread the fire of democracy in every corner of the globe. In almost every foreign policy address, senior members of the Administration speak of the power of freedom and democracy in giving oppressed people everywhere a seat at the table.
"Americans, of all people, should not be surprised by freedom's power," the President has said. He's right, of course. And on the basis of his words, I would expect the President to lead the cause of democracy here at home, especially the cause of electoral reform and cleaning up our dysfunctional election system. Unfortunately, he has not shown much interest.
In order to strengthen democracy here at home while continuing to export it abroad, Democratic campaign officials must make election reform a priority. Voter confusion, delays, equipment malfunction and misinformation continue to prevent many citizens from participating in the electoral process.
Democrats should support election reform on principle, and it can't be presumed that it will always and everywhere help us politically. But given that historically Democratic constituencies are disproportionately affected by voting irregularities, the right thing to do will also improve Democratic prospects in a nation so closely divided along partisan lines.
No, it is not enough to have a good candidate, a brilliant campaign plan, money in the bank and a talented and energetic group of seasoned campaign workers and volunteers. It is also necessary to understand the fundamentals of what constitutes a vote, who is behind the local election regulations and what rules apply to counting ballots in the event of a close election.
As a Democratic strategist, I witnessed first-hand the electoral irregularities surrounding the 2000 Presidential election when my former boss, Al Gore, won the popular vote but lost the election following a Supreme Court decision which halted a Florida recount. Experts agree that the 2004 national election was again rife with election anomalies including, but not limited to: excessively long lines at the polls (particularly in predominantly poor and minority precincts); insufficient and defective voting equipment; voter suppression and intimidation tactics targeting young voters, minorities and first time voters; unlawful purging of eligible voters from voting lists; and massive confusion over the issuance and tabulation of provisional ballots, absentee ballots and ballots cast by U.S. citizens living overseas.
An investigation by Democratic staff of the House Judiciary Committee disclosed massive and unprecedented voter irregularities in Ohio surrounding the 2004 Presidential election as the result of misconduct by Ohio's Secretary of State, Ken Blackwell, and negligence and incompetence among some local election officials.
After two close presidential elections, as well as state and local races that were too close to call, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) launched its own in-depth investigation of Ohio's 2004 election. "Democracy at Risk: The 2004 Election in Ohio," revealed that many Ohio voters were dissatisfied with their electoral experience. From antiquated voting machines in urban minority precincts, to untrained poll workers who turned away thousands of citizens who showed up at the wrong polling sites, to the unusually high number of provisional ballots, our study indicated that electoral inefficiencies left Ohio voters feeling cheated or disenfranchised in a very close presidential race.
As Chair of the DNC's Voting Rights Institute, I was astounded to learn just how dysfunctional our electoral system has become and why this is a serious impediment to successful elections for Democratic candidates at all levels. It's time for Democrats to get smart about election administration and take an active role in cleaning up laws and adopting new ones to protect every citizen's right to vote.
The strength of our democracy depends on the faith of every voter in the integrity of our elections. But it is obvious from the voices of those who stood in long lines in Ohio and elsewhere that confidence in the integrity of our electoral system is waning, even as democracy blooms abroad.
The right of all citizens to vote, and to have that vote accurately counted, is the bedrock on which our democracy is founded. Nothing is more fundamental to our freedom than public confidence in the integrity of basic democratic institutions. We used to be the envy of the world because our elections were hard fought, but the results were rarely questioned. This is no longer the case.
It is America's calling to defend and expand liberty, and to take an honest look at who, and how many, were denied the right to vote in 2004. Given past endeavors by some Republicans to marginalize voting rights concerns, it is up to Democrats to push for the adoption of tough new standards to ensure that no American is ever denied the right to vote.
For starters, the Democratic Party has worked tirelessly in urging the U.S. Congress and the Bush Administration to fully fund the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) and to assist states in improving election administration. While most states are attempting to comply with HAVA's mandates, there is confusion and a lack of consistency regarding the implementation of some of HAVA's requirements and many states are out of compliance.
Last year, a bipartisan Commission on Federal Election Reform co-chaired by former President Jimmy Carter and former Secretary of State James Baker released a report recommending, among other things, that "Congress should pass a law requiring that all voting machines be equipped with a voter-verifiable paper audit trail... (a) to increase citizens' confidence that their vote will be counted accurately, (b) to allow for a recount, (c) to provide a backup in cases of loss of votes due to computer malfunction, and (d) to test - through a random selection of machines - whether the paper result is the same as the electronic result".
Twenty-six states have now implemented requirements for voter-verified paper records and 13 more and the District of Columbia have such a requirement pending. In order to assure equal protection under the law, the independent auditability of the vote count must be consistently and legitimately protected in all states. We must reject the privatization of the vote count through the use of privately controlled electronic devices running on trade-secret-protected and undisclosed software. This practice is fundamentally at odds with government of the people, by the people and for the people. We must demand regulations that mandate transparent election administration, requiring voting equipment vendors to disclose their source code so that the equipment can be examined by third parties.
In addition to requiring a voter-verified paper record for every vote cast, we must urge lawmakers to require a significant percentage of random, unannounced, hand-counted audits of voter-verified paper records as a check on the results reported by electronic equipment.
We must work with local election officials to prohibit voting machines from having wireless or Internet connections and require that all voting equipment be used exclusively for voting purposes. Election officials must make certain that all eligible voters are able to cast their votes without impediment, regardless of physical or language limitation and that ballots are easy to comprehend and voting equipment is uncomplicated to use. Regulations must be adopted mandating that all voting machines used in local, state and federal elections - including, but not limited to direct recording electronic touch-screen machines - be certified as accurate and tamper-proof.
Local party officials must effectively train election monitors and poll watchers to enforce local election laws and procedures. We must continue to advocate for the adoption of election policies which require every ballot to be in a form that voters can read, verify and manually place in the ballot box.
In the post-2000 campaign environment, we must work with local officials to ensure that manual countywide recount procedures are in place before the vote is certified when manual vote tabulation detects a strong possibility of election equipment tampering.
Party leaders must work with state and local lawmakers to adopt regulations which preclude election officials from substituting efficiency for accuracy, so that voters can trust that every vote will be counted as cast.
It is vitally important that campaign personnel review the implementation of all HAVA guidelines, which protect voters from unlawful purges; reinforce the entitlement of voters to cast provisional ballots in federal elections; clarify the proper places and procedures for casting provisional ballots and establish a presumption in favor of validity; and clearly mandate that provisional ballots shall be counted in the most generous possible manner in every state, thereby maximizing and equalizing the value of the right to cast one.
Every Democratic campaign must work with state and local government officials prior to Election Day to ensure the equitable distribution of voting equipment and supplies to all polling places. This is crucial in order to avoid a repeat of those circumstances in 2004 when voters left polling stations out of sheer frustration due to excessively long lines and malfunctioning voting machinery.
It is also imperative that Democrats actively call upon the Republican Party to help stop voter fraud, voter suppression and intimidation, including the use of deceptive practices such as changing polling sites and placing off duty security guards at polling stations explicitly to harass certain voters on Election Day. Although it is an uphill battle, we must be relentless in pressuring federal and state lawmakers to outlaw these bogus practices.
While President Bush champions freedom and democracy elsewhere, I hope that Democrats will continue their call for clean, transparent and honest elections here at home. Before freedom marched in Baghdad, it took a stand here in America. Let's continue to fight for the right of all Americans to vote, to participate in elections to select those who will govern a free people and yes, to hold those elected accountable to our democratic principles and ideals.
By Donna Brazile
The Democratic Strategist
President George W. Bush's main foreign policy goal is to spread the fire of democracy in every corner of the globe. In almost every foreign policy address, senior members of the Administration speak of the power of freedom and democracy in giving oppressed people everywhere a seat at the table.
"Americans, of all people, should not be surprised by freedom's power," the President has said. He's right, of course. And on the basis of his words, I would expect the President to lead the cause of democracy here at home, especially the cause of electoral reform and cleaning up our dysfunctional election system. Unfortunately, he has not shown much interest.
In order to strengthen democracy here at home while continuing to export it abroad, Democratic campaign officials must make election reform a priority. Voter confusion, delays, equipment malfunction and misinformation continue to prevent many citizens from participating in the electoral process.
Democrats should support election reform on principle, and it can't be presumed that it will always and everywhere help us politically. But given that historically Democratic constituencies are disproportionately affected by voting irregularities, the right thing to do will also improve Democratic prospects in a nation so closely divided along partisan lines.
No, it is not enough to have a good candidate, a brilliant campaign plan, money in the bank and a talented and energetic group of seasoned campaign workers and volunteers. It is also necessary to understand the fundamentals of what constitutes a vote, who is behind the local election regulations and what rules apply to counting ballots in the event of a close election.
As a Democratic strategist, I witnessed first-hand the electoral irregularities surrounding the 2000 Presidential election when my former boss, Al Gore, won the popular vote but lost the election following a Supreme Court decision which halted a Florida recount. Experts agree that the 2004 national election was again rife with election anomalies including, but not limited to: excessively long lines at the polls (particularly in predominantly poor and minority precincts); insufficient and defective voting equipment; voter suppression and intimidation tactics targeting young voters, minorities and first time voters; unlawful purging of eligible voters from voting lists; and massive confusion over the issuance and tabulation of provisional ballots, absentee ballots and ballots cast by U.S. citizens living overseas.
An investigation by Democratic staff of the House Judiciary Committee disclosed massive and unprecedented voter irregularities in Ohio surrounding the 2004 Presidential election as the result of misconduct by Ohio's Secretary of State, Ken Blackwell, and negligence and incompetence among some local election officials.
After two close presidential elections, as well as state and local races that were too close to call, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) launched its own in-depth investigation of Ohio's 2004 election. "Democracy at Risk: The 2004 Election in Ohio," revealed that many Ohio voters were dissatisfied with their electoral experience. From antiquated voting machines in urban minority precincts, to untrained poll workers who turned away thousands of citizens who showed up at the wrong polling sites, to the unusually high number of provisional ballots, our study indicated that electoral inefficiencies left Ohio voters feeling cheated or disenfranchised in a very close presidential race.
As Chair of the DNC's Voting Rights Institute, I was astounded to learn just how dysfunctional our electoral system has become and why this is a serious impediment to successful elections for Democratic candidates at all levels. It's time for Democrats to get smart about election administration and take an active role in cleaning up laws and adopting new ones to protect every citizen's right to vote.
The strength of our democracy depends on the faith of every voter in the integrity of our elections. But it is obvious from the voices of those who stood in long lines in Ohio and elsewhere that confidence in the integrity of our electoral system is waning, even as democracy blooms abroad.
The right of all citizens to vote, and to have that vote accurately counted, is the bedrock on which our democracy is founded. Nothing is more fundamental to our freedom than public confidence in the integrity of basic democratic institutions. We used to be the envy of the world because our elections were hard fought, but the results were rarely questioned. This is no longer the case.
It is America's calling to defend and expand liberty, and to take an honest look at who, and how many, were denied the right to vote in 2004. Given past endeavors by some Republicans to marginalize voting rights concerns, it is up to Democrats to push for the adoption of tough new standards to ensure that no American is ever denied the right to vote.
For starters, the Democratic Party has worked tirelessly in urging the U.S. Congress and the Bush Administration to fully fund the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) and to assist states in improving election administration. While most states are attempting to comply with HAVA's mandates, there is confusion and a lack of consistency regarding the implementation of some of HAVA's requirements and many states are out of compliance.
Last year, a bipartisan Commission on Federal Election Reform co-chaired by former President Jimmy Carter and former Secretary of State James Baker released a report recommending, among other things, that "Congress should pass a law requiring that all voting machines be equipped with a voter-verifiable paper audit trail... (a) to increase citizens' confidence that their vote will be counted accurately, (b) to allow for a recount, (c) to provide a backup in cases of loss of votes due to computer malfunction, and (d) to test - through a random selection of machines - whether the paper result is the same as the electronic result".
Twenty-six states have now implemented requirements for voter-verified paper records and 13 more and the District of Columbia have such a requirement pending. In order to assure equal protection under the law, the independent auditability of the vote count must be consistently and legitimately protected in all states. We must reject the privatization of the vote count through the use of privately controlled electronic devices running on trade-secret-protected and undisclosed software. This practice is fundamentally at odds with government of the people, by the people and for the people. We must demand regulations that mandate transparent election administration, requiring voting equipment vendors to disclose their source code so that the equipment can be examined by third parties.
In addition to requiring a voter-verified paper record for every vote cast, we must urge lawmakers to require a significant percentage of random, unannounced, hand-counted audits of voter-verified paper records as a check on the results reported by electronic equipment.
We must work with local election officials to prohibit voting machines from having wireless or Internet connections and require that all voting equipment be used exclusively for voting purposes. Election officials must make certain that all eligible voters are able to cast their votes without impediment, regardless of physical or language limitation and that ballots are easy to comprehend and voting equipment is uncomplicated to use. Regulations must be adopted mandating that all voting machines used in local, state and federal elections - including, but not limited to direct recording electronic touch-screen machines - be certified as accurate and tamper-proof.
Local party officials must effectively train election monitors and poll watchers to enforce local election laws and procedures. We must continue to advocate for the adoption of election policies which require every ballot to be in a form that voters can read, verify and manually place in the ballot box.
In the post-2000 campaign environment, we must work with local officials to ensure that manual countywide recount procedures are in place before the vote is certified when manual vote tabulation detects a strong possibility of election equipment tampering.
Party leaders must work with state and local lawmakers to adopt regulations which preclude election officials from substituting efficiency for accuracy, so that voters can trust that every vote will be counted as cast.
It is vitally important that campaign personnel review the implementation of all HAVA guidelines, which protect voters from unlawful purges; reinforce the entitlement of voters to cast provisional ballots in federal elections; clarify the proper places and procedures for casting provisional ballots and establish a presumption in favor of validity; and clearly mandate that provisional ballots shall be counted in the most generous possible manner in every state, thereby maximizing and equalizing the value of the right to cast one.
Every Democratic campaign must work with state and local government officials prior to Election Day to ensure the equitable distribution of voting equipment and supplies to all polling places. This is crucial in order to avoid a repeat of those circumstances in 2004 when voters left polling stations out of sheer frustration due to excessively long lines and malfunctioning voting machinery.
It is also imperative that Democrats actively call upon the Republican Party to help stop voter fraud, voter suppression and intimidation, including the use of deceptive practices such as changing polling sites and placing off duty security guards at polling stations explicitly to harass certain voters on Election Day. Although it is an uphill battle, we must be relentless in pressuring federal and state lawmakers to outlaw these bogus practices.
While President Bush champions freedom and democracy elsewhere, I hope that Democrats will continue their call for clean, transparent and honest elections here at home. Before freedom marched in Baghdad, it took a stand here in America. Let's continue to fight for the right of all Americans to vote, to participate in elections to select those who will govern a free people and yes, to hold those elected accountable to our democratic principles and ideals.
Civil Rights Coalition in the Making
NATIONAL NEWS
Civil Rights Groups Share Common Agenda
by George E. Curry NNPA Editor-in-Chief
CHICAGO (NNPA) – During Rainbow/PUSH’s annual convention, a panel of leaders was assembled to work on a common agenda.
However, before moderator Ron Daniels could call on a second panelist, NAACP President Bruce Gordon had articulated what everyone would later agree was a series of common issues.
The leaders realized what they needed was not another agenda, but a plan of action.
Outlining the goal of the session, Daniels asked: “What can we collaborate on becomes the most urgent question. How do we frame an agenda and how do we re-gain the momentum in the current climate?”
Gordon, the panelist with the least experience in his or her current position, listed five key areas: education, health care, criminal justice, civic engagement and economic empowerment.
“I believe that already today, regardless of which organization we bring to the table, we’re focused on those five issues,” he said.
Sounding like a battle-weary veteran, Gordon added, “We can’t be satisfied with meetings, discussions and speeches. We need to act on them.”
Southern Christian Leadership Conference President Charles Steele Jr. agreed.
“We don’t have enough direct action,” said Steele. “That’s what got you your freedom.”
The crowd applauded loudly when he urged them to “raise hell.”
Jesse Jackson outlined four targets:
British Petroleum (BP), whom Jackson accuses of having no Blacks among its 800 gasoline distributors and less than 1 percent of its senior managers, figures the firm say are inaccurate; launching a boycott of CNN, if necessary, to get it to place more people of color on the air; taking on unrepresentative trade unions and marching before the Supreme Court to preserve affirmative action.
In taking the action against BP, one of the sponsors of this year’s convention, Jackson says in addition to having a solid case against BP, he was also signaling to corporations that even though they support Rainbow/PUSH financially, that support does not buy his silence.
Jackson said after the BP drive, a coalition of organizations will shift to focus to other oil company in an effort to drive down gas prices.
The threatened boycott of CNN also makes a statement to companies headed by Black CEOs, putting them on notice that they will not be exempt because of their race.
In his letter to Richard Parsons, the African-American who serves as CEO of Time-Warner, Jackson complained about “the patterns of exclusion in front of the camera and behind the scenes – from booking and talent producers, executive producers, anchors and hosts, commentators and guests” as well as issues discussed on-air.
“At our convention this week in Chicago, a broad coalition of African American and Latino organizations – including the NAACP, LULAC, National Action Network and many others – addressed the cultural lock-out by the media. Many feel humiliated and offended by the images projected across television screens around the world. If we continue to be tuned out and locked out, we are prepared to engage in a view out.”
On the panel, Al Sharpton said that when leaders have organized successful campaigns in the past, the White-owned media has rarely given them credit.
“A lot of our people think that civil rights organizations are of the past or don’t score victories,” Sharpton said. “That’s because when we score, the announcer never announces the score.
“This year alone, we were able to make boot camps in Florida illegal – a clear civil rights victory,” Sharpton said.
“We were able to turn around New Orleans, in terms of voter rights and voter participation – a clear victory. None of which was covered by the (White) media.”
Sharpton said Black leaders are often portrayed as ambulance-chasers, moving from event to event.
“In our community, we’re not the ambulance-chasers, we’re the ambulance,” he said, drawing laughter.
Rep. Mel Watt (D-N.C.), chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus, said the issues outlined by Gordon have been longtime staples of the CBC.
“The only thing I argue with is your notion that you can take those six or seven items and compact them into one or two things, “ he said.
“You can’t do that. They’re so interrelated.”
In each category, Watt said, African-Americans need to focus on racial disparities.
He said Blacks are overrepresented in every health category except one.
“We still commit suicide less than White people and we’re closing in on that from the wrong direction,” he said.
Barbara R. Arnwine, executive director of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, urged everyone to pay more attention to political empowerment for concentrating on election reform.
She strongly urged the groups to push for election day voter registration.
“Nine states already have it,” she stated.
“Guess what? They have the highest voter turnout in the country.”
While most states struggle to reach the 50 percent mark, Arnwine said voting jumps to 65 to 70 percent in states that allow same-day registration.
Theodore Shaw, director-counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, said he was concerned by a series of race-related cases the U.S. Supreme Court has decided to accept.
“The question before the court now – it may be framed differently – is whether it will be legal or constitutional in this country to take any action voluntarily or consciously to do anything about racial inequality. That’s what at stake now.”
He said he and Arnwine’s group, among others, would wage to legal battle in the courts and that others should focus on action outside of the courts.
“We cannot win legal battles these days unless we change the political context that we find ourselves a part of,” Shaw said.
“Law without political struggle is like a ship without water – it’s not going anywhere. What we need more than anything else is a movement –give it to us.”
Civil Rights Groups Share Common Agenda
by George E. Curry NNPA Editor-in-Chief
CHICAGO (NNPA) – During Rainbow/PUSH’s annual convention, a panel of leaders was assembled to work on a common agenda.
However, before moderator Ron Daniels could call on a second panelist, NAACP President Bruce Gordon had articulated what everyone would later agree was a series of common issues.
The leaders realized what they needed was not another agenda, but a plan of action.
Outlining the goal of the session, Daniels asked: “What can we collaborate on becomes the most urgent question. How do we frame an agenda and how do we re-gain the momentum in the current climate?”
Gordon, the panelist with the least experience in his or her current position, listed five key areas: education, health care, criminal justice, civic engagement and economic empowerment.
“I believe that already today, regardless of which organization we bring to the table, we’re focused on those five issues,” he said.
Sounding like a battle-weary veteran, Gordon added, “We can’t be satisfied with meetings, discussions and speeches. We need to act on them.”
Southern Christian Leadership Conference President Charles Steele Jr. agreed.
“We don’t have enough direct action,” said Steele. “That’s what got you your freedom.”
The crowd applauded loudly when he urged them to “raise hell.”
Jesse Jackson outlined four targets:
British Petroleum (BP), whom Jackson accuses of having no Blacks among its 800 gasoline distributors and less than 1 percent of its senior managers, figures the firm say are inaccurate; launching a boycott of CNN, if necessary, to get it to place more people of color on the air; taking on unrepresentative trade unions and marching before the Supreme Court to preserve affirmative action.
In taking the action against BP, one of the sponsors of this year’s convention, Jackson says in addition to having a solid case against BP, he was also signaling to corporations that even though they support Rainbow/PUSH financially, that support does not buy his silence.
Jackson said after the BP drive, a coalition of organizations will shift to focus to other oil company in an effort to drive down gas prices.
The threatened boycott of CNN also makes a statement to companies headed by Black CEOs, putting them on notice that they will not be exempt because of their race.
In his letter to Richard Parsons, the African-American who serves as CEO of Time-Warner, Jackson complained about “the patterns of exclusion in front of the camera and behind the scenes – from booking and talent producers, executive producers, anchors and hosts, commentators and guests” as well as issues discussed on-air.
“At our convention this week in Chicago, a broad coalition of African American and Latino organizations – including the NAACP, LULAC, National Action Network and many others – addressed the cultural lock-out by the media. Many feel humiliated and offended by the images projected across television screens around the world. If we continue to be tuned out and locked out, we are prepared to engage in a view out.”
On the panel, Al Sharpton said that when leaders have organized successful campaigns in the past, the White-owned media has rarely given them credit.
“A lot of our people think that civil rights organizations are of the past or don’t score victories,” Sharpton said. “That’s because when we score, the announcer never announces the score.
“This year alone, we were able to make boot camps in Florida illegal – a clear civil rights victory,” Sharpton said.
“We were able to turn around New Orleans, in terms of voter rights and voter participation – a clear victory. None of which was covered by the (White) media.”
Sharpton said Black leaders are often portrayed as ambulance-chasers, moving from event to event.
“In our community, we’re not the ambulance-chasers, we’re the ambulance,” he said, drawing laughter.
Rep. Mel Watt (D-N.C.), chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus, said the issues outlined by Gordon have been longtime staples of the CBC.
“The only thing I argue with is your notion that you can take those six or seven items and compact them into one or two things, “ he said.
“You can’t do that. They’re so interrelated.”
In each category, Watt said, African-Americans need to focus on racial disparities.
He said Blacks are overrepresented in every health category except one.
“We still commit suicide less than White people and we’re closing in on that from the wrong direction,” he said.
Barbara R. Arnwine, executive director of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, urged everyone to pay more attention to political empowerment for concentrating on election reform.
She strongly urged the groups to push for election day voter registration.
“Nine states already have it,” she stated.
“Guess what? They have the highest voter turnout in the country.”
While most states struggle to reach the 50 percent mark, Arnwine said voting jumps to 65 to 70 percent in states that allow same-day registration.
Theodore Shaw, director-counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, said he was concerned by a series of race-related cases the U.S. Supreme Court has decided to accept.
“The question before the court now – it may be framed differently – is whether it will be legal or constitutional in this country to take any action voluntarily or consciously to do anything about racial inequality. That’s what at stake now.”
He said he and Arnwine’s group, among others, would wage to legal battle in the courts and that others should focus on action outside of the courts.
“We cannot win legal battles these days unless we change the political context that we find ourselves a part of,” Shaw said.
“Law without political struggle is like a ship without water – it’s not going anywhere. What we need more than anything else is a movement –give it to us.”
Monday, June 19, 2006
Noted Journalist Speaks Out on Black Youth Violence
Commentary: The Uneasy Question - Why Are So Many Young Blacks So Quick to Kill and Die?
Sunday, June 18, 2006. By: Deborah Mathis, BlackAmericaWeb.com
I don’t know what they would have done in my community back in the day. One young person gunned down would have rendered the town apoplectic. When folks could walk again, it would have been with a slow, stunned shuffle. When they could talk again, the tones of their conversation would have been dulled by disbelief, fear and mourning. And they would have talked about it all the time for years.
In those good old days, you simply did not hear about young people being killed, save for the occasional traffic accident, drowning or the final measure of some dreadful disease. News of a child being shot to death -- especially rare and shocking -- came only when a kid had found a handgun stashed in the house and toyed with it most tragically. Never, but never, did we hear of a youngster shooting anyone intentionally.
The shooting deaths of five young people in the same place at the same time simply would have been unthinkable back then. I don’t know that we would have ever recovered.
But recover they must once again in New Orleans, where, on Saturday, one 16-year-old, one 17-year-old and three 19-year-olds all went down in a hail of gunfire in broad daylight. Two of the victims were related.
Although they have seen plenty in their troubled city, New Orleans police are even reeling from the incident. One veteran police captain couldn’t recall the last time so many were slain at once. Authorities are looking for the shooter or shooters, operating on the premise that the attack involved drugs or retaliation or both.
The motive could be helpful in nailing the villains, but it will not cut very deeply into what makes sense to us. There is no good, acceptable, justifiable reason to take out five young lives. Not out of anger, rivalry, vengeance or sport. Not for any reason. Not in a city that has ample constructive needs for healthy young men. Not anywhere. Not on a lazy summer weekend. Not ever.
Now, families who have already survived one of the greatest catastrophes to ever befall an American city will have to muster the strength to bury their young. They will have to learn anew how to go on and move ahead. They will have to endure the torment of wondering why and what they could have done to save the young men -- an inquiry that may or may not be overdue.
Potentially, someone else will lose their child to the prison cell, perhaps even to death row, and if they have any inkling of it today, they must be wrestling with misery too.
Considerable energy and resources have been poured into the analysis of what went wrong before, during and after Hurricane Katrina struck -- why the evacuation orders came so late; why school buses were not mobilized to move people out of endangered areas; why the Superdome and other makeshift shelters degenerated into swamps of suffering and danger; why the levees broke; why the Lower Ninth Ward still looks like it was leveled by a bomb.
Another pernicious problem is begging for solutions: Why are so many young people, especially young black and Latino men, so quick to kill and die?
Fellas always had gripes and grievances, always competed, often got out of hand. But, back then, they cared first and foremost about survival -- the other guy’s as well as their own.
What caused the breach in the levee between then and now? What wrought this awful flood?
Sunday, June 18, 2006. By: Deborah Mathis, BlackAmericaWeb.com
I don’t know what they would have done in my community back in the day. One young person gunned down would have rendered the town apoplectic. When folks could walk again, it would have been with a slow, stunned shuffle. When they could talk again, the tones of their conversation would have been dulled by disbelief, fear and mourning. And they would have talked about it all the time for years.
In those good old days, you simply did not hear about young people being killed, save for the occasional traffic accident, drowning or the final measure of some dreadful disease. News of a child being shot to death -- especially rare and shocking -- came only when a kid had found a handgun stashed in the house and toyed with it most tragically. Never, but never, did we hear of a youngster shooting anyone intentionally.
The shooting deaths of five young people in the same place at the same time simply would have been unthinkable back then. I don’t know that we would have ever recovered.
But recover they must once again in New Orleans, where, on Saturday, one 16-year-old, one 17-year-old and three 19-year-olds all went down in a hail of gunfire in broad daylight. Two of the victims were related.
Although they have seen plenty in their troubled city, New Orleans police are even reeling from the incident. One veteran police captain couldn’t recall the last time so many were slain at once. Authorities are looking for the shooter or shooters, operating on the premise that the attack involved drugs or retaliation or both.
The motive could be helpful in nailing the villains, but it will not cut very deeply into what makes sense to us. There is no good, acceptable, justifiable reason to take out five young lives. Not out of anger, rivalry, vengeance or sport. Not for any reason. Not in a city that has ample constructive needs for healthy young men. Not anywhere. Not on a lazy summer weekend. Not ever.
Now, families who have already survived one of the greatest catastrophes to ever befall an American city will have to muster the strength to bury their young. They will have to learn anew how to go on and move ahead. They will have to endure the torment of wondering why and what they could have done to save the young men -- an inquiry that may or may not be overdue.
Potentially, someone else will lose their child to the prison cell, perhaps even to death row, and if they have any inkling of it today, they must be wrestling with misery too.
Considerable energy and resources have been poured into the analysis of what went wrong before, during and after Hurricane Katrina struck -- why the evacuation orders came so late; why school buses were not mobilized to move people out of endangered areas; why the Superdome and other makeshift shelters degenerated into swamps of suffering and danger; why the levees broke; why the Lower Ninth Ward still looks like it was leveled by a bomb.
Another pernicious problem is begging for solutions: Why are so many young people, especially young black and Latino men, so quick to kill and die?
Fellas always had gripes and grievances, always competed, often got out of hand. But, back then, they cared first and foremost about survival -- the other guy’s as well as their own.
What caused the breach in the levee between then and now? What wrought this awful flood?
Hip Hop DJ Supports Kevin Powell For Congress
J. Period Presents Official Kevin Powell for Congress Mixtape
By: Mark Lelinwalla
June 16, 2006
Vibe Magazine
When veteran hip hop journalist Kevin Powell expressed his urge to run for congress, mixtape DJ J. Period felt compelled to help spread the news.
What resulted was the Official Kevin Powell for Congress Mixtape, Powell For The People Vol. 1: It’s Bigger Than Hip Hop. The mixtape features revolutionary and politically-charged MCs like Talib Kweli, M-1 from Dead Prez and Black Thought from The Roots.
“To my knowledge he’s (Powell) the first person from within the hip hop community to kind of put his money where his mouth is and go for a political office. Everyone talks about it, but he’s really doing it,” J. Period exclusively told Vibe.com. “Based on that, I started thinking about ways I could help him to spread the word. I came up with this idea of doing a mixtape with revolutionary hip hop mixed in with old Martin Luther King and Malcolm X speeches.
“For me it was exciting to use the medium of mixtapes to get the word out on things that are not entertainment or music related.”
In addition to the aforementioned artists featured on the mixtape, Period has also reached out to the likes of Immortal Technique, Pharoahe Monch and even Lauryn Hill to jump on the special project.
Period teamed up with Hill to present the well-received, The Best of Lauryn Hill mixtape last year.
J. Period’s exclusive mixtape, Powell For The People Vol. 1: It’s Bigger Than Hip Hop, is tentatively scheduled for a July 4th release.
By: Mark Lelinwalla
June 16, 2006
Vibe Magazine
When veteran hip hop journalist Kevin Powell expressed his urge to run for congress, mixtape DJ J. Period felt compelled to help spread the news.
What resulted was the Official Kevin Powell for Congress Mixtape, Powell For The People Vol. 1: It’s Bigger Than Hip Hop. The mixtape features revolutionary and politically-charged MCs like Talib Kweli, M-1 from Dead Prez and Black Thought from The Roots.
“To my knowledge he’s (Powell) the first person from within the hip hop community to kind of put his money where his mouth is and go for a political office. Everyone talks about it, but he’s really doing it,” J. Period exclusively told Vibe.com. “Based on that, I started thinking about ways I could help him to spread the word. I came up with this idea of doing a mixtape with revolutionary hip hop mixed in with old Martin Luther King and Malcolm X speeches.
“For me it was exciting to use the medium of mixtapes to get the word out on things that are not entertainment or music related.”
In addition to the aforementioned artists featured on the mixtape, Period has also reached out to the likes of Immortal Technique, Pharoahe Monch and even Lauryn Hill to jump on the special project.
Period teamed up with Hill to present the well-received, The Best of Lauryn Hill mixtape last year.
J. Period’s exclusive mixtape, Powell For The People Vol. 1: It’s Bigger Than Hip Hop, is tentatively scheduled for a July 4th release.
Thursday, June 15, 2006
The Black Public Intellectual: Journal of the Institute For Black Public Intellectualism
Launching of The Black Public Intellectual
The Institute For Black Public Intellectualism proudly announces the publication of its scholarly journal-The Black Public Intellectual. The Black Public Intellectual serves to provide a much needed voice in the public intellectual landscape. Our audience is both the academic and the larger public. It is our mission to educate all of humanity about the significant role played by black public intellectuals in both U.S. and global public culture. We seek to make plain the important issues of concern to people of Africana descent in our world-past, present, and future. To access the journal, click on the following link: http://theblackpublicintellectual.blogspot.com
Feel free to offer commentary on the contents of our publication. We want to hear from you-the public-because, collectively, you represent the community we work to reach and empower.
Thank you for your support.
Dr. Zachery Williams
Executive Director-The Institute For Black Public Intellectualism
Editor-The Black Public Intellectual
The Institute For Black Public Intellectualism proudly announces the publication of its scholarly journal-The Black Public Intellectual. The Black Public Intellectual serves to provide a much needed voice in the public intellectual landscape. Our audience is both the academic and the larger public. It is our mission to educate all of humanity about the significant role played by black public intellectuals in both U.S. and global public culture. We seek to make plain the important issues of concern to people of Africana descent in our world-past, present, and future. To access the journal, click on the following link: http://theblackpublicintellectual.blogspot.com
Feel free to offer commentary on the contents of our publication. We want to hear from you-the public-because, collectively, you represent the community we work to reach and empower.
Thank you for your support.
Dr. Zachery Williams
Executive Director-The Institute For Black Public Intellectualism
Editor-The Black Public Intellectual
Dr. John Hope Franklin's Mirror to America
One Man's Memory of What the Nation Wants to Forget
New York Times
Editorial Observer
By BRENT STAPLES
Published: June 10, 2006
Nations tend to write their histories by forgetting the shameful parts. In America, once-buried issues associated with slavery and the genocide against Native Americans have resurfaced and been incorporated into the national memory. But World War II has thus far been held apart as an era that is almost beyond reproach. Indeed, the people who led the country in the 40's and fought the war have been transformed from mere mortals — with faults like the rest of us — into sudden secular saints. They were dubbed "the greatest generation" and made out to be peerless in bravery and moral rectitude.
But when it comes to racial justice, any claim of moral superiority is false on its face. Franklin Roosevelt and the national political leadership failed when tested on the great moral issue of the 20th century. It was within Roosevelt's power to strike Jim Crow segregation from the military — which is precisely what Harry Truman would do three years after the war ended. Roosevelt, however, embraced apartheid segregation, actually spreading it from the Army, where it had been long established, into other major branches of the military.
Historians now agree that in the process, the military transplanted Jim Crow racism from the South into parts of the country where it had not previously existed. It further legitimized retrograde racial attitudes by enforcing apartheid policies in the towns where troops spent leisure time.
Beyond that, providing racially segregated living and training arrangements — as well as separate command structures — taxed the country's resources and created a logjam among black recruits. With too few segregated outfits to hold them, hundreds of thousands were either turned away when they volunteered or simply passed over by the Selective Service when they became eligible for the draft.
Black recruits who actually made it into the military were often greeted by a racial nightmare, especially when they waited out the war in Southern camps. There they faced legendary cruelty from white officers who resented having to command them at all, as well as hatred and harassment from townsfolk who were more favorably inclined toward German prisoners of war than toward black Americans in uniform. By the middle of the war, maltreatment of black soldiers had spawned race riots on so many military posts that the Army seemed to be shaking itself to pieces.
African-Americans who lived through this humiliating experience have typically been hesitant to discuss it, and most have taken their experiences with them to the grave. The distinguished historian John Hope Franklin, now 91 years old, broke the silence thunderously in his memoir, "Mirror to America," which offers a clear-eyed but also heart-wrenching portrait of one black family's struggle to serve with honor in a nation that regarded them as less than fully human.
Dr. Franklin was a newly minted Harvard Ph.D. at the start of the war. Like most black intellectuals at the time, he was well aware of the nightmare life that awaited educated black men who were drafted into the Army. He hoped to escape that fate by "selling" himself to the Navy, which was desperate for men after the attack on Pearl Harbor. The recruiter seemed stunned as Dr. Franklin reeled off his qualifications, which included shorthand and typing (at 75 words per minute) as well as his doctorate. But the recruiter, he writes, "said simply that I was lacking in one important qualification, and that was color."
He next turned to the War Department, which was hiring dropouts from Harvard to write the official history of the war. He submitted his qualifications, which included a book already in press, and even solicited support from the first lady, Eleanor Roosevelt, all to no avail. "I decided that they did not want to win the war," he told me in an interview, "they wanted to win the status of white people in this country."
His older brother, Buck Franklin Jr., had a different, and even worse, experience. He was drafted, despite being married, over 30 and a high school principal, by a bigoted draft board that seemed determined to bring an "uppity" black man down. Assigned to a white officer who appeared to have hated him from the start, he fell into a depression from which he never recovered. He died in 1947, after he either fell or jumped from a hotel window. Dr. Franklin, known throughout his career for his evenness of temper, still refers to his brother's death as murder.
The forces of nostalgia see Jim Crow segregation as a minor blemish on the otherwise noble effort that was the great war. But government-enforced racism was actually at the very heart of the enterprise. It undermined the war effort, further poisoned an already racially troubled society and took a savage toll on families like the Franklins. It would be a crime in itself for the country ever to forget that.
New York Times
Editorial Observer
By BRENT STAPLES
Published: June 10, 2006
Nations tend to write their histories by forgetting the shameful parts. In America, once-buried issues associated with slavery and the genocide against Native Americans have resurfaced and been incorporated into the national memory. But World War II has thus far been held apart as an era that is almost beyond reproach. Indeed, the people who led the country in the 40's and fought the war have been transformed from mere mortals — with faults like the rest of us — into sudden secular saints. They were dubbed "the greatest generation" and made out to be peerless in bravery and moral rectitude.
But when it comes to racial justice, any claim of moral superiority is false on its face. Franklin Roosevelt and the national political leadership failed when tested on the great moral issue of the 20th century. It was within Roosevelt's power to strike Jim Crow segregation from the military — which is precisely what Harry Truman would do three years after the war ended. Roosevelt, however, embraced apartheid segregation, actually spreading it from the Army, where it had been long established, into other major branches of the military.
Historians now agree that in the process, the military transplanted Jim Crow racism from the South into parts of the country where it had not previously existed. It further legitimized retrograde racial attitudes by enforcing apartheid policies in the towns where troops spent leisure time.
Beyond that, providing racially segregated living and training arrangements — as well as separate command structures — taxed the country's resources and created a logjam among black recruits. With too few segregated outfits to hold them, hundreds of thousands were either turned away when they volunteered or simply passed over by the Selective Service when they became eligible for the draft.
Black recruits who actually made it into the military were often greeted by a racial nightmare, especially when they waited out the war in Southern camps. There they faced legendary cruelty from white officers who resented having to command them at all, as well as hatred and harassment from townsfolk who were more favorably inclined toward German prisoners of war than toward black Americans in uniform. By the middle of the war, maltreatment of black soldiers had spawned race riots on so many military posts that the Army seemed to be shaking itself to pieces.
African-Americans who lived through this humiliating experience have typically been hesitant to discuss it, and most have taken their experiences with them to the grave. The distinguished historian John Hope Franklin, now 91 years old, broke the silence thunderously in his memoir, "Mirror to America," which offers a clear-eyed but also heart-wrenching portrait of one black family's struggle to serve with honor in a nation that regarded them as less than fully human.
Dr. Franklin was a newly minted Harvard Ph.D. at the start of the war. Like most black intellectuals at the time, he was well aware of the nightmare life that awaited educated black men who were drafted into the Army. He hoped to escape that fate by "selling" himself to the Navy, which was desperate for men after the attack on Pearl Harbor. The recruiter seemed stunned as Dr. Franklin reeled off his qualifications, which included shorthand and typing (at 75 words per minute) as well as his doctorate. But the recruiter, he writes, "said simply that I was lacking in one important qualification, and that was color."
He next turned to the War Department, which was hiring dropouts from Harvard to write the official history of the war. He submitted his qualifications, which included a book already in press, and even solicited support from the first lady, Eleanor Roosevelt, all to no avail. "I decided that they did not want to win the war," he told me in an interview, "they wanted to win the status of white people in this country."
His older brother, Buck Franklin Jr., had a different, and even worse, experience. He was drafted, despite being married, over 30 and a high school principal, by a bigoted draft board that seemed determined to bring an "uppity" black man down. Assigned to a white officer who appeared to have hated him from the start, he fell into a depression from which he never recovered. He died in 1947, after he either fell or jumped from a hotel window. Dr. Franklin, known throughout his career for his evenness of temper, still refers to his brother's death as murder.
The forces of nostalgia see Jim Crow segregation as a minor blemish on the otherwise noble effort that was the great war. But government-enforced racism was actually at the very heart of the enterprise. It undermined the war effort, further poisoned an already racially troubled society and took a savage toll on families like the Franklins. It would be a crime in itself for the country ever to forget that.
In The News:
Six black professors departing from Duke
June 12, 2006
BY PAUL BONNER, The Herald-Sun
Amid the departure of a half-dozen black professors from Duke this summer, the university remains committed to hiring and retaining black faculty, Provost Peter Lange said.
Houston Baker Jr. and his wife, Charlotte Pierce-Baker, are among highly touted hires by Vanderbilt that the Tennessee university recently characterized as a "blockbuster recruiting coup" advancing its scholarship in Southern literature.
Although the couple were wooed to Nashville before the lacrosse rape scandal broke, Houston Baker has been a prominent dissenting voice in Duke's handling of the allegations. His letter charging Duke's administration with "tepid legalism" amid a campus "culture of silence" protecting white male athletes was widely disseminated and continues to have repercussions.
Lange replied publicly to Baker -- although he has declined to discuss the exchange further -- countering that Baker's letter "disappointed, saddened and appalled" him by what Lange said was its prejudgment of the case. Last week, 15 professors from around the country joined the debate, now more than two months old. They signed a letter to Lange, saying his reply to Baker "assumes a lofty and condescending position of White authority."
Lange declined Monday to discuss the latest letter.
And although he and others close to the situation agree that the loss of prominent black faculty is unrelated to the lacrosse scandal -- and in fact, Duke will realize a net gain in black professors this year -- Lange said the university is sorry to see them go. Five are in arts and sciences and one is in Duke's Fuqua School of Business.
"We don't want to lose anybody," he said.
Besides the Bakers, they include John L. Jackson Jr., and his wife, Deborah Thomas, both in Duke's department of cultural anthropology. They will teach at the University of Pennsylvania in the fall.
Lange said that the university is gaining 10 black faculty this year: three in medicine, two in divinity, two in nursing and three in arts and sciences.
"I think this has always been a highly competitive environment," Lange said. "We've been a leader in our aggressive efforts to hire black faculty."
Houston Baker was unavailable for comment, but an assistant released a statement in which the couple said Vanderbilt had made a "generous and gracious offer," and that living in Nashville will put them closer to their children and grandchildren.
Vanderbilt's hires also include scholar Hortense Spillers, from Cornell, and writer Alice Randall, whose novel "The Wind Done Gone" skewers "Gone With the Wind."
Mark Anthony Neal, an associate professor of African and African American studies at Duke, agreed that competition among universities is keen for top black scholars, and that it's not surprising Duke should be a recruiting ground.
"It's the downside of having very good people in a high-profile institution," Neal said. "Duke has benefited from that when we recruited Professor Baker from the University of Pennsylvania a few years ago, and now this is the other side of it.
"And it's a fairly normal thing. ... We're proud of the department we put together over the last couple of years, and we'll be proud of it as we go through the retooling process."
Pierce-Baker's scholarship has focused on issues of rape, especially among blacks. She also spoke out on the lacrosse case, including in a forum on WUNC radio.
Even so, Neal said, speaking of the couple's departure, "ultimately, I think the lacrosse aspect of this is a non-factor."
One of the signers of the latest letter, Clyde Taylor, a professor at New York University, said the Baker-Lange exchange was noticed by another of the signers, Herman Gray, a sociology professor at the University of California at Santa Cruz, who brought it to Taylor's attention.
"I forwarded it to some people I know, and three or four of us thought there should be a response," Taylor said. A draft circulated among as many as two dozen professors, he said.
While acknowledging the signers are "too far away to make any judgment about who did what to whom" in the case, it nonetheless resonates with other racially tinged episodes such as a string of e-mails at his own university containing racial and anti-Semitic hate language, he said.
"We have these events so regularly, and we get used to having them," Taylor said. "I feel we should not become used to having them and should not try to put Band-Aids on these individual incidents."
Duke in 1993 undertook a Black Faculty Strategic Initiative that doubled their numbers from 44 within nine years.
"And we've seen data of late that suggests that among our peers we've been doing quite well," Lange said. "But it's a continuing issue, trying to retain the faculty you have, hire new ones and help fill the pipeline."
Duke operates summer programs in economics and political science to increase the number of minorities moving into faculty positions in those professions, he said. And the university's overall strategic plan includes a goal of 25 more faculty of all minorities in the next five years.
Turnover will likely remain an issue, however, Neal said.
"The only place I think that's not an issue is someplace like Harvard, because where do you go?" he said.
June 12, 2006
BY PAUL BONNER, The Herald-Sun
Amid the departure of a half-dozen black professors from Duke this summer, the university remains committed to hiring and retaining black faculty, Provost Peter Lange said.
Houston Baker Jr. and his wife, Charlotte Pierce-Baker, are among highly touted hires by Vanderbilt that the Tennessee university recently characterized as a "blockbuster recruiting coup" advancing its scholarship in Southern literature.
Although the couple were wooed to Nashville before the lacrosse rape scandal broke, Houston Baker has been a prominent dissenting voice in Duke's handling of the allegations. His letter charging Duke's administration with "tepid legalism" amid a campus "culture of silence" protecting white male athletes was widely disseminated and continues to have repercussions.
Lange replied publicly to Baker -- although he has declined to discuss the exchange further -- countering that Baker's letter "disappointed, saddened and appalled" him by what Lange said was its prejudgment of the case. Last week, 15 professors from around the country joined the debate, now more than two months old. They signed a letter to Lange, saying his reply to Baker "assumes a lofty and condescending position of White authority."
Lange declined Monday to discuss the latest letter.
And although he and others close to the situation agree that the loss of prominent black faculty is unrelated to the lacrosse scandal -- and in fact, Duke will realize a net gain in black professors this year -- Lange said the university is sorry to see them go. Five are in arts and sciences and one is in Duke's Fuqua School of Business.
"We don't want to lose anybody," he said.
Besides the Bakers, they include John L. Jackson Jr., and his wife, Deborah Thomas, both in Duke's department of cultural anthropology. They will teach at the University of Pennsylvania in the fall.
Lange said that the university is gaining 10 black faculty this year: three in medicine, two in divinity, two in nursing and three in arts and sciences.
"I think this has always been a highly competitive environment," Lange said. "We've been a leader in our aggressive efforts to hire black faculty."
Houston Baker was unavailable for comment, but an assistant released a statement in which the couple said Vanderbilt had made a "generous and gracious offer," and that living in Nashville will put them closer to their children and grandchildren.
Vanderbilt's hires also include scholar Hortense Spillers, from Cornell, and writer Alice Randall, whose novel "The Wind Done Gone" skewers "Gone With the Wind."
Mark Anthony Neal, an associate professor of African and African American studies at Duke, agreed that competition among universities is keen for top black scholars, and that it's not surprising Duke should be a recruiting ground.
"It's the downside of having very good people in a high-profile institution," Neal said. "Duke has benefited from that when we recruited Professor Baker from the University of Pennsylvania a few years ago, and now this is the other side of it.
"And it's a fairly normal thing. ... We're proud of the department we put together over the last couple of years, and we'll be proud of it as we go through the retooling process."
Pierce-Baker's scholarship has focused on issues of rape, especially among blacks. She also spoke out on the lacrosse case, including in a forum on WUNC radio.
Even so, Neal said, speaking of the couple's departure, "ultimately, I think the lacrosse aspect of this is a non-factor."
One of the signers of the latest letter, Clyde Taylor, a professor at New York University, said the Baker-Lange exchange was noticed by another of the signers, Herman Gray, a sociology professor at the University of California at Santa Cruz, who brought it to Taylor's attention.
"I forwarded it to some people I know, and three or four of us thought there should be a response," Taylor said. A draft circulated among as many as two dozen professors, he said.
While acknowledging the signers are "too far away to make any judgment about who did what to whom" in the case, it nonetheless resonates with other racially tinged episodes such as a string of e-mails at his own university containing racial and anti-Semitic hate language, he said.
"We have these events so regularly, and we get used to having them," Taylor said. "I feel we should not become used to having them and should not try to put Band-Aids on these individual incidents."
Duke in 1993 undertook a Black Faculty Strategic Initiative that doubled their numbers from 44 within nine years.
"And we've seen data of late that suggests that among our peers we've been doing quite well," Lange said. "But it's a continuing issue, trying to retain the faculty you have, hire new ones and help fill the pipeline."
Duke operates summer programs in economics and political science to increase the number of minorities moving into faculty positions in those professions, he said. And the university's overall strategic plan includes a goal of 25 more faculty of all minorities in the next five years.
Turnover will likely remain an issue, however, Neal said.
"The only place I think that's not an issue is someplace like Harvard, because where do you go?" he said.
Tuesday, June 13, 2006
Institute For Black Public Intellectualism Launches
Under the direction of Dr. Zachery R. Williams, The Institute For Black Public Intellectualism is poised to redefine the role of the global black public intellectual in our nation and world.
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