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About Portland observer. (Portland, Or.) 1970-current | View Entire Issue (April 27, 1972)
X P .g e 2 Decisions Decisions of 1972 As I See It ---------------------- Portland’s Black M iddle Class: A Disappointment! MU5T I t lW TOÛETHEQFPR FULL AND EQUAL EMPLOYMENT. P art Portland/O bserver Thursday A p ril 27, 1972 The N orthw **»’* Be*» W eekly A Block Owned Publication N. Kilhngsworth, Portland, Oregon 97217 Subscription $5.25 per year in Tri-County area by m a il. Out side the I'ri-C ounty area - >6.dl) per vear by m ail. Phone 283-2486. M ailing address - P. o . Box 3137, Portland, Oregon 97208. ALFRED LEE HENDERSr N, 1 a b lish e r/E d ito r Verna L. Henderson Asst. Publisher/business manage: Helen Hendrix INP A Personnel and Production Manager Any erroneous reflection upon the character, standing oi rep utation of person, firm or corporation, which may appear m the Portland Observer w ill be cheerfully corrected upon teing brought to the attention of the E ditor. Decisions Goldschm dt o r deUeese , that is the question' \\ ill e ith e r man remember us a lte r he is elected? o r w ill candidates continue to give those decision making positions to whites say ing that Blacks are not ready? And what about Ed Hamiltion? Would he do better? The The O b s e r v a tio n s Desk ALFRED LEE HENDERSON White responsibility to black business W hat is the responsibility ol the white community to the eco nomic life of the black community ? Since the fir s t white Americans sett.ed the Oregon Country, their economic, social, educational, religious and politica foices have combined to iso ate black people from the economic mainstream. When blacks began to come to Portland in greater numbers, in the e a rly 1940’ s, the lines of separation were tightened and isolation made more d istin ct. A coalition of business, labor and public o fficia ls has con spired to prevent blacks from taking their rightful p ace. This was accomplished through refusal to hire blacks, dis crim ination by labor unions, and the elimination of blacks trom public employment through manipulation of tests and c iv il ser vice lis ts . Government has looked the other way as blacks have suffered discrim ination in education, housing and employ ment. * * " »• White businessmen, union leaders and public o fficia ls are s till in command. Black businesses and other economic endea vors must rely onwhite support or fa il. And if this support Joes not come, they cannot exist. Black business exists in a depressed area, with potential con sumers who have lower than average incomes and must spend a higher percentage of their incomes on the basics - food, shel ter and clothing - than white customers. Business expenses are higher due to inflated insurance costs, high rents, d iffic u lt to obtain c re d it and other handicaps. Yet the same people who have systematically kept blacks out of the economic life of the community, accuse us of failing to have the initiative to become businessmen. The responsibility of the white community is toencourage and support black business. The responsibility of the white corpor ation o r industry is to spend some of its money, especially that provided him by the government, to purchase goods and services provided by black business. Attention W ill the w rite r that mailed to us an " a r tic le ’ ' entitle : "A Community C ries Out in Agony” (The Neil Coidschmidt Pro posal fo r M erger of Poverty Program s) please come in and claim the a rtic le . We w ill print your view, if these are your convictions. Why not let the community know who vou are? Open letter to the school board M r. Robert Ridglev, Chairman Board of Education 631 NF Clackamas Street Portland, Oregon Dear Mr. Ridglev: I cannot in good faith accept the position you asked me to f ill on the committee to choose members to r the d is tric t ad visory committees. 1 am honored by yourconsideration ol me fo r this task. How ever, | strongly believe that members of the advisory com m it tees should be chosen by members ol the communities they represent. A committee chosen by the school board, no m atter how objective it trie s to be. cannot replace the elective process. 1 hope you w ill in the very near future levelop a process whereby committee members w ill be elected with sateguards to insure participation by a ll segments of the population. I would be happy to serve vou in seme other capacity Very truly yours, A . Lee Henderson The o b se rve r's official position is expressed only in its Pub lish e r's Column (The Observation Post) and the E d ito r's I esk. Any other m aterial throughout the paper is the opinion ot the in dividual w rite r or submitter and Joes not necessarily reflect the opinion of the Observer. Deadline Pictu e3 - Mondav 5:00 [an Stories - Tuesday 5:00 pm D ear E d ito n In both editions of the Ore gonian and Oregon Journal of A p ril 19, 1972, an a rticle ap peared accusing the baseball coach of Oregon State I d iv e r sity of discrim ination indeny- ing Verdell Adams, an all P IL baseball player, the right to travel with the school team. T his is not the firs t incident of this kind on the part of this coach who has made public statements that he w ill not have black players on h is team. T his is not the firs t time this has happened at OSL; ask F red M ilton, but this only seems to happen, throughout the entire system of higher education, at OSU. These continual racial slurs demonstrate that there is clearly something wrong with this college and the mental attitude of th e e n tire C o rva llis community. This w ill not once again stand a s o -c a lle d " l o c a l investigation by a local c i tizen” but needs in fact a searching inquiry from th e Governor's office and the State Board of Higher Educa A A tion by a completely impartial body. How do you convince black children not to be drop-outs, when on the highest level of ed ucation, they are dropped out. The state of M ississippi has over two hundred black stu dents on its I Diversity cam pus. There is a message here somewhere. Perhaps it is time fo r our community to organize ami warn its graduating h ig h school students, athletes and nor - athletes alike, that they simply are not welcome in the C o rva llis educational commu nity. J . Alton Page » Conference supports busing Advertising - I uesl i_, 5:00 pm I he anti-busing proposals of both President N i x o n anil separatist groups who suc ceeded in adopting such a res olution at the recent National Bla k P o liti il Convention m ( .ary. In. iana, were lin n lv re- jecte by Ihe National I’ olicv Conference on E location for Blacks. D r. Kenneth C la rk, who is president of the Metropolitan \p p lie i Research Center (MARC), was i keynote qeak- er at the conference. Notonlv Dear Editor: I»: he lenounce theNixonplan as an itcempt to slow the pace I would like to commend of public school lesegrega- you fo r the fine job the f il>— tion, but aiso as a return of the server has been doing with civ il rights movement to a its distribution of news. We point at or le fo re the Plessy need such a vital institution vs. Fergison sep ira te -b u t- in our c ity . I only wished equal stage. He contended that that more citizens (especially this planwoul i hold tie federal whites) read you: newspaper. court hack from acting as an I support you wholeheartedly rnderendent protector of the in your effo rts to bring about rights of m inorities against some change in the com tie prejudices of the m a jo rity. munity, city, and state. "W h ile the President at I also like " A s I See It.” tempts to prohibit transput ta- M r. Davis makes tnary ob tion of students fo r purposes servations that escapes most of desegregation, he would people. He said that the pur perm it ti ansportatlon of these pose of his a rtic le is to In childien lo r other purposes. form tie community ol things He is using ttie power of his of that effect then lives. That fice in a racial controversy on is what he has been doing. tie side nt those w ho have teen Lenwood G. Davis is truly consistently opposed toequal- "T h e Conscious of the Com ity of educational opportunity m u n ity ", and I hope that he for racially rejected m inor w ill continue to be it. I he itie s ," said D r. C lark. community needs such young Mor e than 600 delegates at p ro lific men like M r. Davis. tended the th re e -la y meeting sponsored by th e Congies- I. H. Land sional Black Caucus, with I ,5. III S.W. Harrison R e p . Augustus Hawkins of Portland, Oregon C alifornia as chairman. Letters to the Editor Racism a t OSU 1 changed as long as the Black M kklle Gia as continues to suf fe r from delusions of grandeur and fa il to face tea Illy , things w ill not change ui Put tlaml un til A l l. Black people can Ire respected as fellow human Ic ings ami firs t-c la s s citizens. F or Portland's Black Middle Class to Iwlleve otherwise Is fo r them to suiter from can cer ol the brain and dial itie r of (tie mind. IB I enwoad G. I »sv is Commends WASHINGTON y / - •> I II. . I ■ Ihe Columbia University Graduate School ol Journalism announced that E a rl Caldwell oi the New York l imes rml Robert C. Maynard of th e Washington P o stw ill beeo-di- rectors ol the 1972 summer Program in Journalism to r m inority group memhers. the school said Caldw ell's anil Maynard's appointments mark the firs t time the p r o gram has teen headed by jour nalists who are nationally known. "W e seek to find m e a n s through this program ol e lim i nating from tie lexicon of American journalism th e phrase, 'couldn't tind anyone qua lilie d ,” Caldwell and May nard said. Bayard Rustin, executive d ire cto r ol the A. Phil ip Ran dolph Institute, an orguniza tion that promotes registra tion ami voter eudcation cam paigns among black tr a d e union;., called lo r tlie election this year ol any other Pres idential anil al ate iesvles Richard Nixon o r Governor George Wallace. Rustin said, " A s long as Nixon is in the White House, there can le no social pro gress in A m erica. Nixon';; economic policies produi e scarcity, and as long is there is scarcity, reople w ill light each other fo r jobs, housing iixt medical c a re ." Rustin said any Democratic candidate except George W i l iac* was ac< eptahle to his o r ganization. Rustin urged blacks to jour labor union ami pointe-1 out that tlie 2,5 m il lion blacks who helong to unions earn 50 |iei ent more than blai ks not af filia te with unions. Some Insight into the ways in which ghettos are bred and maintained is provider In a current suit brought by the ACI I igainst Cleveland Ma yor Ralph Perk. I lie suit charges that 62 per entol the c ity 's pubir housing is in pre dominantly black areas. It al so contend , that blacks are be ing isolate! from the white community. II .ucce ,sful, tlie uit will bring a moratorium on tlie fu ture construction ol public housing in black ireas until tlie ie is a balance ol the units in all wards of tlie city. lie life of D r. W illiam Nkomo, who lie l at tie ige ol 57, covered the whole .[«• - trum of tie fight lo r the A f r i can people ol South A frica - from black power to peaceful dialogue. As a young man, he was ex pelled from tie African Na tional Congress (ANC) fo r his m ilita n t le i lets. In later ye n s some blacks spurned him as an "F n c le lorn” fo r advocating dialogue ami omprornisewith whites. Nkomo was bor n iri 1915 in an A frican township near I ’ reto rla . The son of a Methodist m in iste r, lie gained a bachelor of science degree at p o rt Hare I niverslty ami travelled to tie United States just le fo re World War II to attend the World Youth Congress. In January, he was elected fir s t A frican president of tie South A fi lean Institute of Race Relations. I would like to preface this a rticle by staling that I leel that I am in a goal position to analyze Portland's H lackM kl- dle Glass because I have leen designated as being pm t of It. I le ie to ie , I cannot Ire accused ot lemg envious or jealous of It. Having tiaveled In 41)states, 10 countries ami 3 continents, m this w rite r's opinion, Port land's Black Middle Class is tie m o s t G t'M PI. ACE N F, most SA USI-TKD, most APA- I III IIC , most CONSERVA TIVE, mostPKOVINClAI .and most TRADITIONAI of any Black M sidle Class that 1 have seen ANYWHERE! Now let's examine those allegations. Most of Portland's BI ackM kl- dle Class aie under tie sad illusion that we have acquired uur status because oloui abil ities amt initiatives. Chat Is an Invalid assumption. W h a t we do not want to admit is that we did not make it altogether because of our own abilities, but because other Blacks have paved tlie way fo r us. Musi ot the MxldleClass Blacks ate out ol touch with re a lity. We have tailed to realize that we w ill swing together or we w ill all swing separately amt that NO BLACK man is fie e until M l FI \CK men are ERKE. Most ol the Blacks líete ate too fragmented. There is no unity. We are too divided and ate not working together. lo o many ol us ate only concerned with maintaining the status .|uo. Most ot us are too con cerned with projecting our own self unage amt ate NOT con cerned with what happens to tlie masses of Black people. Most atem ore interested with teing part of th e ir own social dubs, fra te rn itie s, sororities and jieer groups than trying to do something lo r our Black brothers and siste rs. Granted th a t sortie of these social groups do give a few scholar ships and make some m inor contributions to the commu nity. However, these acts are mere gestures am! somewhat n il. We are not doing one iota ol what we can ami should rlo. We have tlie N.A.A.C.P. going In one direction; the Urban League in one direction; the Black Panther Party uionedl- rection; the m inisters in one direction; the average i iti/e n in one direction; ami tlie Black Middle Class in another. All oi us should support one o r ganization that - an le tlie voice ol the Black community. At present the Oregon B la c k Caucus is the logical organi zation to speak fo r tie commu nity. A ll ol us should support the el Io its ol the Black Cau cus. Very lew s o -c a lle l Black M Mb lie Class reople have sup ported tie Oregon Black C m- us. several, however, hive, such a I .e e l'. In own (when le is in town). Charle . Jordan, John Toran, o cie I ro tte r, Gladys McCoy, David Nero, Jette Wild a. Hazel Warren, W illi am M C o y , Kay Jeimgan ind etc. Other . have p a rtic i- pated occasionally, such as George Rankins, Paul Knaul , ( halrner , Jones ami etc. oth ers have leen conspicuously ibsent, s u c h us Cleveland G lie re r e , l.eon H a rris ,M é r c e le . Deiz, Aaron B ro w n ,!.. Slelton H ill, E llis Casson, Hazel Hays, II. Belton Ham il ton, Brenda Green, Maltha Jordon, W illiam McClendon, \lv in Batiste, Joe Bawman, J e rry F u lle r, W illiam New- born, Russell Dawson, W II- liirn Gerald, Arthur C ox, C. Don V itin , W illiam Jenkins, Henry Scott, A lbert Scott, Samuel Scott, Manuel S< ott, Vernable Booker, Geoige C hristian, Herman C, Plum m et, I . Hen I , iw, Nathan Nick erson, I,Ivin R oberts,W illiam liillia n l, D.A. Johnson and Helloise H ill. I here have teen NO BLACK Part II of ‘ ‘ Portland's B la c k Mkldle Class: A Disappoint m ent!" w ill apiear next week. Len w o o d G .D a v it speech and leing white orien tated with all ol then values. Ihe Black so-called Middle Class In Portland can no long e r sit idly by while the masses lie re are oppressed. I hey Ml S I RISE A N I) HEC( »ME A VOICE OF DISSENT. Ami if they continue to perpetuate myths of whites, then the Black masseadon't need them, they must realize thatUNTH. A l 1 BLACKS ARE FREE.,Nil HI \CK is F Kid .. I he luture of Portland w ill never te (EDITOR'S Noll-:: IheKdltoi ot the o bserver has attemled meetings ol the BlackCaucus, however, I suggest that the Black Caucus coordinate its meetings at either another day ot at a different hour. Whatever your profession maybe, it the meetings are schaluled dut uig yourwoi king houis you cannot attend. Although the black church has a seven day a week respon s ib ility , most ol its input is on Sunday ami most m in iste is find il unposaible to attend). McCoy DEMOCRAT For State Representative District 15 Responsible Knowledgeable Concerned E lect VLCoy Committee 7433 N. Lombard Si. Dennis M 'G ounack. | ivas. Portlnm l, Oregon 97203 (286-9144) From MCM. the company that gave you SWMT He hit the Man (or $ 3 million Right where it hurts. In the diamonds. PHYSICIANS, DENTISTS, PHARMACISTS, MINIS 11. Rs oi Id SINESSMI.N involved except David Nero. We fiml that a lew of them have the time to v is it Geneva's, F red’s P in e , Ebony Club, I ip- stairs, Jade West, I hunder- b lr l |nn(Jantzen Beach), Ra- hi gla Inn, Sheraton Inn, Holi day Inn, Candlelight Inn (fo r m erly S m ltty's), arid a few out of the way places. Yetsomedo not have tlie time or w ill not take the time to attend the P.lack Caucus meetings. In some cases what we find is the Black Middle Class be ing only carbon copies ol the white middle class in their Clinking, lehavior, d r e s s , And baby, that's cold. MF TRO GOIDWYN MAYIR Present*. GOOI HPK/I Slarnnq IHHIMIKRAMW» JUDY PAU JIM WATKINS IINCOIN Kll PATRICK And RAYMOND ST JAUXJI '■ As Mr h m STARTS W ED N ESD A Y MAY 3 M T . TABOR THEATRE 104»h I ST. D R IV E -IN i
