Image provided by: University of Oregon Libraries; Eugene, OR
About Portland observer. (Portland, Or.) 1970-current | View Entire Issue (Jan. 22, 1976)
**rB Frances Schoon-Newgpeper Reo» U n iv e r s ity o f Oregon L ib ra ry t-ugene, Oregon 97-103 ' PORTLAND Portland, Oregon Thursday, January 22, 1976 M artin Luther King Day Page 5 Entertainment Guide Page 6 National Priorities Page 3 10c per copy Observer awards \ ERNON Jordan was raised in Atlanta. Georgia, where he was born in 1935. He graduated from De l’auw University in 1957 and earned a law degree at Howard Univer sity Law School in 1960. Prior to his present position Jordan was Executive Director of the United Negro College Fund (1970 19721; Director of the Voter Education Project. Southern Kegional Council (1965 1970); Attorney Consultant. Office of Economic Oppor Kissinger ouster demanded by Rov llarvey Republican Congressm an Edward Derwinski (Illinois! called Secretary of Slate Henry Kissinger “a political liability" and demanded his resignation. Ih-rwinski is the ranking Republican on (he House International Relations Com mitlee. "Dr Kissinger has reached a l>oint where his resignation would be beneficial to the country," Derwinski said The Chicago Sun Times and International Press Service (IPS) speeu lated that Derwinski's move was a trail balloon floated for President Ford. This view has been born out, in that last week Kissinger was fired from his membership on the select '40 Committee’. To date the only major press this has lieen reported in has been the Baltimore Sun (January 17th). The Sun notes also that Kissinger was removed from the Defense Policy Planning Committee, and is likely to be removed as head of the Washington Special Action Group (SAG) as well as the SALT verification panel. Insiders say that this move on Kissinger comes from the Kennedy Chicago industrialist grouping, headed by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. The mid west industrialists see in Kissin ger (as well as the Rockefeller interests he is widely reputed to represent) a threat to detente, as well ns a Kissinger connection Io terrorism. What is under fire is the ‘invisible government’ hold on intelligence, banking, and foreign policy. Additionally the Judiciary Committee in the House is considering evidence on the ‘Rockefeller perjury charges' which is a move toward impeachment of the vice pri'sident. * ' Another move in this dismantling operation is the ex National Secprity Council employee Morton Hnlperin land five other NSC staffers) suit of Kissinger over Kissinger's alleged wire tapping of the NSC staff between 1969 and 1971 Kissinger has blamed Nixon for the wire taps, while Hnlperin in deposition say» this is a lie: "Kissinger and the FBI ran the show." The Washington Post calls for (Please turn to page 2 col. 4) UMW The United Minority Workers will receive the First Annual Observer Community Service Award. UMW, which is directed by Nathan Proby, welcomes members of all ethnic groups - Blacks, Indians. Chicanos. The purpose of the organization, which has chapters across the state, is to bring minority people into the economic life of the community through employment. The organization uses all avenues available to encourage the enforcement of federal and local laws and regulations requiring equal employment opportunities and affirmative action. Among those processes are concilliation, picketing and legal action. One of the UMW’s major accomplishments during the past yesr was the elemination of Portland's Home Town Plan following a suit filed in federal court by the UMW. “This is a major breakthrough," Proby explained. "Without the Home Town Plan to hide behind, each construction company must hire minorities in the sixteen crafts in numbers comparable to the minority population.” Proby expects an upturn in minority employment in the construction trades when the building season begins in ’ the spring. Additional suits filed by UMW include: Against Todd Construction Company of Roseburg for non compliance on the Eugene federal building project. Todd was the first Oregon company to receive a non compliance order from the General Services Administration, and according to Proby remains in non compliance. Todd also holds contracts with Pacific Northwest Bell for its office building, with HUD for the Dekum Court fifty unit expansion, and with the University of Oregon and Oregon State University, and with Emanuel Hospital. Against the Operating Engineers Local 701 for discrimination against qualified minority equipment operators. The federal court has accepted the suit, has found a deficient number of minority members, and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has entered the investigation. Against Coos Bay School District 89, which was ordered by the U.S. Department of Health. Education and Welfare to comply in employment by January 30th, 1976. This complaint was filed in behalf of Indian people in Coos Bay who cnarged the school district with discrimination. UMW picketed the Port of Portland construction site at the International Airport this spring and filed complaints with the federal regulatory agen-ies. The Port has hired fifteen minorities on non-construction jobs. The Environment Protection Agency stopped funds to the Delta Park sewer because minorities were not employed on the project. JORDAN The UMW has been successful in placing minorities on jobs. Thirty-five persons have been placed on permanent state jobs, including seven with the State Highway Commission. UMW has been designated as a source for minority employees for highway construction jobs in the five southern Washington counties, by the Washington State Highway Department. tunity (1965); Georgia Field Director. Most of the work of the UMW is done by volunteers, many of whom spend >ong NAACP (1961 1963); and practical law in hours monitoring building sites to verify EEO statistics submitted by the contractors. Georgia and Arkansas. The organization was recently awarded a $30,000 grant by the Campaign for Human He serves on the boards of several Development, a Catholic organization based in Washington, D.C., to assist with its corporations including: Bankers Trust work. Company, Rockefeller Foundation, J.C. In announcing the Observer award, publisher A.L. Henderson said. “The VMW, Penney Company. Incorporated, Xerox under the leadership of Nate Proby, has with very little resources tackled problems of Corporation, (’lark College, Hampshire employment in Oregon that have been avoided by the traditional Civil Rights College. John Hay Whitney Foundation, organizations. They have learned to use the enforcement powers of the federal M. l.T. Corporation, and the National government to bring opportunity to the uJemployed. They have sought enforcement Council on Crime and Delinquency. of the law even when this meant tackling the state’s largest corporations and even The annual meeting will be held at the the federal government itself. They have followed the tennants of the non-violent Sheraton Motor Inn (Lloyd Center), with movement and have used them to gain success - not for themselves as individuals - a no host cocktail hour at 6:30 p.m. and but for their people. They have not limited their sights to the advancement of Blacks dinner at 7:30 p.m. The annual report alone, but have included all of those who feel the oppression of unemployment.” will be presented and board members elected. Tickets may be purchased at the Urban Ix*ague Office. 718 W. Burnside and 5329 N. E. Union Avenue, telephone 224 0161 and 288 6517. UL leader visits P ortland Vernon E. Jordan will be the featured speaker at the I'ban League of Portland's annual meeting, January 29th. Jordan has been executive director of the National Urban la-ague since January 1973. He directs an organization of 103 affiliates, for Regional Office, a Washing ton Bureau and the New York head quarters. Congress and Executive ask by Roy Harvey Stop the depression The profound question which faces working |«-ople is how to stop the de pression: what kind of economic program must be implemented, .Ijist week the Portland Observer put that question to Congressman Robert B. Duncan (Dem 3rd Congressional District). Duncan re ferred to his hill (H.R. 76921 and Wash ington State Congressman Lloyd Meed's bill. H.R. 10138. Duncan said that “While the legislation does not stop the depres sion. it goes in the right direction." The Congressman referred to the Humphrey Hawkins bill as more far reaching. Duncun was aware that Black Caucus member Augustus Hawkins had repu dinted his support for the austerity bill, and had subsequently drafted a new one similar to the Emergency Employment Act (EEA). Duncan's Labor-Intensive Solution Testifying on behalf of Representative Meed’s bill. Congressman Duncan said "Recreation of the Civilian Con servation Corps represents an attack on three major problems faring the country ((«lay: unemployment; a rising crime rate: and deterioration of our natural resoures." The jobs Duran proposed are "labor intensive." In support of the contention that CCC legislation would reduce crime, Duncan cited commentary from “sir of the nation's top police administrators" Duncan a.ided that the jobs would channel young lives into . . . constructive citizenship . . . will improve self esteem" but should start at age 16 and have no "upper age limit, so older unemployed millworkers and loggers could join CCC rather than go on unemployment." Duncan recommended a two year 'service' period for the labor intensive jobs. Congressman Duncan's Washington based aide, Pat Amedeo, who worked on the drafting of the bill, was asked if she were nware of the parallel drawn by Robert A. Brady in Brady's book The Spirit and Structure of German Fascism between the Works Progress Admini stration, the CCC and the Nazi Labor 1 INSIDE OBSERVER Voi. 6 No. 10 f Hill receives Peyton A w ard E. Shelton Hill, former Executive Director of the Urban League of Portland and long a force for racial justice, was awarded the Third Annual Russell Peyton Award by the Metropolitan Human Relations Commission. M ayor sets HCD hearings Mayor Neil Goldschmidt announced two hearings that will be held on the City's FY 1977 Housing and Community Development Program. “The City of Portland has over eight million dollars in federal money next year to be spent on improvements in the City’s residential, commercial and industrial areas. “This is a program that in the past has been used for rehabilitating older hous ing; for street repairs, parks and street lighting; for physical improvements to assist the community's handicapped; for sewers and water lines; for assistance to two or three of the older business districts in town; and for many other projects. “It is proposed that this year the funds be concentrated on housing assistance and neighborhood revitalization projects. But what plan is finally adopted and whether projects are chosen that reflect real community needs, depends on how actively citizens participate in making the decisions. There are two ways to be heard: through your neighborhood as sociation; or at one of the two city wide hearings scheduled in the next six weeks. “I urge all citizens to make that special extra effort that good citizenship re quires; attend the hearings and. if you've got a good idea, speak up. This is your money, to be spent improving your neighborhood or business community. The City cannot intelligently decide how to allocate it without your help." The first hearing was held on January 21st. The Portland Development Com mission and the Portland City Planning Commission sat jointly to take testimony. On February 26th at 2:00 p.m., the City Council will hold its hearing, in the Council Chamber in City Hall, 1220 S.W. Fifth Avenue. Final decisions on the Housing and Community Development program will be made by the City Council after all testimony is in and reviewed. Council hearings are open to the public, and are broadcast on KBOO radio, 90.7 FM. austerity and labor - intensive employment Front. Brady maintains that the economic conditions and socio psychological justifi cations for Third Reich Financial Minister Hjalmar Schact's labor intensive policies and those of the CCC - WPA are identical. Ms Amedeo liughed. saying, “I think that is ludicrous. I don't see a parallel at all." "It's not as bad as all t h a t . . At his appearance at the Multnomah County Central Committee meeting, Congressman Duncan was asked if he saw debt moratoria as essehtial for restarting production. "The banks are not in that bad shape," Duncan responded. Confronted with the Washington Post revelation about the insolvent state of the Rockefeller hanks Chase and First Na tional City Rank, the Congressman said, "I know what you're referring to, but it's not as had as all that." Insiders in the financial community say that the Post's move against the Rockefeller hanks was ,«)litical in nature, and that at least 1300 banks are in similar if not worse shape. The money to restart production, they say. docs not exist: banks are illiquid. A second question facing working people: where is the money to come from to restart production? The Reesian Choice In the past few weeks the Republican Party's efforts to implement corporat ivist austerity (worker sacrifice 'for the good of the nation’ or 'corporation' etc. - historically associated with the Mussolini form of fascism) has been defeat. President Ford's veto of (ex) Secretary of Ixibor Dunlop's “Common Situs" bill (which had the effect of outlawing strikes) signals the end ot the Republican Party corporativist moves in favor ei outright demands for austerity. The President’s State of the Union address calling for a de facto $70 billi«».-. cut in the U.S. budget will soon be felt in the slashing oi social services (education, welfare, health, etc.) accompained by outright demands for speed-up, cuts in wages, pension fund reductions. In the face of this "hard cop" austerity, the Democrats will offer a "soft cop" new deal. It is an often encountered view that CCC and WPA programs “stopped the depression", rather than the war econ omy of World War II (which only stalled the depression) and the subsequent infusion of capital ir> the reconstruction and refinancing of Axis and Allied powers in Europe and Japan - based o;i wage and social service freezes: austerity. Nazi Finance Minister Schaet held debt to be sacred: the program to pay off that debt was simply to use up the skills (recycling) of employed and unemployed workers through labor intensive work projects and military production. The extreme form of this was the use of Jews and others in concentration camps adjacent to Krup, I.G. Farben and other industries. A Jew or a Slave would simply be "used up" in three months work, to be replaced (recycled) by another worker. The less extreme form of the German CCC WPA was the Nazi I»abor Front. Author Shirer was an early admirer of the youth program: “The young in the Third Reich were growing up to have strong and healthy bodies, faith in the future of their country and in them selves." In the Strength Through Joy movement (the counterpart in the U.S. is the so-called quaiity' of Life tendency) human productivity (Strength) was to be determined by the ability of the working class to regain Joy in labor via the efforts of the employer politican class. Robert Ley, Minister of the Nazi I^ibor Front, outlined this in 1935: "We could not offer working meases any material benefits, for Germany was poor and in a state of confusion and misery. New rates of wages and similar things were out of the oaestion . ." hence it was necessary "to surpress the materialism of the workers and instead divert the gaze of the workers to spiritual values of the nation " The pro development of the Kennedy Illinois wing of the Democratic Party sees the only source of capital for restarting industrial production to be in the wages and social services of employed and unemployed working people, while re cognizing that it is debt which is strangling production. Although the Humphrey Javitts bill is a larger auster ity package tha t the CCC type proposals (which are initially intended to employ A Portland business: deterioration of industrial plant and safety conditions some 150,000 workers at minimum characterizes the economic breakdown in the debt ridden advanced industrial sector of the globe. (Please turn to page 6 col. 3)
