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About Portland observer. (Portland, Or.) 1970-current | View Entire Issue (May 7, 1981)
Page 8 Portland Observer May 7,1981 Budget cuts hurt poor families S’ " " The Reagan A d m in is tra tio n ’ s proposed budget would compel more than half o f the nation’ s low income fam ilies to reduce their livin g standards, according to a study by the Congressional Budget Office. A bout 51 percent o f all low- income households, or about 20 to 25 m illion people, w ill have less to live on as a result o f cuts in ten m ajor assistance and employment programs. This estimate does not include cuts that w ill be accomplished by consolidating federal programs into block grants to the states. While the to ta l am ount available w ill be reduced, the impact cannot be measured without knowing how the states w ill allocate the money they receive. Am ong the programs cuts that were not measured by CBO were low -incom e energy and housing assistance, medical, unemployment insurance, trade adjustm ent assistance, and social security changes. Also excluded were the ef fects of reductions in education and health, which affect families finan cial resources. Abraham Reed, honored POIC graduate, meets Reverend Dr. Leon H. Sullivan, founder and national director of QIC. Ireland and the politics of starvation By Frank Viviano (Editor’ s Note: Unlike the violent self-sacrificial acts o f many other political dissidents, the example o f Irish hunger striker Bobby Sands has commanded the w o rld ’ s ad m ira tio n , demonstrating that the militant non-violence of Gandhi and Martin Luther King still holds great power. M oreover, writes Pacific News Service Editor Frank Vivano, it places Sands in an Irish history fu ll o f such conscience-driven in d ividual challenges to state op pression.) In a w orld preoccupied w ith super-state violence and terrorism, it often seems that the individua l conscience counts for nothing. Although profound self-sacrifice is a central element in the Sands’ tale, it is by no means the whole story. The world has seen many ex amples o f lethal self-sacrifice by p o litical dissenters w ithout being dem onstrably moved. But unlike countless others who have raced to certain death in a hail o f gunfire -- members o f the Palestine Liberation Organization and the Japanese Red Army comes to mind - Sands opted for a non-violent, tortuously slow walk to the end. And the extent to which his choice has captured global adm iration speaks volumes about the galvanizing force o f conscience and militant passive resistence. In a little more than two months, Bobby San ds may have done more fo r the cause o f Ulster’ s Catholic m inority than six decades o f k illin g and sabatoge by the Irish Republican Army. In the longer sweep o f Irish ex perience, neither Sands’ tactic nor its possible effects are new, however. At critical junctures in the bloody history of Ireland’ s relation ship with England, in fact, star vation has played a peculiarly significant moral and political role, w ith repercussions reaching far beyond the United Kingdom. Bobby Sands’ most obvious an cestor was Terence MacSwiney, Lord Mayor o f Cork, who starved himself to death in London’ s Brix- ton prison in 1920. MacSwiney had been arrested 73 days earlier at an illegal meeting in C ork, and im mediately commenced a prison hunger strike to protest British rule. It was not the first hunger strike faced by the British government in those years. In 1918, Mohandas Gandhi had made some use o f the tactic in an unsuccessful labor protest at Ahmedabad, India, although th he then regarded it largely as a religious exercise. There were also hunger strikes by other I.R .A . prisoners in 1919 and 1920, which were ended by government Castillo heads political group Gale C astillo, a m arketing ac count executive for Pacific N orth west Bell, was elected president o f the Hispanic P olitical A ction Com m iltee, a statewide organization formed to represent Hispanic political interests. Portland attorney Raul Soto- Seelig was elected treasurer. Elected secretary was Luz Bazan Gutierrez, Salem, an active community mem ber working with the Oregon Com mission o f Hispanic A ffa irs , assisting in lobbying efforts. The new president has served as an o ffic e r fo r Image, a national organization concerned w ith em ployment for Hispanics and with the Committee o f Spanish-Speaking People o f Oregon. Defendent found not guilty (Continued from page I col. 6) the incident, and said he was carrying the gas can because he had been trying to start his girlfriend’ s car, and came back into the bar to get the keys to her (girlfriend) car. Morrison and his girlfriend were the only witnesses to testify they saw Harm on kick at M orrison. Other witnesses, all acquaintences o f Morrison’s, said they did not clearly see the incident, which some said was preceed by racial slurs. Michael Brown, o f the M arion County district attorney’ s office, said he was “ surprised and deeply disappointed” at the verdict, and believes it w ill heighten the mistrust o f the ju d ic ia l system felt by the Black community. Maurice Harmon summed up his feelings: “ W hite people might as well put signs up saying ’ For white only.’ ” BROADWAY MALL FISH MARKET & DELI 1 8 1 5 N .E . B r o a d w a y • P o r t la n d 2 8 7 1221 SPECIALS PERCH................................. LING COD.......................... FRENCH SOLE..................... BLACK COD........................ concessions to the strikers. But no concessions were offered to MacSwiney, and over ten long weeks much o f the world watched as a solitary Irishman confronted the vast power o f the British crown with the example o f his voluntary suf fering. On October 24, 1920, Mac Swiney died. The effect on public o p inion especially in Britian, was enormous. Huge, absolutely silent crowds lined the London streets down which MacSwiney’ s c o ffin passed for shipment to Cork. They marked the measure o f a nation’ s shame and the a b ility o f one in d ivid u a l to become the symbol o f opposition to many economic, social and political abuses. Fourteen months later, the Irish Free State was a reality. Some 25 years after that, India joined the ranks o f liberated British possessions, largely on the strength o f a persistent campaign o f passive resistence in which G andhi ex panded the concept o f the political hunger strike to a fu ll-fle d g e d ideology o f rebellion. Like M ac Swiney, Gandhi understood that the very power o f an oppressive state could be its own undoing so long as world opinion nd moral sanctions meant anything -- as they would not in the case of Nazi Germany. In a sense, o f course, starvation on a massive scale had set the stage fo r Terence MacSwiney. Between 1845 and 1850 more than one m illion Irishmen died in a terrible fam ine which resulted fro m a parasitic blight on the potato crop, Ireland’ s staple food. An additional three million people left the Island, most o f them for the United States. Am ong the repercussions were three developments which w ould profoundly affect the British em pire. A t home, remorse at the role o f England’ s Corn Laws, which forbade the im port or export o f grain and added to the death to ll, led to their repeal and the rise of he Liberal Party. A broad, Irish im migrants acted as Irish patriots; they helped spread critical views o f the British role in their homeland and contributed large sums o f money to the cause o f independence. And in Ireland itself, the famine brought great new influence to Daniel O'Connell’ s Catholic Emancipation Movement, and precipitated the establishment o f the I.R.A. As in the case o f MacSwiney three-quarters o f a century later, the famine raised d is tin c tly m oral questions for the British and for the world, whose opinion mattered to them. It also produced p o litic a l results which would significantly af fect B rita in ’ s behavior as an im perial power, even if the end o f the empire — and independence for Ireland — remained in the distant future. 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B eef Rib Steak G r.d e A fancy to 14 lb $2«« spa USC A C ro c e S-:nrb C ut Lean Ground B eef Farms Ffo /e r TNghs F ryer p arts Foster or Legs iWmgs 78* r ) S D A Choree- Tip Steaks U Bone»«« beet Srriovt 88* $ 2 5® Cube Steaks $2«» $ps B eef Liver U S D A Choree Boneless Bee* Sheer $pa Porode Brand Fre»h Pork 7»gutar or liaban * FRO ZEN FOODS D EPT. * Today Bobby Sands, a single man p ittin g his se lf-control against a state, recalls e x p lic itly the long legacy o f politics and starvation in Ireland. It would be a mistake to interpret his example as the embodiment o f a new I.R .A . ideology in the Gan- dhian sense. Passive resistence in Ireland has for too long been tried to a policy o f uncom prom ising violence outside the prison walls. Nevertheless, Sands’ fast has served to focus new attention on the moral issues at stake in this troubled and divided country. And in the process it has also served as a reminder fo r the rest o f the world that the individual conscience still does count - and that the lessons of Terence MacSwiney, Mohandas Gandhi and Martin Luther King still have meaning. C O P Y R IG H T ■ TURKEY m TIP ROAST Link Sausage (Photo: Richard Brown) fectcd. Reagan’ s budget manager, David Stockm an, said the CBO study is evidence that the President’ s “ safety net” works since most low- income fam ilies would not suffer what he called " a serious reduction in their spendable income.” W ith about tw o -th ird s o f the funding cuts excluded from the computation, the CBO said most in come losses for the poor will be less than 5 percent, but 649,00 families w ill suffer an average income decrease o f 19 percent. Fam ilies headed by non w hite women w ill be most likely to be af- 1981 P A C IH C NEWS GRAPE JUICE SNOBOY 12 oz. 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