Pape 4 Portland Observer, November 3, 1982
The full employment option
EDITORIAL/OPINION
Organize now for 1984
Ed Leek has been elected to the House o f
Representatives from District 18—the district
that was created to give the black community
the maximum potential to elect a candidate o f
its choice—black or white—to the House.
Leek won a smashing v ic to ry — greatly
outdistancing all o f his competitors. But this
victory does not demonstrate that he is repre
sentative o f the community or that he is accep
ted by the community. This fact was evidenced
by the outcry after his Primary win; we do not
know o f a single predominately black organi
zation that supported his candidacy. It is also
demonstrated by the num ber o f black
candidates who ran against him and the efforts
of various groups to find a suitable candidate.
A third signal is that Leek won with less than
50 per cent o f the vote, a smaller number than
those who voted against him and this does not
include those who boycotted this race.
We expect Leek’s voting record in the House
to be very good; he represents the liberal wing
o f the Democratic Party. He is knowledgeable;
his votes w ill be progressive. The opposition is
based on perceived arrogance, egotism and
pa rternalism . Leek managed to allienate
nearly every black group he addressed. Some
of his other efforts have been self-serving, for
example his w ife ’ s attem p t to bar Charles
Staudam ire fro m the D em ocratic C entral
Committee, because he was reported to have
supported Kent F o rd , at a tim e when
Democrats should be encouraging black
participation. This does not reflect well on a
man who is elected to represent the black
community.
The reason Leek could be elected is that the
leadership o f the black com m unity did not
select and unite behind one candidate. The
BUF attem pted to meet w ith p o te n tia l
candidates to begin the process, but most o f
the p o te n tia l candidates denied they were
candidates. The Front then added its candidate
to the pool. The other leadership groups— the
m inisters, the o rgan ization s, the social
clubs—remained silent.
None o f those who fin a lly surfaced in the
p rim a ry were w illin g to w ith d ra w in the
interest o f unity and the same thing happened
in the General.
We have only ourselves to blame. The door
was open but this community did not have the
p o litic a l know how to go throug h it. This
p o litic a l knowledge must be developed and
developed q u ic k ly i f black people are ever
going to have an opportun ity to participate.
Factionalism must be left behind; the political
system must be understood and used.
In other com m unities eight, ten or more
candidates can run for office and may the best
candidate win. The black community does not
have that luxury. A t least fo r now, it w ill be
d iffic u lt fo r any black candidate to get the
votes to win. Cut those available votes four or
five ways and it is impossible. In P ortland.
Oregon the way for a black candidate to win is
to be the candidate. I f that is to be, some
persons w ill have to put their own personal
ambitions and desires aside in the interest o f
the community. Not all can lead; not all can be
elected.
The decision o f who w ill be the candidate in
1984 must be made by the com m un ity and
it must be made soon. I f the com m unity can
get together and select a candidate— rather
than a llo w in g the candidates to select
themselves—the results can be different next
time. The work and organization needed must
begin soon.
The question that now must be answered is
whether Leek w ill learn to represent the
com m unity. It is incumbent on h im —as the
elected o ffic ia l— to bu ild bridges, to insure
that he communicates with the community, to
invo lve the com m un ity in the legislative
processes. He might find out what it is that so
allienates many o f his constituents and make
amends. He could, perhaps, even gain some
re lu cta n t support or at least a w o rk in g
relationship.
This is a tw o way street. Leek w ill be in
Salem; he has a vote and w ill have influence.
The com m unity leadership must insure that
Leek receives the input that w ill guarantee that
he represents District 18.
I f this communication is not achieved, both
will be isolated. Leek w ill be in Salem without
the support o f his constituents and this
community w ill still be without representation.
Hill, Leek join Legislature
(Continued from page 1 column 6)
publican challenger Thomas Phelan
3 to 1; Les AuCoin handily defeated
B ill Moshofsky, form er Georgia-
Pacific executive; Jim Weaver re
tained his 4th District seat. Denny
Smith narrowly defeated Democrat
Ruth McFarland in D istrict 5. Re-
Gains, losses
(Continued from page I col. 6)
with a 53.9 percent favorable vote.
Included in this initiative is a consti
tution that, if adopted, would be the
most progressive in the nation.
Among the stipulations o f this con
stitution is the right o f every resi
dent to a job or an income.
The vote is only advisory, since
only Congress and the states can
create a new state.
Walter Fauntroy was elected to
another term in Congress, where he
represents Washington, D.C. resi
dents without a vote.
The Observer welcomes "Let
ters to the E ditor” . Letters
should be brief and must contain
the w riter's name and address
although addresses are not
printed. The Observer retains
the right to edit for length.
publican Robert Smith becomes
Oregon’s fifth Congressman.
Jim H ill o f Salem has won elec
tion to the House o f Representatives
from District 31 in Salem.
A lawyer, H ill served as a hear
ings officer in the State Department
o f Revenue for three years, hearing
citizens’ appeals o f property and in
come tax assessments. As an Oregon
Assistant Attorney General he spe
cialized in public utility regulations,
crim inal law, anti-trust enforce
ments and workm en’ s compensa
tion.
H ill, a Democrat, defeated Re
publican Diana Evans with 60.71
percent o f the vote.
Oregonians defeated all ballot
measures except the nuclear freeze.
O f special concern was Ballot Mea
sure 3, the I 'A percent property tax
limitation which would have greatly
restricted funds available to state
and local governments.
State Superintendent o f School*
Verne Duncan won a third term,
handily defeating challenger B ill
Kendrick, Superintendent o f the Sa
lem School District. Labor Commis
sioner Wendy Roberts retained her
position.
Dennis Buchanan defeated con
servative Gordon Shadburne for
Multnom ah County Executive.
Commissioners Gladys McCoy and
Earl Blumenauer easily prevailed.
Police issue undecided
(Continued fro m page I column 2)
of the measure.
Stan Peters, president o f the po
lice union, is in the same position as
Commissioner Jordan— w ith the
election results hanging at nearly 50-
50. "T h e re was a fast swing from
being 1,000 votes ahead to being 500
behind,’ ’ he said Wednesday. " I
w ouldn’ t like to lose by 500 and
neither would Commissioner Jo r
dan. I t ’ s not good to lose by a nar
row m argin—but i t ’ s not good to
win that way either. You always pre
fer a decisive win.”
Peters said that regardless o f how
the vote goes it indicated that people
have an interest in a review board
and they should have one. He w ill
not oppose a citizen review board
w ithout politicians on it, he said.
The disadvantage o f the measure
passing is " th a t we would have a
disciplinary board with politicians
on it. That won’t work—it never has
and it never w ill.” Peters said that if
Measure 51 fails to pass he will not
oppose the creation o f a citizen re
view board. “ A review board would
serve both our interests—the peo
ple’ s and the police’ s.”
6 v Norman H ill
A Philip Randolph Institute
The monthly recitation o f Labor
Department unemployment figures
lately has taken on the characteris
tics o f a dirge. W ith each m onth’ s
inexorable increase in the human
misery brought about by the reces
sion come the inevitable grim-faced
e dito ria lists w ith the ir televised
commentaries lam enting the A d
m in istra tio n ’ s inaction. From the
Administration come the obligatory
expressions o f concern and the
empty promises o f prosperity
around the corner. When such
equivocations were first advanced,
they at least had the force o f novelty
behind them. Today even the novel
ty has worn thin and the unemploy
ment statistics only emphasize the
bankruptcy o f the Administration's
economic program.
Each month o f Reaganomics
brings with it more o f the same bad
news. The tragedy o f 11.3 m illion
out o f work, and o f millions more
working part-time or dropping out
o f the jo b market, has been ritu a l
ized.
This record o f continued failure
must test the lim its o f the public’ s
tolerance. And October’s news that
the unemployment rate stands at
I0.1 per cent indicates where the
limits of tolerance lie.
Yet, disastrous as it is, for black
Americans 10.1 per cent unemploy
ment, would be regarded as a heav
en-sent improvement. For, today,
black unemployment stands as 20.2
per cent, more than double the rate
for white workers.
For the last two decades, through
ups and downs, under Republicans
and Democrats, black unemploy
ment has consistently stood at twice
that o f other workers.
The reasons for this phenomenon
are complex and numerous. Blacks
are d isp rop o rtio na te ly located in
such industries as steel and auto,
which have been hardest hit by the
recession. The black w orkforce is
younger in age and has less seniority
than the white workforce. A large
proportion o f black workers arc un
skilled and so are most vulnerable to
layoffs.
Yet despite such elegant and so
phisticated explanations, the fact re
mains that today black unemploy
ment stands nearly at the same level
as national unemployment during
the Great Depression. It constitutes
a national failure and disgrace.
The full extents of the catastrophe
have yet to be guaged. But we all
know what losing a jo b can do to
family stability, to a person’s sense
o f self-worth, to a worker’s sense of
motivation. This recession is tearing
at the scams o f the social fabric o f
the black community.
What the unemployment statistics
would seem to call for is a jobs pro
gram that deals w ith the require
ments o f all those who are out o f
w ork, whether they be black or
white, while recognizing the specific
needs o f blacks.
Yet according to the October 7th
Washington Post, Reagan Adminis
tra tio n o ffic ia ls in the Education
Department have recommended ma
jo r personnel cuts in education pro
grams that primarily benefit minor
ity and disadvantaged children. The
focus o f the recommended cutbacks
is Title I. a program that provides
states with funds to help disadvan
taged children improve their math
and reading skills. Such skills are
absolutely essential for any worker's
succesful entry into the job market.
There is, o f course, a humane,
workable and rational alternative to
such inhumane proposals. It is to be
found in the anti recessionary pro
gram developed by the A FL-C IO .
The program calls for a massive re
industrialization and remoderniza
tion e ffort centered around a gov
ernment-supported Reconstruction
Finance Corporation which would
target loans; loan guarantees, inter
est rates, subsidies and tax benefits
to stim ulate economic growth in
high unemployment areas. The pro
gram also calls fo r tem porary re
strictions on imports which result in
the loss o f American jobs, fo r the
training and re-training o f workers,
and for the providing o f funds for
new lo w -a n d -m id d le -in c o m e
housing.
The disastrously high unemploy
ment rate is only the latest signal
that Reaganomics has failed. Yet
even if the President and the Repub
lican Party arc repudiated on
Election Day, November 2nd, the
momentum o f this repudiation will
soon dissipate if it is not channeled
into support for a constructive na
tional economic agenda that recog
nizes the special needs of blacks and
other unemployed workers. Only by
linking the politics o f protest to such
a program for economic growth will
our contry find itself on the road to
economic recovery.
Crisis on the Black Campus
by Manning Marable
A ll educational institutions m ir
ror the racial and class dynamics o f
the larger society. Black higher edu
cation was designed neither to pro
mote the intellectual development of
black youth, nor to advance the ma
terial prospects fo r black working
class and poor people. Education
for blacks, as first advanced by the
white majority, was to maintain the
structures o f inequality within both
the political economy and the cul
ture and society as a whole.
Thus, black students and faculty
who attended and taught at m ajor
ity black colleges have always faced
a very different set o f problems than
those which confront progressive
minded whites at predom inantly
white schools. From their beginning
after the Civil War and Reconstruc
tion periods, these colleges were d i
rectly the products o f racial segrega
tio n. Black scholars like W .E .B.
DuBois, who graduated from Har
vard with honors in 1895, were not
hired to permanent posts in white
universities simply on the basis o f
race.
The historically black college is
largely the direct product o f racial
segregation. Ninety one o f the 107
black colleges were established be
fore 1910. Generally underfinanced
»nd inadequatley staffed, black
higher education was permitted to
exist only in skeletal form during the
long night o f White Supremacy. As
late as 1946, only four black colleges
—Howard University, Fisk Univer
sity, Taladega College and North
Carolina State—were accredited by
the Association o f American U n i
versities. In the school year 1945-46,
black undergraduate enrollment was
43,878 in the black colleges. Less
than eighteen hundred attended
black professional schools; only 116
were then training to become law
yers. Even after the passage o f ex
panded educational legislation,
the number o f Afro-Americans who
were financially able to attend uni
versities was p itifu lly small. By
1950, 41,000 "m in o r ity ” men and
42,000 “ m inority” women (blacks,
Asians, etc.) between ages 18-24 at
tended colleges, about 4.5 per cent
o f their tota l age grouping. That
same year, by way o f contrast,
1,025,(XX) white males between 18-
24 years old attended college, 15 per
cent ol (he total white age group. rigid constraints of race/class tyran
The function o f the black college
ny, and often suffered under benign
was, at least from the view of while
-to malignant adm inistrations im
society, to train the Negro to accept
posed by white trustees and state
a "separate and unequal” position
governments. But despite these and
within American life.
other contradictions, the black uni
Despite these in stitutio n al bar versities have on the balance been
riers to quality education, the black
much more open to progressive and
schools did a remarkable job in pre liberal faculty—particularly during
paring black youth for productive
the period o f the Cold War o f the
careers in the natural and social sci
1940s and 1950s. They created the
ences, in the trades and humanities.
intellectual and social space neces
A brief review o f one black college,
sary for the development of militant
Fisk University, provides an illustra political reformers, dedicated public
tion. Fisk was the home for a major
school teachers, physicians, and
number o f black intellectuals during
other skilled professionals withing
the era o f segregation: DuBois, his the black community. Without such
torian John Hope Franklin; sociolo
institutions, the nightmare o f Jim
gist E. Franklin Frazier; artists/no-
Crow might still exist, and the ma
velists James Weldon Johnson,
terial conditins o f the black ghetto
Arna Bontemps, Sterling Brown,
and w orking class would unques
N ik k i G iovanni, John O liver K il-
tionably be worse.
lens, and Frank Yerby. A number of
The Civil Rights and Black Power
Fisk alumni joined the ranks o f the
Movements, combined with a poli
black elite in the twentieth century
tical shift o f the U.S. government
as decisive leaders in public policy,
under the Johnson Adm inistration
representing a variety o f p olitical
toward implementation o f some a f
tendencies; U.S. Representative
firm ative action guidelines w ithin
William L. Dawson; Marion Berry,
while civil society accelerated this
mayor o f Washington, D.C.; Wade
educational process. By 1970,
H. McCrec, U.S. Solicitor General
192,000 black men and 225.000
during the Carter A dm inistration;
black women between ages 18-24 at
U.S. district judge Constance Baker
tended college. The overall percent
M otley; C ivil Rights activist John
age o f black youth enrolled in col
Lewis; Texas State Representative
W ilhelm ina Delco; Federal judge
lege, 15.5 per cent, contrasted with
James Kimbrough. Other Fisk grad
white attendance figures o f 34 per
cent for males and 21 per cent for
uates moved into the private sector
females. Five years later, 294,000
to establish an economic program
for black development along capi
black men and 372,000 black wom
talist lines, such as A. Maceo Walk
en between ages 18-24 were in col
er, president o f Universal Life In
lege, respectively 20 and 21 per cent
surance Company. One out o f every
of their age groups. The most recent
six black physicians, lawyers and
available statistics, fo r the years
dentists in the United States today
1976 and 1977, reveal a slight de
cline in black college enrollment— a
arc Fisk graduates. A similar profile
could be obtained from A tlanta
testament to the p olitical assaults
University, Morehouse College o f
against black educational opportuit-
A tla n ta , Spelman College o f A t
ity of the 1970s. The total numbers
lanta, Tougaloo College o f Missis
o f black college youth slipped froqi
sippi, Tuskegee Institute o f Alaba
749,000 to 721,000, and the per}-
ma, Howard University o f Wash
ventage o f black men who were col-
ington, D.C., and other black insti
leg« students w ithin the 18 24 age
tutions o f higher learning. My point
group declined from 22.0 to 20.2 per
here is not that these schools ever
cent. Despite the desegregation df
developed a clear pedagogy for
white universities, tra d itio n a lly
black liberation, nor that they were
black institutions continue to served
organically linked to the daily strug
majority of blacks seeking college dr
gles o f the black masses. The con
professional training. 25 per cent til
servatism o f many black college ad
all blacks in higher education attend
ministrators, as represented by Tus
the 35 state-supported black c o l
kegee’ s Booker T. Washington, is
leges. 62 per cent o f all black M Djs
almost legend among people.
and 73 per cent o f all black Ph.Djs
These schools operated under the
arc products of black institutions.
4
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