Page 4, Section I, Portiend Observer. July 27,1963
Academic racism
EDITORIAL/OPINION
by De. M anning M arable
Public should help unions
W orkers who thought accepting decreases in
wages and other concessions would make em
ployers more appreciative and cooperative have
been fooled. The pressure to accept less pay and
fewer benefits continues, with the threats o f jo b
losses, o f plants closing or moving overseas,
hanging over the workers’ heads.
Government has sought to lim it the growth o f
wages for years, even when wages were not
growing with inflation. W hat government could
not do, the depression, massive layoffs, and the
competition for jobs has done.
According to the Bureau o f Labor Statistics
the decline in wage increases began in 1981 and
picked up speed through 1982 and the first quar
ter o f 1983.
In 1982 about one-third o f the union workers
covered by contracts negotiated that year re
ceived no wage increases, and those who did re-
ceived the smallest increase since 1973. M illions
o f workers in the basic industries took wage cuts
o f $1 per hour or more.
Routinely, wages are blamed for rising costs.
However, the pattern over the past twenty years
has shown that wages lag behind the rate o f in
flation. High wages are also blamed for lack
o f competitiveness o f U .S . industry and the
•‘need’ * for plant closures. But while workers
have taken massive pay cuts, wage freezes, and
loss o f benefits, the corporate profit for 1983 is
expected to increase by at least 30 percent.
The only obvious answer for the employees is
strong labor organization and refusal to accept
wage and benefit concessions. This requires that
the general public understand and support union
activity, honor picket lines and support those
whose jobs and futures are at stake.
Will we tolerate hunger ?
Hunger is an increasingly serious problem in
the United States. In the recent annual meeting
o f the U .S . Conference o f Mayors held in
Denver, urban ieaders reported that there are
“ increasing numbers o f homeless and hungry
people in the nation’s cities due principally to
record high unemployment and cuts in federal
funds."
The mayors said soup kitchens, food banks
and other volunteer services are not adequate to
meet the needs.
D etroit, Cleveland, New Orleans and Roches
ter reported sharp increases in the need for
emergency food aid. In O akland, 30,000 more
people need food than the supplies can feed. In
San A n to n io the number o f people needing
emergency food aid is expected to reach 50,000
next year.
The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
examined 181 emergency food programs during
the past year, in cities including Portland, and
found a 50 percent increase in the number o f
people served by one half o f the programs exam
ined. M ore unemployed workers and more fam
ilies with children are applying. Ninety per cent
reported serving people whose food stamps did
not last through the month.
Still, the Adm inistration opposes plans to
increase food subsidies — even those that dis
tribute surplus commodities like cheese, wheat,
honey, corn meal and rice. Billions o f tons o f
unused food are rotting in underground govern
ment storehouses.
H ow long will we tolerate mass hunger?
—
'
a
l it
Part o f the renaissance o f racism
today is found on college campuses.
As moat o f us know, racism has
taken the form o f attacks against a f
firmative action in the hiring and
promotion o f black faculty and
staff; the decline in the recruitment
o f black graduate and undergradu
ate students at white schools; the
attack against Black Studies depart
ments; and the low o f federal and
private funding for historically
black universities. There is one oth
er component o f “ academic rac
ism” which must also be evaluated
— the growth of new eugenics re
search which describe* blacks as
“ genetically inferior” to whites.
A * documented in a recent issue
of Science f o r the People, Bairy
Mehler notes that there is a direct
connection between racist white aca
demic researchers, the New Right
and politics o f the Reagan Adminis
tration. Over recent years the Pio
neer Fund, an academic foundation,
has funded a number o f racist col
lege professors. The officers and
directors o f the Pioneer Fund in
1981 included Thomas Ellis, a
major financial contributor to Rea
gan, and John B Trevor, a founder
of the American Coalition o f Patri
otic Societies.
The Pioneer Fund has given thou
sands o f dollars to British fascist
Roger Pearson, author o f Eugenics
and Race, and an organizer of a
large “ neo-fascist and anti-semitic”
by Congressman Ron Wyden
Efforts to cut spiralling medical
costs are once again on the front
burner o f the national agenda. And
with good reason. Despite years of
debate and the publication o f reams
of materials on the subject, we are
still in much the same situation we
were in two — and even 10 — years
ago.
Costs are still going up. Choices
are still limited in some areas. And
millions o f Americans sre still fac
ing bills they can't afford to pay.
The statistics are frightening. A
yet unpublished report by the De
partment o f Health and Hum an Ser
vices indicates that medical costs in
creased 12.3 percent last year, rais
ing the total national health care bill
to $322 billion, or 10.3 percent of
our Gross National Product — the
highest percentage ever. That means
that SI out o f every S10 we spend
goes to health care. And that's just
too much.
But how do we go about cutting
medical costs?
The current Administration main
tains that savings in the Medicare
system should come from the pock
ets o f senior citizens.
I don’t agree. I believe that the Rx
for curing medical care in the nation
is a combination o f efficiency
(Continued fro m Page I )
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there is no "scientific and historical
evidence” that blacks are the equals
o f “ the intellectually well-endowed
races.”
Mehler notes that the god o f this
new eugenics research “ is a world of
racially pure stocks living in separ
ate geographic areas, with strict
apartheid practices in areas where
racial groups share one geographic
land mass. The extreme wing o f this
movement openly advocates the
elimination o f all nonwhite races,
Jews and homosexuals.”
Some o f us might think that
this racist garbage could not pos
sibly be taken seriously in respected
universities. Think again: Jensen’s
writings have appeared in the H a r
vard Educational Review, and his
“ theories on the inferiority o f black
children” have been published in
the New York Times, Newsweek,
the Educational Digest, N ational
Review and Science News. Former
University o f Chicago professor
Dwight Ingle has widely published
his view that "Negroids' ” prob
lems are “ not caused by racism”
but by the "Negroid-Caucasoid IQ
gap.” The task o f uprooting white
supremacy was only begun when we
removed the Jim Crow signs and
when Civil Rights legislation was
passed in the 1960s. Now we must
develop a serious campaign to de
stroy racist ideology in every form
in the campuses across this country.
conference in Washington, D .C . in
1978; notorious racist W illiam
Shockley, who had written ten
major studies trying to “ prove”
white supremacy; A rthur Jensen,
called "A m erica’s leading propo
nent o f black inferiority“ ; Univer
sity o f Georgia professor R. Travis
Osborne; and professor* Frank Mc-
G urk and Audrey Shuey, authors of
The Testing o f Negro Intelligence,
ter ned by Mehler “ a book that has
formed the basis for numerous rac
ist studies.”
W hat kind o f academic research
in the fields o f biology, psychology
and sociology is being distributed to
thousands o f college students and
public policy makers? A brief pas
sage from the 1978 book. Human
Variation, edited by R. Travis Os
borne, Clyde E. Noble and Nathan
iel W eyl, is clear enough: “ (During
slavery) the environment was more
favorable than anything (blacks]
had experienced in A frica. As
slaves, they improved in health and
increased in numbers. When the Ne
groids were liberated from agricul
tural slavery, they were thrown free
to shift for themselves in largely
Caucasoid societies . . . These sim
ple, rural people were suddenly o f
fered irregular urban employment
combined with the opportunities of
drink and drugs, gambling and
prostitution, and no reliable means
o f productive, creative or congenial
labor.” The authors conclude (hat
Washington Hot Line
Immigration Laws
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* 'From the Grassroots ‘ ’
o pinion," according to Krueger.
Many Central Americans would
seem to qualify, yet according to
Krueger asylum is rarely granted to
those from a country with whom the
U.S. has friendly relations, as is the
case with El Salvador and Guate
mala
Carl Houseman, Portland INS
deputy director, said that while the
IN S considers political asylum
claims on a case by case basis, "the
current administration o f the U.S.
government feels that, specific in
formation to the contrary. Central
Americans who are fleeing from
their country are fleeing from eco
nomic conditions.”
Very few o f those who apply actu
ally achieve asylum status, but the
lengthy hearing and appeals process
extends the time that refugees can
remain in the U.S. scmi-legally, and
they can even work while awaiting a
decision. A major disadvantage to
poor peasants trying to achieve asy
lum is that it is expensive, and they
must find a sponsor or free legal
help.
Voluntary departure occurs when
refugees agree to depart the U.S.
voluntarily. Rogers says that many
refugees with little or no knowledge
o f English or IN S policies are intim
idated into signing the voluntary de
parture forms, and soon find them
selves flying back to an uncertain
delivery o f health care and cutting
waste from government programs.
There are a number o f ways we
can achieve the first goal o f increas
ing health care options for consum
ers. One o f these is to encourage the
development o f a new, innovative
health care option called Preferred
Provider Organizations (PPOs).
PPOs represent a sort o f cross be
tween a Health Maintenance Organ
ization and the traditional one-on-
one doctor-patient relationship, and
show real promise for keeping costs
down.
Unfortunately, laws in some
states discriminate against PPOs.
That's why I'v e introduced legisla
tion that would clear away these dis
criminatory provisions and allow
PPOs to develop.
But just increasing choices will
not resolve all the problems o f the
health care system.
That's why I have also moved to
cut out specific examples o f waste in
the Medicare program — thus cut
ting costs without cutting benefits.
The first initiative, called the Fair
Lab Payments Act, requires inde
pendent laboratories which current
ly charge Medicare and its patients
more than other customers for the
same tests to establish one price for
fate.
Extended voluntary departure
means the refugee agrees to depart
voluntarily, but after an indefinite
time. It is usually granted to foreign
relatives o f U .S. citizens, according
to Krueger. Rogers said that one
hope for liberalization o f immigra
tion policies is allowing more Cen
tral Americans extended voluntary
departure status.
Krueger mentioned that in some
cases an executive order can cause
departure not to be enforced, as in
the case o f Poles, Ugandans, and
Ethiopians fleeing from regimes not
considered friendly to the U .S. gov
ernment.
According to Rogers, the refugees
are in desperate need o f bail money
and legal services.
For those who cannot affo rd pri
vate counsel now, the Catholic-
sponsored Immigration Counseling
Service offers accredited representa
tion in IN S hearings.
IC S director Margaret Godfrey
reports 12 Salvadoran asylum cases
pending in Portland. “ W e have
more cases than we can handle,"
she said, but she knows o f only one
refugee that has been granted asy
lum.
“ It's terrible when you are w ork
ing with someone who has experi
enced all kinds of horrors — includ
ing wholesale murders — which
most o f us can’ t even imagine,” said
Godfrey. “ I find it very discourag
ing.
all customers. This “ small" change
would mean big savings: approxi
mately S2I million next year.
The second bill, which I intro
duced just last week, would reduce
the amount charged to Medicare for
pacemakers. Currently, Medicare
pays an average o f $4.000 for a
pacemaker that costs only $600 to
$900 to manufacture. This happens
because the device is marked up sev
eral times between the point o f man
ufacture and the point o f reimburse
ment by Medicare. M y bill would
begin to put a halt to this by cutting
significantly the amount health care
providers are reimbursed for pace
makers and related surgical proce
dures. Savings are estimated at near
ly $200 million a year.
Together these two bills would
save more than h alf the $400 million
which Congress seeks to save in
Medicare this year. It would do so
by cutting obvious waste — not by
making senior citizens pay more.
T o corral wildly escalating health
care costs will require a long and
concerted effort on the part o f
Congress, the Administration, the
health care industry and consumers.
But I believe these are steps in the
right direction and I plan to pursue
them vigorously.
"T hey have no families, no rela
tions They have no way of staying
in this country unless asylum is
granted. No other country has so
consistently taken so many refugees
as the United States. 1 think it would
help if the U.S. government would
recognize that these people have a
genuine fear o f returning home, and
permit them to stay for awhile.”
The Lawyers Committee Against
U .S. Intervention in Latin America
is participating in C A M IN O by set
ting up a panel o f lawyers studying
immigration laws who will donate
their services to refugees in need.
Phil H ornik, a bi-lingual Port
land immigration lawyer, thinks
“ the need for such a panel is defin
itely increasing.”
Even though harboring illegal
aliens is a felony, those who harbor
have little to worry about, according
to H ornik. He was unaware o f sny-
one prosecuted under the provisions
o f the “ harboring law ” in Oregon
except for those caught smuggling
undocumented farmworkers into
the state.
“ It is an interesting question
whether the church sanctuary move
ment is against the law ,” he said. “ I
am unaware o f anyone anywhere in
the country being prosecuted in the
sanctuary movement.”
For more inform ation, contact
the Lawyers Committee Against
U.S. Intervention in Latin America,
228-3222, or the American Friends
Service Committee, 230-9427.