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Page 2—The Portland Observer-January 30, 1991
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Civil Rights Journal
By Benjamin Chavis, Jr.
V ---------------- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------—
The Federalization Of Racism
January 15, 1991 became an
h istoric day in U.S. jud icia l history
because on that day the Supreme Court
o f the United Sates took another step
backwards away from racial justice.
Iro n ic a lly , January 15th is the birthday
o f the Rev. Dr. M artin Luther King Jr.,
the renowned slain c iv il rights leader
w ho championed the cause o f racial
equality.
In the case known as the Dowell
vs. the Board o f Education o f O kla ­
homa C ity, the Supreme Court ruled
favorably to constitutionally allow a
return to racially segregated “ neigh­
borhood schools.” This latest decision
by the Supreme Court follow s a pattern
o f retreat from a strong comm itment to
affirm a tive action and other legal reme­
dies to compensate for past and present
racial discrim ination.
E arlier we filed our protest to
the U.S. Department o f Education at­
tempts to lim it the provision o f m inor­
ity-based scholarships at colleges and
universities. A ll o f this comes on the
heels o f President Bush’s veto o f the
C iv il Rights A ct o f 1990. Now we have
learned o f Bush’s inclination to also
veto the proposed C iv il Rights A ct o f
1991.
During the last thirty years the role o f
the federal government has changed
dramatically from being an advocate o f
measures to eliminate racism to being
an advocate o f measures to maintain
and further institutionalize racism. We
refer to this phenomenon as the “ feder­
alization o f racism” in the United Slates.
The executive, legislative and ju d icia l
branches o f the federal government are
all guilty o f promulgating racism. O f
course, this goes against the grain o f the
future demographic character o f the
nation, which is to be more m ultiracial
and m ulticultural.
Justice Thurgood Marshall, in
a dissenting opinion to the Oklahoma
City school desegregation case, explained
the com plexity o f the racist nature o f
the issues involved in this case. Marshall
posited “ In 1972-18years alter this Court
first found segregated schools uncon­
s titu tio n a l^ federal court fin a lly inter­
rupted this cycle, enjoining the O kla­
homa C ity School Board to implement
a specific plan for achieving actual de­
segregation o f its schools...The practi­
cal question now before us is whether,
13 years after that injunction was im ­
posed, the same School Board should
have been allowed to return many o f its
elementary schools to their form er one-
race status. The m ajority today suggest
that 13 years o f desegregation was
enough. The Court remands this case
for further evaluation o f whether the
purposes o f the injunctivedecree were
achieved sufficient to ju s tify the de­
cree’s dissolution. However, the inquiry
it commands to the D istrict Court fails
to recognize e xp licitly the threatened
rcemergencc o f on-race schools as a
relevant “ vestige” o f de jure segrega­
tio n .”
In other words, the stage has
now been set by the Supreme Court o f
the United States for low er courts to
have a fee hand in authorizing the re­
segregation o f the public schools in this
nation. Racial segregation in public
schools serves directly to consign m il­
lions o f African American and other
racial and ethnic children to receive
substandard education.
A ll forms o f “ federalized ra­
cism ” must be challenged. We jo in
w ith Justice M arshall in dissent and
protest to the decision o f the D ow ell vs.
the Oklahoma C ity School Board case.
Equal quality education fo r all.
Letter To The Editor
failed, some have been in prison, and
Dear Editor:
We are concerned about the edu­
they have found life to be hard out
The decision o f the Black United
cation o f Black Children. We have lost
there.
Front to Boycott Portland Public Schools
a great deal o f the generation o f the
It’s not only the failure o f the School
is not a new idea, but a delayed action
60’ s, 70’ s, and 80’s to drugs, and eve­
to accept and deal w ith their responsi­
that was postponed over eighteen years
rything; we want things better fo r the
ago. The negotiation
children who are
between the Black
c o m in g along.
Community and the
This is what we
Blacks have been denied on a wide scale to partici­
P o rtla n d School
are saying to the
pate in wealth of growth that this country have enjoyed.
Board was never
School Board, the
c o m p le te d. The
C ity o f Portland,
We were brought over as slaves, denied education,social
School Board de­
and America.
rights and freedom, but yet we have survived under un­
faults on many o f
Give us our
human circumstances. We have shown our loyalty to
its promises.
dream, give us Dr.
our Country, because even with all the difficulties and
W hat we are
K in g ’ s D ream ,
problems we still love this country. When we criticize
seeing in form o f
because as long as
gangs and drugs
we labor under the
the system, we do it because we are a part of this
dealers and sellers
social ills and c ir­
country and want to be treated as equals in every way.
and other crim inal
cumstances that
activities occurring
we are presently
in N orth and N orth­
under, we are los­
b ility , but our C ity o f Portland and the
east Portland is the aftermath o f failure
ing our strength as a strong country. We
State o f Oregon as w ell as our Country,
to educate the Portland black Student
are as strong as our weakest lin k -” Re-
America who has dealt very hideous
in the 6 0 ’s, 70’ s, and 80’ s. In these
member this.”
w ith problems facing Black Americans
years we had some poorly equipped
Sincerely,
educationally, economically, socially,
teachers who were sent to the area to
Vesia Loving-DeWeese
has not been justifiable.
teach. They were given what I started
P o rtla n d , Oregon
Blacks have been denied on a wide
to call “ combat pay” , which was a
P.S. To those who are trying to
scale to participate in wealth o f growth
thousand dollars or more a month to
blame Portland’s schools’ problems and
that this country have enjoyed. We
teach over here. A t that time, most o f
failures on Dr. Matthew Prophett,
were brought over as slaves, denied
the teachers’ m otive was financial.
remember these were and s till are the
education,social rights and freedom,
Children were sent to tim e-out day after
problems and failures o f the Blanchard
but yet we have survived under unhu­
day to spend most o f the day. Suspen­
years that M r. M cC lroy have continued
man circumstances. We have shown
sion was the order o f the day.
to implement w ith the fu ll support and
our loyalty to our Country, because
These are the men and women who
knowledge o f the school board, Under
even w ith all the difficulties and prob­
are having children and i t ’ s their c h il­
the leadership o f Dr. Prophett. Dr. Pro­
lems we s till love this country. When
dren we are dealing w ith; most did n ’t
phett has only been in Portland eight
we criticize the system, we do it be­
have pleasant experiences or success in
years. These problems were here when
cause we are a part o f this country and
school. That’ s why there is very little
I went to high school and that wasn’ t
want to be treated as equals in every
m otivation or even cooperation. Their
yesterday.
way.
feelings are negative because they have
Stephen
Cosgrove
Reading For Kids
Saturday
Storytelling
(USPS 959-680)
OREGON'S OLDEST AFRICAN AMERICAN PUBLICATION
Established in 1970
Alfred L. Henderson
Publisher
Joyce Washington
Operations Manager
Gary Ann Garnett
Business Manager
Leon Harris
Editorial Manager
The PORTLAND OBSERVER is
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Exie Publishing C om pany, Inc.
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«
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The Bitter Fruits Of War
_____________ _>
Pow ell’s Books for Kids in Beav­
erton presents children’ s author/illus-
trator Stephen Cosgrove at our Satur­
day Storytelling on February 9th at 11
a.m. M r. Cosgrove w ill read at 11 a.m.
and w ill autograph books afterward.
Stephen Cosgrove’ s books include
the Serendipity series as w ell as other
w ell known books including Prancer,
the Dream Stealer, H e id i’s Rose and
The Song o f the Sea trilogy. Pow ell’ s
Books for K ids Saturday Storyteling
begins at 11 a.m. weekly and is free.
For more information or to reserve books,
please call 643-3131 or 671-0671.
National
Response Center
Hotline
Operated by the U.S. Coast Guard,
this hotline is used to report spills o f o il
and other hazardous materials. The hot­
line is available 24 hours a day, every
day o f the year.
1-800-424-8802.
Safe Drinking
Water Hotline
Provides inform ation and publica­
tions to the public and the regulated
com m unity in understanding EPA’ s
drinking water regulations and programs.
Operates Monday through Friday, 8:30
a.m.-4:30 p.m., Eastern time. 1-800-
426-4791.
Every empire has required an ex­
ternal enemy, in order to ju s tify its
measures to suppress domestic unrest,
and to silence its internal critics. Every
empire must have a focal point to chan­
nel its aggressive objectives. Ancient
Rome had Carthage; Napoleon had the
British. The fundamental basis o f
American power in the twentieth cen­
tury has been the quest for empire. In
Southeast Asia, the declared goal o f
“ containing Communism” was respon­
sible fo r the deaths o f 50,000 Am erican
troops and m illion s o f additional casu­
alties among the Vietnamese people.
The propaganda o f Am erican power
has always created external enemies,
larger-than-life figures which are used
to ju s tify massive m ilita ry expendi­
tures.
Saddam Hussein is only the latest
in a series o f “ p olitical demons” cre­
ated by the U.S. media, government
o fficials and the corporate elite. In an
infantile language more appropriate to
Saturday afternoon wrestling matches
on television, the public v illific a tio n o f
Saddam is personalized by Bush and
his flunkies. To preserve corporate
dom ination o f w orld o il markets, and to
assert Am erican m ilita ry hegemony in
the Mideast, fillin g the vacuum left by
the Soviets, the masses o f U. S. citizens
are being manipulated into endorsing a
war in which thousands o f innocent
people w ill become victims.
In the euphoria generated by
Am ericas’ blitzkreigh against Iraq in
the opening days o f the war, the stock
market soared and o il prices fe ll to
August, 1990 lows. The American people
were told that the fruits o f war would be
the easy destruction o f an e vil dictator,
the crushing o f international terrorism,
and the reestablishment o f the U.S. as a
Superpower.
Few measured the real human costs
o f war, upon both its victors and v ic ­
tims. The fruits o f war are young c h il­
dren who must be told that their father,
a young flight lieutenant, was shot down
in his F-16 fighter over Bagdad, never
to return home. The fruits o f war are the
mothers and fathers o f wounded and
captured soldiers, who must w orry as
parents only about their children, and
yet are powerless to do anything about
it. The fruits o f war are young women
and men who w ill lose their limbs, or
are paralyzed or blinded by mortar fire,
and must be retrained to enter the
workforce. The fruits o f war are the
thousands o f American fam ilies whose
economic lives are disrupted, pushed
to the edge o f bankruptcy, falling be­
hind in mortgage payments, because
one parent in the army reserve has been
shipped out to Saudi Arabia.
Television reporters tell us about
“ surgical air strikes” by Americans
bombers, a concept both absurd and
dishonest. Pilots speeding at one thou­
sand miles per hour, dropping one ton
bombs guided by lasers, are not con­
ducting kidney transplants or brain
microsurgery. They are obliterating fami­
lies, homes, mosques, and centers o f
daily life. The sixteen year old boys in
the Iraqi army are not the security thugs
who raped and murdered Kuwaiti people.
They are also the innocent victims,
sacrificing their lives beneath A m eri­
can bomardments.
This unnecessary, avoidable and
indefensible war is not against Saddam
Hussein. It is, in effect, a massive at­
tack against the Iraqi people specifi­
cally, and generally against the entire
Arab w orld. The fruits o f war are guilt,
shame, and the immoral responsibility
fo r acts o f m ilitary terrorism which
equal or exceed those committed in
K uw ait by Saddam Hussein.
The only positive fruits produced
by war are the protests o f those who
oppose death and destruction. People
o f conscience are taking a stand. In
Hiroshima, survivors o f the 1945 atomic
bombing staged a sit-in. In Germany,
one hundred thousand marched the day
after the war began. In San Francisco,
nearly one thousand antiwar demon­
strators were arrested, the most ever in
a single day in that c ity ’s turbulent
history. In New Y ork C ity, five thou­
sand protested, tying up traffic for hours.
M ajor demonstrations were organized
in Washington, D.C. The bitter fruits o f
war w ill only be ended when the
American people regain control o f their
own government, demanding an end to
thi
o litic s o f empire and violence,
w h itn threatens the peace o f the world.
Nearly forty years ago, in late 1952,
the Supreme Court heard the historic
case, Brown v. Board o f Education o f
Topeka, which would outlaw racial seg­
regation in pubic schools. Brown was
the culm ination o f twenty years’ legal
strategy by the N A A C P ’ s legal staff,
directed by Charles H am ilton Houston
and Thurgood Marshall. The High
C ourt’ s decision declared unanimously
that “ in the field o f public education
the doctrine o f ‘separate but equal’ has
no place. Separate educational fa c ili­
ties are inherently unequal." The Brown
decision led directly to the important
Montgomery Bus B oycott movement
which catapulted M artin Luther King,
Jr., into political prominence, and even­
tually shattered the system o f Jim Crow.
More than a generation has passed
since the great victories o f the civil
rights movement. O ur cities have be­
come more racially segregated than
ever before; public schools in urban
areas have become more racially seg­
regated than ever before; public schools
in urban areas have deteriorated with
declining tax bases and the flig h t o f the
middle classes to the suburbs. The signs
reading " w h ite ” and “ colored” are
no longer present in the doorways of
our schools, but the segregation o f
income, poverty and the ghetto has in
effect reversed the Brow n Decision.
M illion s o f Black, Latino and low in­
come children are being deprived qual­
ity education, because school systems
are unable to provide the academic
tools necessary fo r learning.
Last m onth, the Supreme Court
took another decisive step away from
the legacy o f Brown. In a 5-3 ruling in
an Oklahoma C ity case, the court made
it easier fo r cities to halt school busing
for desegregation, even when their
schools remain rigidly polarized by race.
The court’ s m ajority declared that a
locality could terminate a desegrega­
tion order in its school system i f it
eliminated the “ vestiges o f past
discrim ination...to the extent practi­
cable” in hiring policies, students’ school
assignments, transportation, and fa c ili­
ties. A school system had to show that
it; made efforts to com ply w ith deseg­
regation orders w ithin a vaguely termed
“ reasonable period o f tim e.” C hief
Justice W illia m Rehnquist, speaking
for the m ajority, stated that “ Federal
supervision o f local school systems was
intended as a temporary measure to
rem edy
past
d is c r im in a tio n .”
Rehnquist’s ruling utterly failed to take
into account that institutional racism
did not disappear w ith the end o f Jim
Crow segregation. In dissent. Associ­
ate Justice Thurgood M arshall wrote:
“ The m ajority suggests that 13 years o f
desegregation (in Oklahoma city schools)
was enough. I strongly disagree.”
More than four hundred school dis­
tricts across the country are under a
court-ordered desegregation plan, in ­
cluding Cleveland, Dallas, Chicago,
B uffalo and Phoenix. Many o f these
CONTINUED ON PAGE 5
Are • The • Proud • Sponsors • Of
Reinvestments
Community
Nero and Associates Discusses
Changes in Black Community
Nero and Associates, Inc.
(N A I) congratulates the Portland
Observer on twenty years o f p u b li­
cation, serving both the Portland Black
com m unity and the entire C ity o f
Roses.
“ What’s in it for us?” How
does the Portland Observer help the
drugs, prostitution, and broken fami­
lies, w ithout the p olitical expedi­
ency o f others diminshing our voices.
We can no longer afford to
ask, “ W hat’ s in it fo r me?” We
must ask, “ W hat’ s in it fo r us? How
do m inorities benefit?” Ifw e d o n o t
do this, we stand the risk o f being
cational system to provide equal op­
portunity, fin an cia lly as w ell as aca­
dem ically. We must change our aid
and social welfare programs to en­
courage fam ilies to come together
and stay together. W e must improve
our legal system to promote the
concepts o f fairness and consistency
"‘W hat’s In it for us?’ Hopefully, a society in which we can all live, without daily
fear of crime, violence, drugs, family disintegration, and hatred. One which re­
sponds to our humanity, rather than our inhumanity. One which helps rather
than hinders, tears down walls instead of building them, shows carir n rather
than apathy."
Black comm unity? How does it
help the city?
Black-oriented newspapers
give their readership the opportunity
to see d aily events from the point o f
view o f other Blacks, in contrast to
the more sterilized views o f our local
television stations and regional
newspaper.
M inority-oriented newspa­
pers provide a forum for the m inor­
ity com m unity to express its views
w ithout hesitation. We can view
and discuss the progress and vita lity
o f our com m unity, as w ell as address
the solutions to problems o f crime,
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seen as self-centered, self-righteous,
and unresponsive to othcrs-preciscly
the qualities seen by many in to­
day’s mainstream society and gov­
ernm ent
N A I encourages the Port­
land Observer and all Portlanders,
whatever race or ethnic group, to
jo in in an e ffo rt to improve our­
selves and our relations w ith others.
W ithout the a bility and willingness
to cooperate, no actions we take as
individuals or small groups can have
a lasting impact to cause positive
change.
We must improve our cdu-
in enforcem ent and compassion in
providing alternatives to those and
only those who can and are w illin g
to be helped through education, train­
ing the counseling.
“ W hat’ s in it fo r us?”
H opefully, a society in which we
can all live, w ithout daily fear o f
crim e, violence, drugs, fa m ily d isin ­
tegration, and haired. One which
responds to our humanity, rather than
our inhum anity. One w hich helps
rather than hinders, tears down walls
instead o f building them, shows car­
ing rather than apathy.
T hat’s a lot o f “ in i t ” for
all o f us.
"Reinvestments in the Community" is a weekly column appearing
in API publications throughout the USA.
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