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F ebruary 7,1996 • T he P ortland O bserver
Editorial Articles Do Not Necessarily
Reflect Or Represent The Views O f
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IFCO-Pastors For Peace Violently Attacked p e r s p e c t i v e .
How Just Is The “Just” Stamp?
15 Non-Violent Protestors Jailed
’ his week U.S. Customs
a g en ts vio le n tly at-
' tacked volunteers from
a humanitarian aid caravan-the
Interreligious Foundation for
Community Organization ( IFCO)/
Pastors for Peace-as they at­
tempted to carry computers
across the San Diego border into
Mexico.
The 30-vehicle caravan arrived at
the border early Wednesday after­
noon carrying nearly 300 computers
bound for Cuba.
The computers were donated to an
on-line medical information system
which would link Cuba’s medical
system, including hospitals, clinics
and medical schools. All of the com­
puters were seized, including 23 from
Canada which had earlier been
cleared by Customs.
As many as 50 riot police with
shields moved into place, despite the
commitment of the caravan drivers
to act nonviolently in all cases. Fif­
teen squad cars and many uniformed
and plainclothes police from multi­
ple law enforcement agencies con­
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in IBI
C O A L IT IO N
verged on the border, along with 19
tow trucks. An interagency task force
of U.S. Customs, INS, the U.S. At­
torney’s office, FBI, California High­
way Patrol, Caltrans, and the San
Diego Police and Fire Departments
had planned for weeks to seize the
computers before they crossed the
border into Mexico, according to
unclassified government documents.
After police blocked the way of
the caravan, about 20 drivers attempt­
ed to carry computers across the bor­
der on foot, and were gang tackled by
as many as 8 police at a time, who
then violently wrenched the comput­
ers from their arms. Customs agents
opened the backs of several trucks
and began confiscating the comput­
ers. Caravan drivers, who had formed
a protective ring around the trucks,
some even sitting on top of them,
were violently dragged away from
their vehicles. Several people were
injured, including one man who was
knocked unconscious by police. He
was hospitalized. Custom officials
shut down the border to all vehicles
and pedestrians for most o f the day.
Police arrested 11 menand4wom-
en, including the Rev. Lucius
Walker, Ex. Dir. of IFCO-Pastors
for Peace, which, since 1992, has
organized 5 national aid caravans
directly challenging the U.S. embar­
go o f Cuba. Also arrested was the
Rev. George Hill o f Claremont, CA
Those arrested spent the night in the
Federal Metropolitan Correctional
Facility in downtown San Diego.
They were arraigned, but released on
their own recognizance without
charges being brought against them.
However, the feds can still bring
charges at a later date.
“ It is inconceivable that our
governm ent would deny modern
medical care to Cuban children
and senior citizen s,” stated Rev.
Lucius W alker. JaxF ax urges
calls & faxes to Robert Rubin
(Treasury), 202-622-5300, Fax
2 0 2 -6 2 2 -0 0 7 3 ;Janet Reno (Jus­
tice), 202-514-2000, Fax 202-
514-0467; Ron Brown (C om ­
merce), 2 0 2 -4 8 2 -2 0 0 0 ;and Pres­
ident Clinton, 202-395-3000, Fax
202 -4 5 6 -2 4 6 1 to: (1) demand an
end to the immoral U.S. embargo
of Cuba; and (2) dem and release
o f the com puters so they can be
u sed to im p ro v e
C u b a ’s
healthcare system.
Civil Rights Journal
A Legend In Her Own Time
n
by u
B tn
ernice
p i
P o w eil J ackson
- ho could ever forget her
deep, thundering voice
with that wonderful elo­
cution and the brilliant thoughts
behind the words? If you ever
heard Barbara Jordan speak, you
never forgot it. You never forgot
the moral authority, the integri­
ty, the brilliant analysis and the
truth of her words.
February is Black History Month
and Barbara Jordan was a Black His­
tory maker from her college days. A
graduate of Houston’s segregated
schools, she attended the all-black
Texas Southern University, where
she joined the debating team. It was
that team which maneuvered the
Harvard debate team to a tie. “When
an all-black team ties Harvard, it
wins,” Ms. Jordan recalled.
She made history again when she
became the first African American
ever to be elected to the Texas State
Senate and the first black elected to
the Congress from the South since
Reconstruction. “She proved that
black is beautiful before we knew
what it meant,” said President Lyndon
Johnson, who was Jordan’s mentor.
She spent only seven years in the
U.S. House of Representatives, but
she will be remembered forever in
our nation’s history. “There is no
black woman in politics today that is
not in her debt,” said Eleanor Holmes
Norton, Washington D.C.’s congres­
sional delegate.
Barbara Jordan will be remem­
bered forever for her fierce determi­
nation to protect the U.S. Constitu­
tion during the Watergate fiasco and
the ensuring Congressional impeach­
ment hearings. “My faith in the Con­
stitution is whole, it is complete, it is
total, and I am not going to sit here
and be an idle spectator to the dimi­
nution, the subversion, the destruc­
tion o f the Constitution,’ she said
during those hearings. But then she
reminded the nation that she had felt
left out the Constitution by the mis­
take o f George Washington and
Alexander Hamilton, “but through
the process of amendment, interpre­
tation and court decision I have final­
ly been included in We, the peo­
ple.’”
Barbara Jordan will be remem ­
bered forever for her integrity
and her ability to call the nation
into account. Most recently, as
chairperson o f the Commission
on Im m igration R eform , she
spoke out against a proposal to
deny autom atic citizenship to the
children born in this country to
illegal immigrants, saying, “ To
deny birthright citizenship would
derail this engine o f American
liberty.”
In 1979, after serving only three
terms in the House of Representa­
tives and stricken with multiple scle­
rosis, Barbara Jordan announced her
retirement and her plans to return to
Texas to teach at the Lyndon B.
Johnson School of Public Affairs at
the University of Texas. Her courses
were so popular that students had to
enter a lottery to take them and her
students remember her always hav­
ing a copy of the Constitution in her
purse.
Barbara Jordan once said that she
never intended to be a run-of-the-
mill person and clearly she succeed­
ed in her goal. The daughter of a
Baptist minister who worked two
jobs to pay for her college tuition,
she recently visited the elementary
school named for her in Austin. She
told the students, “Study hard in
school, and don’t let people put you
in a box and c lose it. ” Barbara Jordan
didn’t let anyone put her in a box.
Had her health held out, she may
have added the Vice Presidency or
even the Presidency to her list of
firsts. Barbara Jordan was a Black
History maker who lived in our time.
She was, indeed, a legend in her own
time.
V a n ta g e P o in t
“Where There Is No Vision The People Perish”
by
R on D aniels
antee a basic standard of living for all
a culture of rights which ensures that
ofthe people who live in this country
every person in this society is enti­
visionary whose capaci-
is simply and outmoded and unwork­
tled to certain basic human rights: a
dream and articu­
able idea.
decent job with decent wages or a
late his dream to the suffering
“Where there is no vision, the
guaranteed income; quality afford­
masses of African humanity in
people perish.” Ifthe massesofBlack
able health care for all; affordable
the U.S. helped to fuel one of the
people, people of color and poor and
housing; quality education; and, a
most profound social movements
working people vision of a new and
safe and clean environment.
in the history of this nation and
humane society, then we will surely
On the contrary we must go on the
the world.
perish. But if we are true to the spirit
offensive articulating a vision of a
Unfortunately, the forces of reac­
of Martin Luther King, then we are
culture o f rights as an integral and
tion have gained ascendancy in this
challenged to confront the current
indispensable ingredient in a new
nation and through their “Contract
crises with the resolve to pose the
and more humane society; a society
on America” seek to turn back the
visionary alternative.
where social and economic rights are
clock on the hard fought gains of the
It was Martin Luther King who
accepted as inalienable rights which
60’s. Indeed, Black people, people
called upon us to push for a transfor­
cannot be violated. And, like Martin
o f color, poor and working people
mation of American society: “ I am
Luther King, we must be prepared to
and the struggling middle class are
convinced that... we as a nation must
put our bodies on the line to struggle
being conditioned to believe that the
undergo a radical revolution of val­
for the realization of our vision and
kindofEconomicBillofRightswhich
ues. We must rapidly begin the shift
our dreams.
King was speaking to and fighting
from a thing oriented’ society to a
The recent general strike and tur­
for at the end o f his life is an anach­
person oriented’ society. When
moil in France demonstrates that
ronism in the current climate of the
machines and computers, profit mo­
somewhere in the world there are
“free market” and “global competi­
tives and property rights are consid­
working people who are unwilling to
tion.”
ered more important than people, the
accept the demands of the corporate
The American people are being
giant triplets of racism, materialism,
elite that the safety net for poor and
conditioned to accept a kind of mod­
and militarism are incapable ofbeing
working people and the middle class
em day Social Darwinism, a “surviv­
conquered.”
be dismantled to protect the compet­
al o f the finest” doctrine where there
The contemporary meaningofthis
itive position and profitability of the
are winners and losers in the new
message from Martin is that we must
bankers and bosses, shareholders and
world order of global competition.
reject the notion that we “market,”
bondholders and the captains of com­
We are being conditioned to accept
profit, property, accept the conten­
merce and industry. Similarly, in the
obscene levels of inequality, pover­
tion o f the radical right and the
Chiapas region of Mexico, the indig­
ty, misery and a prison-jail industrial
Republicans that gross incqual ity and
enous people have revolted to resist
complex as part of the natural order
extremes of wealth and poverty are
the destructive impact of NAFTA
of things. We are being conditioned
inevitable in American society. We
and other international and national
to accept the notion that the concept
do not have to be bound by their view
policies being imposed on them by
of a culture o f rights where the gov­
that there is something old fashioned
an undemocratic and corrupt gov­
ernment and the public sector guar­
and unrealistic about the concept of
ernment. The Zapatista Liberation
artin " Luther
King was a
irttr»«1
i
[
Front is determined that there will be
a new day, a new society for indige­
nous people into the 21st century.
They are not prepared to accept the
status quo, to suffer and die.
“Where there is no vision, the
people perish.” Black people, peo­
ple of color and poor and working
people must be equally determined
to become ungovernable in the U.S.
in defense o f the basic human rights
o f the vast multitude o f people who
are being victimized by the Contract
on America.
As M artin Luther King once
put it, “true com passion is more
than flinging a coin to a beggar;
it comes to see that the edifice
that produces beggars needs re­
structuring.” We must offer a vi­
sion of social transformation, of a
radically changed society where so­
cial and economic justice and genu­
ine democracy are integral to the
very fabric of the nation.
It is that vision which will enable
Black people, people o f color and
poor and working people to rise above
the constraints ofour current circum­
stances to struggle for the dawning of
a new day.
It is that vision, the capacity to
imagine and dream that things can be
different that will energize the apa­
thetic and indifferent to forge a peo­
ple movement that will create a new
tomorrow. In the face o f formidable
odds we are chailenged to choose life
over death.
i better TSf ffhe (SSCditcr
Send your letters to the Editor to:
Editor, PO Box 3137, Portland, OR 97208
«
Black History For 32C
conclusions in his published pa­
pers, space scientists in the 1960s
began launching biosatellites into
orbit. They wished to expand Just’s
pioneering research to study the ef­
fect of the earth’s magnetism (and
radiation) on an assortment of plants
and animals.
By 1930, Just
Dr. Just pio­
was recognized
neered the study
world wide as a
of cell life and
leading authority
By
human metabo-
in his field, and
Professor
ism. In the
had
been named
Mcklnley
1920s
and
vice-president
of
Burt
1930s, this bril­
the American So
liant Phi Beta
ciety of Zoology
Kappa graduate of Dartmouth Uni­
But nevertheless, he still suffered
versity became the first to unlock
many o f the slings and arrows of an
secrets of cell function that shat­
“outrageous fate”-th e color of his
tered many long-held scientific the­
black skin.
ories about cell structure and func­
Despite all the good press in ac
tion. Much of the research that es­
ademic bulletins. Just became em
tablished him as the world’s lead­
bittered over never being asked to
ing authority on egg cells and the
study at prestigious universities. At
development of marine animals was
Howard University, the facilities at
done at the famed “Woods Hole
the under funded black college were
Marine Biological Laboratory” in
not those needed to support a scien
Massachusetts.
tist o f his caliber. The Julius
Beginning in 1909, Dr. Just be­
Rosenwald Fund Furnished some
came understudy and research as­
support for five years but it was far
sistant to some of the most eminent
from adequate; a few thousand for
men in his field; A H. Sturtevant
books, equipment and research
and Calvin Bridges in Chromosome
Remember, this scientist was the
genetics, K.S. Cole and Selig Hecht,
greatest in the world in his field, but
the American pioneers of biochem­
rejected by the Rockefeller Insti
ical and biophysical neurology-and
tute.
the noted cytologist E. B. Wilson.
Like some blacks before him
By 1916, Just again displayed his
Dr. Just left America for Europe
intellectual abilities, earning his
and found complete acceptance and
doctorate in Zoology from the Uni­
support, academic, emotional and
versity o f C hicago, magna
financial For years he carried on
cumlaude.
his research at a marine biology
For twenty marvelously produc­
station on the Bay ofNaples in Italy
tive years, Dr. Just studied and ex­
From 1938 to 1940 he lived in
perimented at Woods Hole with the
France and published two of the
reproductive cells o f marine ani­
greatest of his over fifty works: The
mals. In his writing Just said that
Biology of the Cell Surface and
understanding the working of cells
Basic Methods for experiments on
would be useful in finding cures for
Eggs of Marine Animals.
such diseases as sickle-cell anemia,
The advent of World War 11 saw
cancer, leukemia and other diseas­
him return to America and a teach­
es caused by abnormal cell growth
ing post at Howard University. He
(this writer cannot help but specu­
died shortly afterwards in 1940, at
late that if this genius were with us
the age o f 57. In 1957 the Woods
today, we would have a cure for
Hole scientists published a ‘revised’
AIDS).
version of Dr. Just’s book on “Basic
Half a century before the space
Methods...” In 1930 in a farewell
age, Dr. Just applied various
speech at the Wood’s Hole Research
amounts of magnetic energy to eggs
Center, Just had said, “in one year at
to determine the effect on cell divi­
the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute in Ger­
sion; he found marked difference.
many I received more assistance
Building upon his work and the
and fraternity than I ever did her.”
everal callers said that
their spirits were con­
siderably lightened by
the decision of the U.S. Postal
Service to Issue a commemora­
tive stamp in honor of the great
African American biologist, Dr.
Ernest Everett Just. (1 8 8 3 -
1940).
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