P vt » e A2
M ay 29,
1996 • T he P ortland O bserver
Editorial Articles Do Not Necessarily
Reflect Or Represent The Views O f
(The JJortlanh (i)bseruer
Civil Rights Journal: The Shame Continues
By Bernice Powell Jackson
It was shocking. To drive down
that country road outside Meridian
MS and turn onto a parking area and
see only charred remains o f what
used to be a house o f God. Only the
concrete steps were left standing o f
what was once St Paul's Primitive
Baptist Church. Gone were the pews
Gone was the pulpit Gone was the
cross Only a few pieces o f burned
wood and ashes, a lirtle bit o f the
siding and the memories o f the peo
ple were left
The fire started on Easter Sunday,
but because this little country church
only meets two Sundays a month, no
one was there The local officials
came, followed by the Justice De
partment They sifted through the
ashes for nearly two day s. And then
after they left, a second fire started,
destroying everything.
And. like in many o f the 31 cases
o f black church burnings since the
beginning o f 1995. the officials are
investigating the deacons or the pas
tors first, accusing them o f burning
down their own churches, intention
ally or accidentally In this case, they
say it was accidentally started by a
deacon who put out a cigarette as he
was locking up
But when you see the building's
remains and see that the church sat up
two feet off the ground, you see how
unlikely that was When you know
how reverent black folks are about
their churches, you know no deacon
would ever have been so careless
And when you see the pattern of the
firebombings in churches across the
South, you realize how unlikely it is
that these burnings are unconnected,
random acts.
1 joined a National Council o f
Churches delegation visiting w ith the
pastors o f many o f the burned church
es and over and over again we heard
the same stories The story o f how
both local and federal officials first
investigated the pastors and deacons
Even through many o f the churches
were uninsured or underinsured, even
when two black churches in the same
community were burned the same
night, officials suspected that the
churches w ere burned down by those
who loved them the most. In some
cases, that seems to be as far as the
investigation has gotten
We heard stories of white men seen
near the fires, sometimes by the fire
fighters, but never heard about again
We heard stories o f expletives being
painted on buildings, and then being
painted over by investigators and nev -
er mentioned again We heard stories
o f how months have passed with no
contact from local or federal inv est iga-
tors We heard the story o f one black
j udge in A labama who w as bold enough
to sentence the white men responsible
for a church burning hav ing his house
shot at in the middle of the night We
heard stories o f how officials told
church people in Tennessee towns not
to talk about what happened, so that
months passed before they realized
what was going on all round them
On Monday we visited with a
group o f pastors who had come to
Nashville to tell their stories o f what
was happening in their communities.
They told o f the unanswered ques
tions. the cloud o f suspicion placed
ov er them, the questioning o f their
members. But they also expressed
their commitment to re-build
Indeed, many o f them already have
re-built, often with their congregations
going into debt to do so. As the assis
tant pastor o f the Inner City Church in
Knoxville said. "If they bum us again,
we ll re-build They're not going to
run us out o f our community ”
We were in Tennessee on Mon
day. On Tuesday another black
church was burned there
(You may write to Attorney G en
eral Janet Reno at Department of
Justice, Constitution Avenue & 10th
Street. NW. Room 4400. Washing
ton. DC 20530 .)
v û iA fû ü e P o i n t
The Making Of The Second Post Reconstruction
bv
Ros D aniels
©
ne hundred years after
|the historic Plessy vs.
Ferguson Supreme court
Decision which sanctioned the
doctrine of "separate but equal"
and provided th e ju d ic ia l
capstone for the betrayal of the
civil rights of Africans in Ameri
ca. there is a view that Black
America is experiencing a sec
ond Post Reconstruction.
One could argue that the period
from 1954 to 1965 marked the sec
ond Reconstruction period with the
milestone Brown vs Board o f Educa
tion decision sparking a civil rights
revolt that resulted in several new
civil rights laws culminating with the
Voting Rights Act o f 1965 Taken
together the Court decisions, presi
dential executive orders and civil
rights laws essentially reclaimed that
which Black America loss after the
betray al o f 1876 and the onslaught o f
Post Reconstruction The Voting
Rights Act in particular unleashed a
mobilization of Black electoral pow
er that resulted in the election of
thousands o f Black people to public
office.
However, by the time Martin
Luther King journeyed to Memphis,
as he prepared to launch the Poor
People’s Campaign, he was sound
ing the alarm about a “white back
lash" that threatened to stall the steady
march o f Africans in America to
wards first class citizenship Indeed,
the white backlash that King warned
about steadily gained momentum.
During the Nixon years there was a
concerted effort to curtail civil rights
enforcement in response to the “si
lent majority." Ronald Reagan bor
rowed the “burden o f government"
themes o f George W allace’s cam
paigns for President, with all o f the
racist code words and phrases, to
propel himself into the White House.
Once in office Reagan launched
an all out assault on civil rights and
affirmative action introducing such
terms as "reverse discrimination" and
“black racism" into the national dia
logue on race relations in America.
The Ju stic e D ep artm en t under
Reagan was assigned to dismantle
civil rights laws or interpret them in
such a way as to undermine their
original intent. The not so subtle
message of Reagan's attack on civil
rights and affirmative action was that
the federal statutes enacted by Con
gress and the decisions rendered by
the courts were infringing on the
rights o f White Americans.
Throughout the Nixon, Reagan
and Bush administrations there was
a gradual erosion o f the gains o f the
civil rights movement as the conser
vative forces fueled the white back
lash against Black progress. The as
sault on civil rights and affirmative
action reached its apex, however,
with the appointment o f Clarence
Thomas to the Supreme Court by
George Bush and the Republican
capture o f both houses o f Congress
in November o f 1994
With the appointment ofClarence
Thomas, a Black conservative, to
the Supreme Court, the reactionary
forces gained the majority w ithin the
body which had promoted and de
fended civil rights for more than
three decades. And, the rise to pow
er o f New! Gingrich and company
with a majority in both houses o f
Congress positioned the conserva
tive forces to initiate a legislative
attack on civil rights, affirmative
action and related issues through the
racist and reactionary Contract with
America.
Though there are qualitative dif
ferences between 1896 and 1996,
there is no doubt that once again
forces within White America are at
work to thwart the forward advance
o f Africans in America. And, just as
the Supreme Court o f a hundred years
ago provided the judicial sanction
for our reversal o f fortune, the cur
rent Supreme Court is leading the
charge in turning back the clock on
Black advancement.
The Supreme Court with brother
Mr. Justice Thomas casting the deci
sive votes is sy stematically destroy
ing affirmative action as an instru
ment to overcome past and present
discrimination, and gutting the Vot
ing Rights Act as a tool which pro
duced the largest number o f Blacks
in Congress since Reconstruction.
American Violence In Black And White
By Earl Ofari Hutchinson, Ph D
“ Why is the FBI being so soft on
them9 They ’ ve got to do someth ing.”
The resident o f Jordan, Montana was
bewildered that more than a month
(and still counting, later a small army
ofFB I agents waited patiently for the
band o f 20 Freemen holed up in a
Montana ranch house to surrender.
The Freemen were wanted for land
theft, check fraud, swindling banks,
public institutions, and businesses of
$1.8 million The FBI wait-out cost
the taxpayers S300.000 per day and
M o n ta n a re sid e n ts an ad d ed
$250,000.
FBI officials say they wanted to
avoid a repeat o f the blood bath that
followed the siege at W acoand Ruby
Ridge, which touched o ff public out
rage and congressional investigations
over FBI tactics. Ramona Africa was
probably bewildered that law en
forcement didn't take the same pre
cautions to avoid bloodshed and the
destruction o f property in Philadel
phia a decade ago A week after the
FBI wait-out in Montana began, Af
rica filed a multi-million dollar law
suit in federal court against Philadel
phia city officials for the March 1985
bombing o f MOVE headquarters that
killed 11 MOVE members.
Although local police confronted
MOVE and the FBI confront the
Freem en, there are sim ilarities.
MOVE, like the Freemen, was as
radical fringe group Their members
were armed They had members in
jail and a history o f prior confronta
tions with the law. Women and chil
dren were in the siege house N eigh
bors and area residents complained
about them. The bomb dropped on
MOVE contained C-4 explosive was
reportedly supplied by the FBI
But there are also differences be
tween the law enforcement confron
tation with MOVE and the Freemen.
The Freemen sunbathe, ride horses,
dance jigs, receive visitors, and plow
their fields in full view o f the FBI
Their armed supporters patrol the
back roads keeping the press and on
lookers out. Their sy mpathizers have
an open platform in newspapers, on
radio, and national TV talk shows to
spout their views. MOVE didn’t.
In less than 48 hours, a Philadel
phia police helicopter dropped the
C-4 bomb on the roof o f the MOVE
headquarters. Six adults and 5 chil-
A year after the bombing o f the
federal building in Oklahoma City,
441 active “anti-government" mili
tia groups operate in all fifty states
and have paramilitary training sites
in 23 states. One hundred and thirty-
seven groups have ties to white su
premacist organizations like the Kian
and the Aryan Nation. Last July the
Aryan Nation, active in 22 states,
held its Annual Aryan World Con
gress near Hayden, Idaho, It drew
200 w hite suprem acists. M ilitia
groups have more than 100 World
Wide Web sites to spew their hatred
dren were incinerated, 61 homes de
stroyed, and 350 resident were left
hom eless. T hree days after the
MOVE bombing then Attorney Gen
eral Edwin Meese told the California
Peace Officers Association that the
bombing was “a good example for us
al! to take note of."
to millions in Cyberspace.
Their terrorist threats, tactics,
criminal activities, and violence are
not the stuff o f nightly Action News
reports, press features, editorials, and
exposes. They are not singled out as
a menace to society in national de
bates over crime bills, three strikes
probation. Nearly half o f America's
one million prisoners are black. The
top heavy number o f black men in
jail reinforces the public view that
they commit most o f the major vio
lent crime in America.
They don't. White males commit
fifty -four percent ofviolent crimes in
America, sixty percent o f the urban
hate crimes and the majority o f serial
and mass murders.
The O.J. Simpson, Mike Tyson,
Mel Reynolds, and Colin Ferguson
trials dominated press headlines for
months. The legal actions involving
accused Oklahoma City bombers,
T im o th y M cV eigh and T erry
Nichols; accused mass serial mur
ders, Glen W alters and Charles
Rathbum; accused child murderer
Richard Allan Davis; and accused
double murderer Robert Acremont
have barely made a media ripple.
There are thousands o f Freemen,
Militia, Patriot, Aryan Nation, O r
der, and neo-Nazi members at large.
They are well armed and financed.
They have the tacit support o f dozens
o f public officials, and the sympathy
o f millions o f Americans. Many o f
their members agree with William
Pierce who in the rabidly racist. anti-
Semitic fictional blueprint for terror
The biggest difference, however,
between the two groups is that the
MOVE activists were black men,
women, and children The Freemen
are mostly white males.
In the decade since the MOVE
bombing, armed white “anti-govem-
men," militants like the Freemen have
committed dozens o f bank robber
ies, shot it out with FBI, IRS, BATF
officers, attacked federal land agents,
stockpiled mountains o f weapons,
openly tested bombs, and conducted
military maneuvers.
legislation, the death penalty, and
prison construction. In the immediate
aftermath ofthe Oklahoma City bomb
ing, there were no mass raids on their
headquarters or roundups oftheir lead
ers. Clinton and political leaders as
sured, and the media demanded, that
their civil rights and civil liberties be
scrupulously respected
The public veil over white vio
lence is in stark contrast to Ameri
c a 's open assault on black violence
In 1995, one out ofthree young black
men are in jail, or prison, on parole or
Tumer Diaries wrote that “We are in
a war for the survival o f our race.”
Their key to victory is terror and
mass destruction
While they often get kid glove
treatment from law enforcement,
militant groups like MOVE get swift
ly attacked and harshly prosecuted
Violence may come in black and
white, but law enforcement does not
treat both the same.
Responses may be sent e-mail to
Earl Ofari Hutchinson
ehutchi344fyaol com
r/7e/r terrorist threats, tactics, criminal
activities, and violence are not the stu ff
o f nightly Action News reports, press
features, editorials, and exposes.
1
l/> e r s p e c t i r e s
Our Summer Reading List: Motivations,
Factual, Inspiring, P l l l a r t II
his week. I am present
egyptologist. has included the lyr
ing a most “eclectic"
ics o f several songs in the “estab
list; as Webster says,
lished genre" o f Egy ptian litera
"selecting what appears to
be Dover Publications, Inc. @ 3 1
ture
the best in various doctrines,
E. Mineola. N Y 11501 or call
methods, or styles".
(516,242-6657 to order and/or re
History, prose or
c e iv e c a ta lo g
poetry, these are the
(sam e for first
best Thank you for
book cited).
your comments on
“African Mu
last w e e k 's list;
sic: A Peoples
happy to be able to
Art”, Josephine
“open your mind"
B e n n e tt, L aw
as one reader put it.
rence Hill & Co..
Africa led in the healing profes
1975 Here, we leap to the twenti
sions.
eth century , but again with an ex
First, let me cite three books that
cellent text, photographs, support
will broaden your appreciation o f
ing notes and appendices. The ba
early African civilization fully as
sic elements o f a discography are
much as those revelations o f medi
provided underageographicalclas-
cal firsts. And keep in mind that
siflcation. And there are revealing
w hen we speak o f “Egy pt" o f an
insights into both the musician and
cient days, we speak not o f arbitrary
the aesthetics o f his art; the book is
boundaries and restrictions estab
highly recommended.
lished by European marauders and
"Conversations With God: Two
colonialists -- but o f Nile Valley
Centuries o f Prayer by African
cultures which were, o f structural
Americans", James Melvin W ash
necessity , integral at various times
ington Composed between 1760
w ith Ethiopia, Sudan and Liby a(lan-
and today, these 190 prayers repre
guage, technology, religion agri
sent an indomitable spirit that has
culture, literature).
flourished in the face o f horren
"Ancient Egyptian construction
dous odds' (Christianity Today).
and A rch itectu re,” C larke and
There's Douglass, Hughes, King,
Engelbach. Dover Publications Inc
Dubois, Baldwin, Wright. Walker,
a thoroughly enjoyable book writ
Truth. Thurman, 347 pages, hard
ten for the layman and well illus
cover S14.95, No. 71618, The Re
trated. Much more to be appreciat
ligious Book Club, P.O. Box 7000,
ed since the racists and revisionists
Peabody. MA 01961-7000; (508)
have been proven quite wrong in
977-5000, S&H 3.00.
their allegations that the monumen
Also, I stopped by the Reflec
tal architectural achievements o f
tions Bookstore the other day to
the Africans required hordes o f
replenish some o f my library stan
slaves.
dards (lost) strayed or stolen) and
Excavations the last two decades
to pick up anything new and inter
reveal elaborate housing complex
ested. I've got to get up to N.E.
es built next to major engineering
Martin Luther King Blvd. and N.E.
sites such as py ramids, dams, ca
Killingsworth more often. I picked
nals and urban developments. Per
up the follow ing books at this well-,
manent housing for projects w hich
stocked collection o f black history
might require decades or a century
and culture.
to complete, reflected the social
The following three books are
structure o f the w orkforce. The la
by Cheikh Anta Diop, that most
borers and minor craftsmen were
renowned and respected African
provided smal I but comfortable two
Scholar:
or three-room apartm ents while
“The Cultural Unity o f Black
foremen and supervisors occupied
Africa: The-Domains o f Patriar
larger, more sophisticated quarters
chy and o f Patriarchy”
to match their rank.
“Precolonial Black Africa: Sys
“Music And Musicians In An
tems Compared”
cient Egypt", Lise Manniche, Do
“Civilization or Barbarism: And
ver Publications Inc. this book is a
Authentic Anthropology.
true treasure with excel lent i I lustra
And another classic by a re
tions and with notes on Egyptian
nowned scholar o f African Histo
I musical conventions and terminol
ry, Ivan Van Sertima, “They Came
ogy. T he a u th o r, a D anish
Before Columbus”.
T
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