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J uly 23, 1997 • T he P ortland O bserver
P age A2
Editorial Articles Do Not Necessarily
Reflect Or Represent The Views O]
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Deadline for all submitted materials:
n Wednesday, July 30th,
(a t 8:00 p.m., the first
night of the Rainbow/
Push Coalition annual confer­
ence, Reverend Jackson is put­
ting together an important panel
to discuss the current state of
racism in our county.
The panel is entitled “Race, Rea­
son, Remedy,” and will be m oder­
ated by the distinguished harvard
professor and author, Dr. Charles
Ogletree.
W hy do we need such a panel? A
few key statistics provide insight:
“Senator Spencer Abraham (R-
M) has proposed an amendment to
the juvenile crime bill to address the
disparity between pow der and crack
cocaine sentences, a disparity that
was confirmed by the Sentencing
Commission, and which we have dis­
cussed in this fax in the past.
However, Abraham will not at­
tempt to equalize the situation by
lowering crack sentences; instead,
he suggests raising sentences for
people distributing the lowest quan­
tities o f powder cocaine.
In addition, penalties for higher-
level dealers o f pow der cocaine
would remain the same; only low-
end cocaine defendants would face
increased sentences.
Wallace suspects this proposal is
1Î
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Publishers, Inc, New York, NY, and The West Coast Black Publishers
Association • Serving Portland and Vancouver.
y \
fter all, the powers-that
be just held a contest
v t o rename th at little
Exploration vehicle running
around the surface of Mars - And,
Io and behold, the winning name
as “Sojourner.
“ But Black History is pretty much
as the inimitable Bill Cosby described
it, “Lost, Strayed or Stolen.”
Just how many Americans do you
think will relate this choice to that
brave African woman who escaped
the obscene involuntary servitude o f
Dixie to ‘Sojourn’ the length and
I t ’s a m a z in g w hat k i d s p i c k u p
a t th e beach.
Over a liietime, one in f i v e Americans
will develop skin cancer. Don’t let your
child be the one. For more information,
**
*
\
fAAD *
’
1,1» <,*
»»„X
www.aad.org
Bositis also makes the following
points:
C O A L IT IO N
Race, reason, remedy
“...a cynical effort to quiet the com ­
plaints o f racism in crack sentencing,
while in fact making the racial im­
pact much worse.”
Wallace notes that “nothing is done
to relieve the draconian sentences
for crack; an addict convicted o f
simple possession will still get a
mandatory five years.”
T he S en ten cin g C o m m issio n
found that “low-level street dealers
o f powder cocaine are primarily poor,
minority youth, generally under the
age o f 18,” while its Chairman testi­
fied in the Senate in 1995 that just
raising penalties for powder, rather
than lo w erin g crack sentences,
“Could distort this sensible structure
[the current targeting o f mid- and
upper-level dealers] and result in
application o f the mandatory mini­
mums to defendants at lower culpa­
bility levels.”
The W hite House is reportedly
planning to weigh in on this issue
next week. President Clinton and
S>
f
6'
Attorney General Janet Reno need to
hear our views. D on’t we already
have enough young African Ameri­
cans in prison? The U.S. is #2 in
incarceration rates (behind only Rus­
sia). 51 % o f this national prison popu­
lation, and 41% o f death row in­
mates, are African Americans.
One in three young Black men is
caught in the criminal justice system.
And a recent report by the Sentenc­
ing Project indicated that 1/7 o f adult
African American males cannot vote
due to felony convictions. These are
horrible statistics for the world’s most
powerful democracy.
Quoting from a recent analysis by
Davide Bositis o f the Joint Center for
Political Studies, “in the 46 states
that in some manner deny or abridge
voting rights, there are 510,000 Black
men in prison, 250,000 on probation,
and 190,000 on parole; there are
510,000 Black ex-felons in those
states that permanently disenfran­
chise felons.”
(¡
t'
It
• “There is differential treatment o f
Whites and Blacks by police authori­
ties in enforcing the law.” Even a
majority o f Whites agrees with this
point-56% in a 1/97 survey.
• “As far as the racial makeup o f the
prison population, the single largest
contributor is drug convictions.”
• “At the start o f the current cam ­
paign finance scandal hearings. Sena­
tor Daniel Akaka (D-HI) received
the following vicious fax:
“D on't even Think about playing
the race card! D on't use the words
’ra cist,' nativist, ’ or Asian-bash-
ing. ’ None o f those words are appli­
cable at all here. I f you use this tactic
you will be swimming in the slimy
depths with the likes o f Johnny
Cochran. We are watching fo r this
shameless and despicable tactic that
it is rumored you would use, without
regard to the truth. Why don 't you
surprise us and display integrity,
and character? "
Talk about shameless and despi-
cable-this is nasty stuff. Just another
reminder that not everyone is com­
fortable in our emerging multiracial
society.
F
G
Ss
Lets sojourn (rove) farther into science
S e a s h e lls .
D riftw o o d .
S kin cancer.
see your dermatologist.
/M W f lO O U S H
All this, out o f a total Black adult
male population o f only 10.4 m il­
lion. One out o f every seven.
breath o f the rest o f the land as a
lecturer and anti-slavery crusader -
“Sojourner Truth.” Too proud to
adopt the convention o f taking the
‘m asters’ name, this heroic black
woman named herself to exactly cor­
relate with her cho­
sen life-long crusade
for human freedom
and dignity - “So­
journer T ruth,” yes
Lord, she did!
S e v e ra l re a d e rs
have predicted that
there will be serious objections just
as there have been to including so­
journer among the statues o f historic
women crusaders whom female con­
gress persons are seeking to have
elevated to a more conspicuous spot
in a prom inent building in W ashing­
ton D.C. Another reader, a senior
citizen, reminds us that many years
ago when space exploration was first
contemplated, the Pittsburgh Cou­
rier, an African American newspa­
per, com e out with a cartoon that
mirrored the mind-sets o f the times.
A large, sleek space ship was
shown streaking heavenward, with a
full crew o f Anglo Saxons in control,
noble visages fastened on eternity.
Some distance behind and connected
by a tow chain several miles in length
was a trailing vehicle with no visible
means o f propulsion but containing a
full crew with decidedly African fea­
tures. It was labeled, “Colored sec­
tion!”
W ell,
so
much for levity
|
PRO FESSOR
(o f a sort), that
T | | M < KIM I t
last m eeting o f
L*" B i RT
concerned par­
ents determined
to enhance their
children’s immersion into the sci­
ences and mathematics agreed on
several key points. “Much o f our
limited resources will be better di­
rected to support the purchase o f
equipment and materials for our kid’s
neighborhood science clubs. OMSI
is fine for occasional structured vis­
its to keep the big picture in view, but
not as a technology “Disney Land’,
an overly-expensive entertainment
center and parent trap.”
A n o th e r c o n v e rs a tio n a ro se
around my experiences with an OMSI
Northeast “outreach” branch. This
was about a decade ago when I was
engaged as a consultant, with ill-
defined duties. A parent pointed out
that I hit a stone wall when I tried to
bring in talented black role models
who were professionally engaged in
high level technology in industry,
government, military or as an avoca­
tion.
I located a black traffic engineer
who was a walking history on ‘M or­
gan’ the African A m erican’ who in­
vented the automatic stop light and
sold it to General Electric; A navy
man and scuba diver with pictures
andtapewhocould expound for hours
on the sea shore and tide pools; A
young I .B.M. employee whose hobby
was building radio-controlled heli­
copters. These among others.
The parent who had a younger child
in that group made the point that I
didn’t receive strong support from
black staff to bring in high-level super-
competent African Americans. “You
know folks, we’ are frightened to do
that. We think it makes us look bad,
and old massa might get disturbed.” A
closing comment was “are we going to
be about buying micro scopes, tele­
scopes and chemistry sets for our kids,
or stupidly buying some more $150
sneakers?”
Next week the mathematics orien­
tation you wanted.
Civil Rights Journal
Forty acres and a mule
by
B ernice P owell J ackson
eople have been asking
what I think about all the
■talk about whether the
Jon should apologize to Afri­
can Americans for slavery.
C o m b in e d w ith P re s id e n t
Clinton’s recent call for Americans
to dialogue about race and his apol­
ogy to the victims o f the Tuskegee
syphilis experiment, much attention
seems to be focused on righting our
past sins as we prepare for a new
century and a new millennium.
Having visited the "slave castles”
in Ghana and Goree Island in Senegal
where my ancestors were held until
the slave ships arrived, I know some
o f the physical and psychological
pain those men and women must
have felt. This nation, and others,
have much to atone for when it comes
to slavery.
Unfortunately, slavery is not all
this nation has to apologize for to
African Americans. It has the lynch­
ings o f thousands o f black men and
women and it has decades o f Jim
Crow laws o f segregation. It has po­
litical disenfranchisem ent and de­
struction o f whole towns like Rose­
wood, FL and whole communities
like Greenwood Ave. in Tulsa, OK
to apologize for.
I must admit it’s difficult to find
words to express what I feel about all
o f this.
As a Christian, I truly believe in
the power o f forgiveness. As a stu­
dent o f language, I understand the
pow er o f words.
But, as a student o f American his­
tory, I know that words alone can
ring hollow.
I know o f the many times our
nation has signed treaties with our
native American brothers and sis­
ters, only to break them when they
were no longer convenient.
Words alone are too easy. Words
must be accompanied by repentance
— by em pathizing with the people
who were hurt and acknowledging
the wrong that has been done. Words
alone, without wrestling with the pain
o f the broken relationship, are not
true apology, they are only words.
Many cultures o f people o f color
around the world are based on rela­
tionship and include a formal or in­
formal process for reconciliation.
Native Hawaiians, for instance, call
this process ho’oponopono, which
means setting to right. It is based on
the word and concept o f pono or
righteousness which is always con­
nected to right relationship and re­
quires one to keep working at rela­
tio n s h ip u n til it is rig h t.
H o’oponopono includes prayer and
a conversation among those whose
relationship has be' n broken. Con­
fession is made; restitution is of­
fered. Forgiveness follows.
W ithout all these steps, apologize,
I haven’t heard much support for
restitution. In the 1960’sa n d 7 0 ’sw e
called it reparations and Congress­
man John Conyers had even intro­
duced a bill calling for some kind o f
payment to African Americans, the
bill may still be languishing some­
where in the basement o f the Capitol,
but we haven’t heard it mentioned in
the discussions about apology.
Reparations re probably politically
problematic. But, if Congress is seri­
ous about apology, then restitution
might take the form o f college schol­
arships, job training programs and
prison intervention and alternative
programs. If Congress is really seri­
ous about apology, how about in­
creasing Head Start programs and
providing health care for all African
American children.
It’s a little difficult to take seriously
all the talk about apology from a na­
tion which is quickly retreating from
the closest thing we have had to resti­
tution - affirmative action - after only
thirty years. It is difficult to hear a
president talk about race and racism
only months after he signed a welfare
“reform” bill which he knew would
make 1 million poor children - many
o f them children o f color — poorer.
African Americans are not likely
to get those forty acres and a mule
promised at the end o f slavery. But
without their modern-day equivalent,
we can talk about apology, but I
don’t know if we can really have
reconciliation.