How far will DA Nifong set back race relations?
[Excerpt from Gaynor column quoting Taylor, October 23, 2006]
One would expect the Durham Committee on the Affairs of Black People to object to a rogue prosecutor and to resent Black voter manipulation by racial pandering. Yet the Committee, which had supported a Black candidate (Keith Bishop) in the Democrat primary, just endorsed Mr. Nifong in the general election.
The Committee's spokesperson, Lavonia Allison, insisted that quality-of-life issues explained its endorsement of Mr. Nifong. Ms, Allison added that the Committee urged voters to vote strictly Democratic, in the hope of having officials concerned with "the least among us as well as the most."
Stuart Taylor, Jr., America's top legal commentator and a lawyer who recognized the Duke case for what it was at the start, did not mince words about the damage the Committee did by endorsing Mr. Nifong:
"I believe that this endorsement and other support for Nifong by African-American leaders will come back to haunt African-American individuals, who are by far the most disproportionately numerous victims of prosecutorial and police misconduct in North Carolina and around the country.
"Nifong's grotesque abuses in a case involving well-off white kids who have already been proved innocent beyond any reasonable doubt could have had a powerful educational effect on well-off people like their parents, relatives, friends, and sympathizers.
"It could have taught such well-off people to guard against the abuse of police and prosecutorial power more generally, which goes on every day in hundreds if not thousands of cases that draw zero publicity. I have hoped to reinforce this education in a modest way in my book.
"Black leaders could have reinforced this education in a far more powerful way by standing on principle with other critics of Nifong — as they (and I) would no doubt be doing were Nifong persecuting black football players in this manner.
"Instead, the vast majority of black leaders — all those who have supported Nifong and many of those who have simply ignored or minimized his abuses — are teaching the rest of us that they don't give a damn about opposing injustice when the victims are white kids.
"As we see unfolding before our eyes the use against innocent white kids of the same police and prosecutorial powers that are more often used to ruin the lives of innocent black kids, black leaders are at best indifferent. Many are applauding.
"Some well-off whites will, I hope, continue to deplore such abuse of law enforcement power regardless of who the victims may be. I certainly will.
"But many will conclude that black leaders and those who support them are immoral and unjust people undeserving of sympathy when they or their children are persecuted by the Nifongs, Gottliebs, Himans and Claytons of this world. This is not only setting back race relations. It is setting back any hope of getting the prosecutorial-misconduct boot off the necks of innocent black kids."
http://www.renewamerica.us/columns/gaynor/061023
* The Committee is doing all the manipulating.
Power trumps race issues in these situations, always has always will.
Interesting Read.....
http://www.duke.edu/web/dulug/list/840.html
Re: DULUG: GNOME! (fwd)
On Tue, 23 Mar 1999, Robert G. Brown wrote:
(snip)
Lastly, we come to Durham. Durham is the only _real_ city in
this whole area. Durham has some suburban areas, often annexed
thanks to the state's rather loose annexation laws that don't require
consent of the annexed, and a real inner city. Durham has always
been an industrial city, and looked down on by the other cities
for that reason. Durham is also where much of "the working class"
of Cary and Chapel Hill live. (UNC Housekeepers, Cary firefighters,
etc.) Why? Because it's the only city where there's cheap housing
available. (Cary only builds expensive housing-- Chapel Hill builds
expensive when it must, but generally prefers not to build at all)
Why is cheap housing available in Durham? Politics. Durham
has a much easier process to build, but the political dynamic
also plays into it. Durham, unlike the other cities, has politics
controlled by 4 PACs (Poltical Action Committees) It's often
possible to predict elections by counting the sponsorships of:
the People's Alliance, a left-liberal group with Chapel Hillian ideas.
Many of them live in the Watts Hospital neighborhood, where the homes are
surprisingly expensive for their size. They're generally well-to-do,
but that doesn't stop them from getting state money to keep their
neighborhood in shape. Their candidates tend to win, but they tend
to get betrayed on lots of issues, thanks to THE COMMITTEE (more on
that later)
the Durham Voter's Alliance, a moderate liberal group. Tends to
represent the swing opinion of the city, and their candidates tend
to win.
the Friends of Durham, a moderately conservative business-oriented
group. The losers in most elections. Often a candidate supported
by the Friends of Durham will face a candidate supported by the other
3, and lose big.
finally, the most powerful is the Durham Committee of the Affairs
of Black People. The Committee is the only mostly black PAC, and
in a city with the black population of Durham (defnitely higher
than other cities in the state), that means a lot. The Committee
does a great job getting the black voters of the city to vote
for their candidates. Their leadership consists of the black
leadership and business leaders of the town. (Like people on
the board of NC Mutual Life, the largest black-owned insurance
company in that nation) Since they're both large and effective
at turning out the vote, they're very strong. Generally liberal
in outlook, the Committee nearly always approves of development
as long as the Committee gets it's share of the pie. This may
take the form of deals with prominent Committee members (Ken
Spaulding, Lavonia Allison, NC Mutual Life, etc.) for financial
gain, promises to high black workers, renovations to black
communities, etc. This frustrates the People's Alliance especially,
because while nominally slow-growth, the Committee ends up favoring
most growth because most businesses, like Duke, know how to deal
with the Committee. Observe the Southpoint Mall, where People's
Alliance candidates, most also supported by the Committee,
voted for it, while most of those who voted against were not
supported by the People's Alliance, like Republican mayor
Nick Tennyson, who incidentally is a real estate developer.