Posted on 05/17/2004 7:34:54 PM PDT by writer33
In the newspaper look of the day, the front page of The Spokesman-Review on May 17, 1954, contained 15 to 20 stories -- most under one-column headlines -- and a couple of black and white photographs.
Near the center of the page, a wire item filed by the Associated Press from Louisville, Ky., related an outrage that reminds us today of the temper of those times.
An electrical contractor named Andrew E. Wade IV wanted to buy a house that his wife had fallen in love with. There was a problem, though. The Wades were black and the house was in a white neighborhood.
When a white friend purchased the house and transferred the deed to Wade, the builder was furious. But the couple and their 2-year-old daughter moved in without trouble.
For a day.
On the second afternoon, they came home to find a large front window had been smashed by rocks. In the evening, as Wade watched, five men erected and burned a cross on an adjoining lot. That night, while a friend was dozing on the couch, at least six gunshots struck the house, one of them narrowly missing the guest.
The almost matter-of-fact news story made no mention of whether anyone had been arrested or, indeed, if authorities were even investigating the incident.
The next day's front page moved on to a more prominent and more positive story that had been breaking while Spokane read about the Wades. This second story, from Washington, D.C., would be news for days -- decades, actually. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled unanimously that school desegregation was unconstitutional. Separate accommodations for children of different races were inherently unequal, according to the decision in Brown vs. Board of Education.
School segregation was not about to die with a pen stroke. Resistance to the ruling and obstruction of its implementation was so fierce that in some cases whole school systems were shut down rather than open the doors to allow black and white children to learn together.
For the record, The Spokesman-Review editorial page commended the decision as the only finding the court could have reached, but cautioned both the federal government and civil rights leaders against unrealistic demands for immediate change.
“This is a time when responsible leaders of the south, both white and Negro, must be on guard against the agitators who would like to wipe out the progress of the last 90 years,” the editorial declared.
In the 50 years that ensued we have learned a lot that might have stunned observers in 1954. The turmoil of the '60s, of Watts and Detroit, of Selma and Birmingham, of Mississippi burning, of the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., of Rodney King and Simi Valley -- all those episodes underscore how much was left undone by that seismic Supreme Court ruling in 1954. Certainly the Inland Northwest, about as remote from the segregationist South as you can get, has had its own taste of bigotry.
As the ethnic diversity of society accelerates, here and nationally, conscientious citizens recognize there's much more to be done. Energetically promoting greater civil rights and diversity won't erase past progress. Failure to do so, however, will only delay the day we can say we've arrived.
Would somebody please tell me what day that is so I can mark it on my calendar? Any black leaders out there that have a firm date in mind to when we've arrived. I think things are pretty equal now. I could use some FReeper help on this confusing subject.
Could you help me understand this commentary?
I'm confused.
Seems to me that they're just trying to say America hasn't achieved much when in fact, it's the other way around. Liberals depress me.
Well. Do you know a date we can put down on the calendar when we can finally say we made enough strides and we've arrived at equality? I thought we were pretty close now, but now I'm completely confused again. Darn it. :)
Something about this sentence is contradictory.
Forced diversity is a bane on our society. It forces people to look at our differences instead of what we have in common. Hence, relations between races, ethinicities, etc. can only get worse. As they have.
I know. I was being sarcastic. With liberals, there always has to be a misery. Don't YOU feel cheated? :)
I'll get back to you as soon as I let liberals know this isn't the 1950s anymore.
Good. I didn't think I was alone on this one. Whew. That was a close one. For a minute, I thought I might be a racist. :)
It's all about quotas aka "affirmative action," which has long since lost its meaning of trying to expand the pool, and has become a synonym for quotas. Middle class blacks in large numbers (certainly not all of course) still think, but won't say, that quotas are a big part of where they are today. And about half of blacks today ARE middle class, or close to it, and only a quarter are really "poor." (The black underclass really is shrinking in percentage terms, and that is good.) The rest is just noise.
>>>>>> Do you know a date we can put down on the calendar when we can finally say we made enough strides and we've arrived at equality?<<<<
When that date comes Affirmative action will cease, I dont expect to live to see it.
Whats next? Scholarships and set asides for homicide bombers.
"When that date comes Affirmative action will cease, I dont expect to live to see it."
Nor do I.
"Whats next? Scholarships and set asides for homicide bombers."
Is that a racial slur? Are you directing those comments toward Arab Americans. Because if you are, that's very diversity challenged. I hope your happy. :)
Denote heavy sarcasm.
Arab Americans have very high incomes in the US, not as high as the Greeks, or the Indians from India (who have the highest, higher than Jews as a median statistic), but very high. Discrimination simply doesn't slow these folks down.
Of course you know we have to understand WHY these people homicide bomb. We just have to get to the bottom of this. And if that means offering them educational benefits to get them off the streets, that's what it means.
I know you're obviously used to putting people into classes, but since you're an obvious conservative racist, you probably wouldn't understand this. :) HA!
Most here think I have certain leftist tendencies, and I do have a few actually, along with some hard right ones. So mark me down as a moderate "racist." Actually, I was raised to think that the Catholic Church was the great Satan. Somewhere along the line I lost that one, although I still loathe pre Vatican II types like Pat Buchanan, albeit not primarily because he is pre Vatican II. I hope that helps.
Just giving you a hard time.
No sh-t. LOL. I can take it. Some poor chap went after me the other day, and got himself banned, through no hand of my own, and I regret his banning, and wish it had not happened. I must admit however, as well, for the record, that a couple of my bon mots to the poor guy got deleted as well.
"Some poor chap went after me the other day, and got himself banned, through no hand of my own, and I regret his banning, and wish it had not happened. I must admit however, as well, for the record, that a couple of my bon mots to the poor guy got deleted as well."
Most of the mods here know I'm full of excrement. So, they don't even bother banning me. :) Usually, most of the people know I'm just kidding and don't hit the report abuse button.
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