Posted on 08/06/2003 4:14:05 PM PDT by OESY
Hollings Stories Laud Racial Record, Skip Segregationist Work
Washington Post and New York Times stories Tuesday, on the decision of South Carolina Senator Ernest Hollings to not seek re-election, lauded the Democrat for how, in contrast to what occurred in other Southern states, as Governor he had presided over “the peaceful” and “orderly desegregation” of South Carolina’s public schools.
But in offering such a positive review of Hollings’ record on race, the newspapers skated over his role as a dogged defender of segregation who only gave in when he realized the fight was hopeless, a favor not afforded to Southern Republicans with an unpleasant history on race. Recall how Trent Lott was portrayed as a racial retrograde, not as a relative moderate on race for not participating in the most virulent anti-black activity when he belonged to a segregated fraternity.
Neither the Post nor Times reminded readers how Hollings managed to vote, decades apart, against the two blacks ever nominated to the Supreme Court: Thurgood Marshall and Clarence Thomas. Nor did they remind readers how, as a symbol of anti-desegregation defiance, it was Hollings as Governor who had the Confederate flag raised over the South Carolina statehouse. As Deroy Murdock wrote in January on National Review Online: “Byrd's Senate colleague, Ernest Hollings (D, S.C.), meanwhile, told reporters on December 14, 1993 that he attended international summits alongside 'these potentates from down in Africa.’ He continued, 'rather than eating each other, they'd just come up and get a good square meal in Geneva.’ There also would be no debate today about flying the Confederate flag over South Carolina's statehouse had then-Governor Hollings not defiantly hoisted it above the state capitol in 1962.”
For Murdoch’s piece in full in the wake of Lott’s resignation: www.nationalreview.com
It will be my earnest aim that The New York Times give the news, all the news, in concise and attractive form, in language that is permissible in good society, and give it as early if not earlier, than it can be learned through any other reliable medium; to give the news impartially, without fear or favor, regardless of party, sect, or interest involved; to make of the columns of The New York Times a forum for the consideration of all questions of public importance, and to that end to invite intelligent discussion from all shades of opinion. -- Signed editorial, August 18, 1896 in The New York Times, by Adolph Ochs (1858-1935), one of the publishers who helped articulate and set the standards against which journalism continues to be measured
Hollings turns 94 today.
But his teeth are only 53.
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