Newspapers / The Charlotte Post (Charlotte, … / Dec. 12, 1974, edition 1 / Page 2
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- cdiiofiflii d'conimcnn Too Many Crimes Committed -B^Ttlacks Apainst Blanks ..There is a high degree of crime against the person and property within the black community. ..These crimes committed by blacksmith the victims being also black. Since it is not a problem caused by someone or something outside the black community, the ~tratrse-mwi«-tMui;i*Hin .We believe that cause to bp fear, along with a lack of concern for fellow community members. A criminal cannot exist within a community whose members have decided to be without crime. A criminal exists within a community only if he is allowed to do so. ..When the average community member is afraid to check, or question another community mem ber, then criminal activ ity will have a high rate of occurrence. When the average community member is not concerned with the well-being of his neighbors, then his well-being is also in jeopardy. ..Criminals, therefore, exist in the black community because they are allowed to exist due to our fear of one another along with our lack of concern for one another. ..To end criminal activity within our neighborhoods, we must turn to working with one another. Each community member must be willing and committed to aiding felow community members. • We, a people who have suffered long, must not commit crimes against ourselves. We can end criminal activity in our neighbor hoods, we must turn to working with one another. Each community member must be willing and com mitted to aiding fellow community members. • We, a people~who~h5,ve~siiTfered long, must not commit crimes against ourselves. We can end criminal activity in our neighbor hoods by making our neighborhoods our homes. We realize that crimes against our communities are crimes against us, then we will be moving toward our goal of crime-free neigh borhoods. . .However1, for any given commun ity to move progressively, its young must be progressive. If our young do not aid us in ridding our neighbor hoods of crime, criminal activity will remain. The young black man and woman must feel responsible for their communities. ..Concern, responsibility and determination coupled with a sense of unity with black men and women, will end the high degree of crime occuring within our neighborhoods. ..We owe it to ourselves to do something about the problem, and we should do it immediatelv. Poor Will Pay The Highest Price ..The seriousness of the current recession and the coming energy crisis is not going to strike home to most of us until we feel a bitter frostbite in our homes. Most of us appear to have accepted the fact that the United States is short of an environmentally-clean fuels with an attitude of unclfhcern. . There is little argument over the cold facts that poor consumers will pay the highest price for these shortages. We need to understand that fuel crisis, whether fact or fiction, will entail more than just federal regulation of the everyday consumers’ use of fuel. ..The possibilities in increased cases of pneumonia or influenza looms far more dangerous to the poor than an oil a'nd gas shortage, driving around town on Sundays, lowering the thermostats to 68 and cutting down on electricity. . .Along with this threat comes that fact that many budg&ttintfetl have recently purchased cheap, poorly constructed heaters. Unfort unately, these people are the last to be protected by government regula tions. N. . The energyshortage has brought a serious^^rlfts to our midst, but we ought hot to forget those who will generally have to pay the highest price(for the short-sightness of our politicians and the large oil interest. uiack s Economic Gams Have Vanishec ..According to the latest official reports of the Urban Institute Blacks economic gains vanished during me ..Mi Administration. . .The Census Bureau reports that by 1973 median black family income was down to 58 percent of white after reaching 61 percent in 1969. Also, the earnings of white families from 1969 to 1973 outstripped price increases by 6.1 percent, but black families ' failed to keep pace with inflation. ..Black families below the~poverty line increased by 160,000 while 350,000 white families moved above the line. .. A 1971 study by the Urban Institute states that if black workers were paid as much as whites for the same worn, their incomes would rise by 27 percent. Further, if they advanced in equalproportions ta better paying jobs, blaclj income would increase an additional 45 percent. ..Why are so many black people poor? ..Poverty means hungry children; old people alone and in need; families turned sour and broken apart by the abrasion of constant want. .. We ought to think about it! Fear Has Become The Companion Of The Elderly In The Black Community Down To Businessx Unity For Economic Survival By Dr. Berkeley G. Burrell ..Black Muslim Minister Louis Farrakhan urged Black business men at the Annual NBL Convention to seriously consider ways to work cooperatively for the economic sur vival of Black America. ..Speaking at the Minority Enter prise Luncheon held during the Atlanta convention, October 23-26, ... Minister Farrakhan electrified the audience with his message on the convention theme, “The Power Of Unity.” If just this room alone could unite this afternoon,” Farrakhan told the group representing the bulk of the Black economic power in this coun try, “this room alone possesses the power to lift 30 million Black people in America up from the mud, up „ fron> poverty and want and naked ness and squalor. But these that are ■ here must learn the power of unity, L and then adopt those principles that will cause us to achieve it.” ..In what many consider to be the highlight of the four-day conference of seminars and workshops on busi ness, government and communica tions, Minister Farrakhan, the national representative of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad, excited the audience by both prais ing them and exhorting them to action. ..“Yes, you have individual know ledge and individual expertise. You have individual accomplishment, and you have a degree in this and in that. But until we learn the value of polling those resources intellect ually as well as financially, until we learn that unless all of u$ make it, iu> * one of us makes it....“And unless we learn that, this will only be another one of 74 conventions where you meet together and drink and so cialize and party and hang out and talk trash, and talk about how much money you got last year, how you did that one in, and wangled this money out of the government, begged for that, crawled for this, and stole that,” Farrakham preached as the audience roared its acknowledge ment. ..‘‘Pardon my frankness,” he chuckled, “but you should never have invited a Muslim, if you didn’t want to hear the truth.” ..Graciously commending NBL President Dr. Berkeley G. Burrell for selecting such a powerful theme as “The Power of Unity,” Minister Farrakhan constantly sought to emphasize its meaning. .. “Unless we give up the pettiness of the white American decadent philosophy of ‘rugged individualism’ that has brought America now to the brink of ruin, unless we can see the value of our cooperative working together for a common end, then we • might as well say this is nothing more than another party on the social calendar of Who’s Who in Black business in America,” he declared. .. Frequently reminding the audience that he was speaking on behalf of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad, Minister Farrakhan admonished them to think about the future survival of the Black masses. . .“White America is in trouble her self,” he explained. *-■- - TO BE EQUAL VERNON E. JORDAN JR. Behind Suburbia's Barricades . .This past summer the U. S. Commission on Civil Rights released a report titled "Equal Opportunity in Suburbia” that deserves a lot more attention than it’s received. ^"Fh^*^pert-4s-a-dammng__indictmentof the growing polarization that locks rnore^mtTlnore blacks into city ghettos while more and more whites flock to suburbs from which blacks and other minorities are largely excluded. • "The exodus, of affluent whites fropi the cities has continued unabated,” the report states, "along with the large-scale movement of jobs and wealth. The new suburbs have enjoyed an era of unparalleled prosperity, while the central cities have strained to answer growing demands for services for the urban poor and, ironically, suburban commuters.” . .The population shift is easily seen. From 1960 to 1970 the white population of large central cities declined by 1.9 million people, while their black population increased by 2.8 million. As the central cities became blacker, the suburbs absored greater numbers of white families. ..A population shift of this size doesn’t just happen. There are two basic reasons why blacks did not join the movement to the suburbs - past and present racial discrimination in housing, and the suburbs’ intentional lack of housing opportunities for lower income families. Even this last reason has racial connotations - propor tionately twice as many poor blacks as poor • whites live in central cities. This situation affects blacks negatively in many ways. First, there is the denial of equal opportunity to live where a family wants to live. .. It also means lost job opportunities. Most cities are experiencing a loss in jobs, especially blue-collar jobs most likely to be held by ' minorities. Not only are old factories moving out of the city into the suburbs, but new industries are also locating there. . .This, means, for most black workers, an impdssibly long and costly commute or the ' necessity to buy cars or join undependable car pools. Many business pull out of the city without any attempt to insure that the suburbs they move to will allow housing for their workers. ..Federal and state fair housing laws have proven ineffective. They are not enforced and beyond making a few cosmetic changes, most real estate brokers continue to foster a dual market for housing, shunting blacks into all black or “changing” neighborhoods. Many banks and mortgage lenders "red-line” such areas too, refusing mortgage money for houses there. ..Suburban governments erect barricades behind which few blacks are -allowed. Their zoning laws make it impossible to build on smaller lots or to build apartment housing. Often, the Commission found, existing black neighborhoods were demolished by roads and other government-sponsored projects. And most have refused to allow their 'communities to participate in public housing or rent supplement housing. . .The report documents too. the extent to which the federal government has encouraged this trend, starting with official backing for racially restricted neighborhoods and continuing to the present passive role in enforcing anti-discrimin ation laws and desegregating the suburbs' THE CHARLOTTE POST “THE PEOPLES NEWSPAPER” Established 1918 By A M. Houston Published Every Thursday By The Charlotte Post Publishing Co., Inc. 9139 Trinity Road - Charlotte. N.C. 28216 Telephones (704 ) 392-1306 - 392-1307 Circulation 11,000 Bill Johnson.....Editor - Publisher (,erald O. Johnson.Business Manager Robert L. Johnson.Circulation Manager Second Class Postage Paid at Charlotte, N.C. under the Act of March 3,1878 Member National Newspaper Publishers Association National Advertising Representative Amalgamated Publi^Jiers, Inc. 45 W. 5th, Suite 1403 2400 S. Michigan Ave ___New York, N.Y. 10036 Chicago. Ill 606ifi ' 4W-T270 " Calumet S 0300__ 9 ► * i i - I i # Administration Poor On Public Relations By GERALD JOHNSON ..As the country faces one of Its biggest challenges ever, and pro bably the worse crisis since the early 30’s the Ford administration is still trying to paint a picture of roses. Several months ago the administration claimed that the re-' / cession we would face would be mild. Now that the recession has been nothing less than traumatic, the administration is maintaining that a depression is out of the question. Nothing could be more false, for it is felt by many experts in the area that we are in the beginning stages of a depression. With no one actually defining the necessary conditions for a depression to exisF makes The ai guiutlU academic, -»—. . ♦ * .4» that the administration is playing hush-hush with the seriousness of this problem. I have no other ———— than m h*H»vft fhpt the situation is so clandestine because of the coining presidentail elections. The administration Is playing poli tics with the public’s welfare. • ..A gasoline rationing, or a high gasoline tax is a mandatory action needed now. The Ford administra tion should Uike this action and publicly back it up by explaining the critical situation this country is in. The gasoline companies should be forced to stop playing price games and the administration should make It publicly known when these price games are started. „ r __ m ..All oil based products should be allowed to rise in price, causing more efficient use. The administra tion, again, should be responsible fot mgjking the public aware of the situation .andjjse force to see to it I hearedStHngent gulde,ine8 ar« ad ..There is an obvious communica tion gap and the public is obviously not aware of the acuteness of this problem. Many people feel that the energy crisis is a political game and that no shortages exist. Still others can't understand the social and poli tical ramifications involved in such a complex situation. •Well, the energy crisis is for real, the problem is more complex thani most can imagine and an immediate In .,°f ,al1 th,S is an alteration in American lifestyles. To make the lumps easier to bear, I feel the public should be let In on the problem, its complexities, and pro posals for solving those problems. Also, hard core guidelines have to be set up to assure equal suffering for
The Charlotte Post (Charlotte, N.C.)
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Dec. 12, 1974, edition 1
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