4A
EDITORIALS/ The Charlotte Post
October 17, 1996
Cljarlotte ^osit
Published weekly by the Charlotte .Post Publishing Co.
1531 Camden Road Charlotte, N. C. 28203
Gerald O. Johnson
CEO/PUBLISHER
Robert Johnson
CO-PUBLISHER/
GENERAL MANAGER
Herbert L. White
EDITOR IN CHIEF
We’re in need of an awakening
An historic
opportunity in
U.S. Senate race
By Ralph Levering
SPECIAL TO THE POST
People living through important events often do not recognize their
potential significance. Given the modest level of
public interest in the Senate race between Harvey
Gantt and Jesse Helms, that adage seems to be
valid in North Carolina this fall. Yet the potential
significance seems clear: if Gantt wins, the Tar
Heel state will have its first African American high-
level elected official (president, U.S. senator or gov
ernor) in its more than 200-year history as a state.
In the 19th century one southern state,
Mississippi, sent two black senators to Washington.
But in the 20th centuiy — a time of great progress
for blacks (and for southerners generally) that has
witnessed a civil rights revolution and the emer-
Helms
Gantt
By Michael Sharp
NATIONAL NEWSPAPER
PUBUSHERS ASSOCIATION
In my time on this planet, Tve
found that if there is one axiom
that has proven to be true time
and time again, it is that the
hardest thing for a person to do
is change.
As I look back at African
American history, I am filled
with an immense sense of pride
at what we have accomplished
and, at the same time, I am
filled with remorse that more of
our people aren’t fighting the
good fight.
While there are more law-
abiding African Americans
pulHng their weight in our soci
ety, there are still far too many
brothers and sisters who aren’t.
The majority of these people,
our people, are in this predica
ment either because of igno
rance or apathy or both. This
creates a breeding ground of
hopelessness and despair that
eventually feeds upon itself,
leaving little room for escape.
It’s similar to a nightmare in
which you are trapped in a
room full of white folk and
forced to watch our people on
the Ricki Lake show. Even
though the Afncan Americans
on the screen are hardly repre
sentative of the larger popula
tion, you feel uneasy. In our
poorer communities, this
nightmare is all too real but
the solution to this problem is
the same solution for a bad
nightmare — an awakening.
As time passes, what is
becoming brutally clear is that
it is in the best interest of
African Americans and other
Americans to be awakened.
Ignorance must be eliminated
in our communities, and only
we can eliminate it. Ignorance,
of course, can never be fully
eradicated, but surely we can
do a whole lot better than
we’ve been doing! We, as a peo
ple have to disavow ignorance,
not embrace it.
I have witnessed first-hand
how ignorance sneaks up on
African Americans, befriends
us, lulls us into a false sense of
security, then rips our whole
world apart. Ignorance knows
no financial boundaries,
although the poorer you are, the
higher the probability that
knowledge will be restricted In
America, information is a com
modity. Those without access
have to work harder just to get
information. However, an edu
cation is no guarantee against
ignorance. There are more than
a few of us out there with
degrees and no practical knowl
edge of what we’re talking
about. These people can be more
dangerous than illiterate, crack
smoking, gun-toting gangsters.
By being educated far beyond
their competence, some people
conspire to keep iis in disunity.
Whether they have good inten
tions or bad doesn’t make much
of a difference because the
results are still the same.
The time is now to change —
not just change for the sake of
change but for a positive, life
enhancing, race-fortifyjng
change. Instead of standing idly
by as our lying and conniving
segment — you know and they
know who they are — continue
to exploit the system, do some
thing about it. I’m not saying
get a gun and take on the near
est gang. Be smart. Lead by
example. Give yoimger brothers
and sisters someone to respect
and admire. You may not get
the recognition you want or
even rightluUy deserve, but if it
was easy everybody would be
doing it.
If you have children, educate
them on how great America
really is and how much better it
can become. Show them how to
take responsibility and not gov
ernment handouts. Teach them
that everything has its price,
that “ain’t nuthin’” free.
Do something. The world is
always changing. It’s constantly
presenting us with new chal
lenges and different situations.
Either we wake up, unite and
promote our brightest and our
best, or we let ignorance contin
ue to wreak havoc on a great
people.
MICHAEL SHARP is a mem
ber of Project 21, an African
American leadership group.
gence of a large, educated, black middle class — not a single African
American has been elected senator in any southern state.
As a Tar Heel-bom U.S. histoiy professor, I take a particular inter
est — and pride — in the state’s history. I teach
students that North Carolina has been a national
leader in tlu.s lenturv ni such areas as economic
development, medical research, and higher educa
tion, and that the civil rights movement occurred
here much more constmetively—and peacefully —
than in most other southern states.
Drawing upon Alexis de Tocqueville and many
other writers, I teach my students that the most
tenaciously held American ideal is the belief in
equality. Together with widespread prosperity, this
vision of equality under law has drawn large num
bers of immigrants from all over the world to our
country. Do we North Carolinians really want future history books to
point iPuLthat), despite our deepening commitment to equality and
despite increasingly diyerse populations that averaged roughly one-
quarter African American, no southern state in the 20th century
elected an African American senator?
Like many Americans, I distrust many politicians, especially “no
government” Republicans and “government-is-the-answer”
Democrats. Yet I admire the far-sighted public servants of both par
ties who willingly accept financial sacrifices and unfair criticisms. I
considered voting for Ross Perot in 1992, and still hope that a viable
third party develops. Having voted for both Democrats and
Republicans in the past, I see myself as a “moderate.” (I use quotation
marks around political labels because they often obscure more than
they reveal; both Gantt and Helms, for example, strongly believe in
the capitalist system and in obtaining government benefits for con
stituents.)
In observing the Senate race this year, I am pleased that both
Gantt and Helms have moved toward the political middle, at least
rhetorically. But despite the many services that Helms has per
formed for North Carolina over the years, I caimot vote for him for
one main reason: unlike former Alabama Gov. George Wallace, who
also gained a national reputation in the 1960s as a white racist.
Helms has never repudiated — nor asked forgiveness for — the bla
tant racism that propelled him into high office.
Put simply, Helms's formerly explicit, now largely implicit racism,
contradicts my deepest beliefs as a Christian and as an American. It
goes against the way I try to live, and what I try to teach. I thus could
never vote for Jesse Helms nor, for that matter, for someone like
Louis Farrakhan.
Partly because our other senator, Lauch Faircloth, is a staunch
“conservative,” I can vote comfortably this fall for Gantt, a thoughtful
and experienced “moderate to-liberal” architect/pubUc servant whose
life epitomizes the American Dream of success through education,
shrewdness and hard work. Unlike a generation ago, I believe that
fulfilling this dream — including the dream of being a U.S. senator —
is now possible for people of all racial and ethnic backgrounds.
If the state’s majority-white electorate chooses Gantt, my belief in
the South’s growing practice of equality — and in North Carolina’s
continuing leadership of the region — will be vindicated. More impor
tant, if he takes the oath of office in January as the first black to join
the roughly 50 white North Carolinians who have served in the U.S.
Senate, both Gantt and his fellow Tar Heels can be proud of the histo
ry they have made.
RALPH LEVERING is Professor of History at Davidson College
(i4NirT’5 AD?
Kissing episode N.C.’s hot topic
DG
Martin
North Carolina’s biggest news
story of the season is not the
November election.
But the big story does cover
most of the political hot button
topics.
Schools. Discipline and the
lack of it. Politics. Litigation.
Local govenunent. Political cor
rectness. Family values and
raising children.
Exploitation.
You know what I am talking
about, don’t you? You know the
best known North Carolinian
today. It is not Jim Hunt and it
is not Jesse Helms, is it? It is 6-
year-old Johnathan Prevette,
the little boy whose kiss of a
first grade classmate made
front-page news across the
country.
Why are we so fixed on this
small classroom crisis? Why is
the whole country and much of
the world focused on our state?
Hasn’t this matter — and its
aftermath — gotten too far out
ofhand?
Or is there something useful
to be learned? Maybe. I think
the story reminds us of some of
the toughest questions we face
in reruing our children and run
ning our schools.
Here are a couple of those
questions.
First, how do we react when
one of our children gets in trou
ble at school? Of course, we
want our children to get a fair
shake from those who have
authority over them. And it is
tempting to rush to defend them
every time they get into trouble.
There are times when a school
authority’s mistake is so grave
or so damaging to the child that
confrontation is necessary. But
those times are probably rare.
Ordinarily, we serve our chil
dren better if we help them
understand that discipline is
never perfect — never absolute
ly fair. Even though it is imper
fect, discipline is necessary. And
it is usually good for us.
Most of us agree that there is
too little rather than too much
discipline in our classrooms. I
have a feeling that some of
those who criticize our schools
most severely for a lack of disci
pline go after school authorities
the hardest when one of their
own children is punished for a
school infraction.
The punishment for
Johnathan’s kiss may have been
too severe or even unnecessary.
But wouldn’t Johnathan have
been better off if his parents had
swallowed hard, given
Johnathan a hug and kiss at
home, told him to mind his
teacher, and sent him back to
school ready to move on to the
next class project? Better off
that way, I think, than being
pushed on to the front page of
every newspaper in the countiy.
All this leads to the second
hard question that sometimes
confronts parents.
When is it a good idea to pro
pel a child into the public spot
light?
When Johnathan gets in a lit
tle trouble next time — and
surely he will if he is like any
other normal child, wiU he have
a chance for normal supportive
discipline? Or wiU everybody in
authority be watching out for
litigation and bad publicity and'
just let Johnathan take care of
his own growing up?
I don’t think the answers will^
be happy ones. ‘
Ask Johnathan 25 years finm
now. I bet his answer will be'
something like this:
“I have had to cany the rap of
being the ‘classroom kissef all'
of my life. Maybe sometimes it
helped me get attention. But',
most of the time it has been a'
noose around my neck. It is all
anyone wants to talk about.
Nothing could happen in my.
family without the press report-,
ing it. That is quite a strain on a
family. And later on, when I got
in trouble at school, everybody
would always remember. Once,
when I got into trouble with the
police, it made the headlines aU
over the country. ‘
If I hadn’t been the ‘kisser,”
nobody would have noticed
much. I could have moved along
better than I did without all
that publicity. No, I wish it had
never happened.”
D.G. MARTIN is vice presi
dent of public affairs for the
University of North Carolina
system.
A vote for Clinton a matter of survival for African Americans
NATIONAL NEWSPAPER
PUBLSIHERS ASSOCIATION
Ralph Bunche once said: “We
must fight as a race for every
thing that makes for a better
country and a better world. We
are dreaming idiots and trust
ing fools to do anything less.”
Lest we want to fall into that
fateful category of “trusting
fools” Bunche spoke about, we,
as African Americans, must
show up at the polls on Nov. 5
in massive numbers.
There are clear and com
pelling reasons to once again
ca.st our vote for Bill Clinton.
Returning him to the White
House is absolutely essential to
a future of opportunity for
Afiican Americans.
The 1996 election, for Afncan
Americans, is about more than
mere civic duty. This election is
about black survival. It also rep
resents an historic opportimity
to build on a rather lengthy list
of policy and program develop
ments that have made a posi
tive difference in our fives in the
past four years. These policy
and program developments
have come from the Clinton
White House, and judging by
President Clinton’s first term
and looking at the alternative,
he is, by far, our best choice to
establish a beachhead of hope
for preparing to meet the chal
lenges of the 21st century.
History also makes a solid case
for African Americans to sup
port President Clinton. There
has not been a two-term
Democratic President since
Franklin Delano Roosevelt and
the New Deal.
For all the accomplishments of
the past 30-plus years of
Presidents Kennedy, Johnson
and Carter, the fact is they have
had but one term to enact their
legislative agendas, and the
gains — while very real and
meaningful — have been
stymied at the hands of
Republican successors. As a
result, many of the issues clos
est to the hearts of African
Americans have not been fully
woven into the national policy
fabric. In 1996, we know that
much work remains, but we can
only keep the momentum going
by voting a second term for Bill
Clinton. It is the only way that
gains of past administrations,
as well as the Clinton
Administration, can be solidi
fied.
The fact that whoever is presi
dent during the next four years •
will have the opportunity to
appoint at least two new mem
bers to a Supreme Court that
has made 5-4 decisions against
affirmative action and redis
tricting is as urgent a reason as
African Americans need to
defeat ultra-conservative former
Sen. Bob Dole.
The worst thing that could
happen on Nov. 5 is for Afncan
Americans to wrongly decide to
sit this election out, either out of
a false sense of security created
by media predictions of a land
slide for Clinton or finm falling
prey to those old enemies of
indifference and apathy.
Our vote is critically impor
tant in our future and that of
our family and community..
Let’s make our last presidential
vote of the 20th century an his
toric vote that rings loudly
throughout the land, conveying
a clear message to politicians'
everywhere that African'
Americans are active partici
pants in America’s political
process and our voices will be
heard. I
The National Newspaper.
Publishers Association repre
sents 200 black newspapers. ,