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4-THE CABOUNA TIMES EAT., MARCH 31, 1979 7c2tcd ... Job Mj-. ) if v i ) MORGAN'S LAMENT North Carolina's "Democratic" Senator, Robert B. Morgan, is reported by the Associated Press as saying "Perhaps it is time for North Carolina to take a look and see just how well it can get along without the federal aid, if it is going to be administered in such a high handed manner." This statement is popular and is shared by many legislators and a majority of the Board of Governors. It is also reflective of the attitudes of conservatism and racism and raises "the old specter of resistance to integration." Morgan's concern that the HEW UNC controversy is tarnishing North Carolina's reputation is interesting; Jack Bass and Walter DeVries in their book, "The Transformation of Southern Politics"' as reported in the New York Times, February 22, called their chapter on North Caro lina "The Progressive Myth." Perhaps Morgan is right. Maybe we should take a hard look at the funding of our universities. It has been reported by the media that HEW estimated that it would require $121 million to correct the deficiencies at the five black schools. David Tatel, Director of the Office of Civil Rights, denies that HEW ever gave out such a figure. HEW gave UNC a list of proposed improve ments and UNC came up with the numbers, which reminds us of the old bromide, that figures don't lie, but liars figure. It should be noted that seventy per cent of the federal funding involved in this action goes to two campuses. Of the $89 million, $63 million goes to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and to North Carolina State University. Of the black schools, A&T State University receives about two million dollars and the others get less. If the black schools are deficient, even with federal funding, it is reasonable to assume their future would be in jeopardy without it. It is apparent to many that this is the game plan of the establishment. All of the pro grams that the black schools have that are designed to attract the non traditional students and new students are substantially federally funded. Approximately 100 million dollars has been spent on the development of the medical school at East Caro lina University and the proposed veterinary school at N.C. State. In both cases, the spending has just begun. East Carolina doesn't have a teaching hospital yet and no one knows what it will cost to operate the Vet School. The need for both of these schools was questioned. Studies done by the Southern Regional Education Board have indi cated that there is no need for the Vet School. Despite this, the powers that be have persisted. Here we have hundreds of millions of dollars for two programs in two white schools and only a fraction of this amount has been suggested for the five black schools. Plans are being made to spend millions for the high school for gifted students in science and math. In the midst of all the talk about tax reductions and tax rebates plus North Carolina's surplus comes the suggestion from Senator Morgan that North Carolina might be better off without Federal funds. When black voters hear sugges tions like this from Senator Morgan, we are again reminded of his first incursion into statewide politics, as a central figure in the calculatedly racist campaign of I. Beverly Lake for governor. Like the state of North Carolina, Senator Morgan is not as progressive as some think. THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW BROWN . . The first negro novelist h america he trained as a printer with abolitionist EDITOR ELIJAH R LOVE JOY a BECAfe AN AGENT OF THE WESTERN MASSAfflU STTKNTI-SL WERY SO CISTY THIS POOfyCLOTELowW PRESIDENTS daugh TOfVAS PUBLISHED IN LONDON IN 1853, IN THE OS. IN 1664, AND WAS WIDELY READ continental f catures m r "jet: WQt EQUAL Social Security Cuts Endanger System By Vernon Jorda EXECUTIVE DIIECTOI, NATIONAL UIIAN LEAGUE ' ... The Administration's budget makers, in search of ways to trim federal spending for the proclaimed "austerity budget, have planned significant cuts in Social Security benefits. These cuts endanger the integrity of the sys tem, undermine the public's confidence in it, and would deliver serious blows to the poorest among us. This ill-advised plan has already suffered a setback in the House Ways and Means Commi ttee, but the Administration has vowed to press foreward and it will very likely surface again, it ought to be buried and forgotten. 4 One of the ugliest things about the plan is that it wouldn't save much money at all. The cuts have been called "nickel and dime cuts' and that is an accurate description. They're not nickel and dime cuts though, for the peo ple who depend on their Social Security cover age. One, perhaps the meanest, would do away with the $255 lump sum death benefit. Poor people depend on that small payment to en sure a decent burial, perhaps the only thing many have to look forward to. How in the world does a government that manages a three-trillion dollar economy and spends over $500 billion itself, explain to a poor widow that it can no longer afford to give her a measly $255 to bury someone who has been paying into the Social Security system? Another proposed cut aimed at the poorest people is the elimination ot the minimum monthly benefit. Many workers were brought into the Social Security system only in the past several years. Most are in low-paying jobs, of ten beneath the poverty level. Since their earnings record and payments record would only qualify them for extremely low benefits only $ 1 22 per month. The official reason given for this curical plan is that some people retire from federal employ ment., work for a short time in private industry, and then collect both federal pensions and minimum Social Security pensions. If the government wants to get at this form of "double-dipping" is should do so directly, by targeting measures to end the abuses it wants to stop. But in the process of going for a handful of people who collect multiple pensions the Administration's plan would take away the rightful benefits of the poorest of the elderly. In reply, officials say it won't happen, that the needy could apply for supplemental social insurance payments. That is an indication of the confusion in the minds of policy-makers. The Social-Security system is an insurance system that pays retirment benefits as a matter of right. SSI is a means-tested welfare system. To force people off the minimum benefit which is theirs by right and onto the welfare roUs.with the consequent loss of dignity and respect, is a heartless act that cannot be condoned. Another major cut would axe the benefits now available for dependent children attending post -secondary schools. The rationale it that other education grants would be available. But those grants are means-tested and don't begin to cover all students who need them. Another planed cut would discontinue mother's benefits when the youngest child reaches 16, Instead of 18 as at present. This would save pennies but inflict serious hard ship on many. Another target is disability benefits. The purpose is supposed to be discouragement of abuses. But again, there are better, more effective ways to get at abuses than to punish all recipients, especially in the absence of job programs for disabled workers who cannot obtain private employment. These cuts would make only minimal sav ings. All together they'd slice only about $500 million of the 1980 budget. That's about one tenth of one per cent of all federal spending, and the costs attached to that small saving -suffering among the poorest Americans - would be enormous. The Social Security sytem is sustained by the faith placed in it. Now the govenment is proposing to tell over a hundred million peo ple that their insurance protection will be eliminated. Not only is this morally wrong, but it deals a deadly blow to the fundamental principle that Social Security benefits are guaranteed right contributors can count on. f F o f ml rffc. ... I Congressman Hawkins' Column It's Not That That Good -Either By Augustus F. Hawkins Anyone who talks to me for more than five minutes knows that I am an avid football fan. I love the excitement of the sport. I revel in its intelligence and in its toughness. I glory in its emphasis on winning the battle on the field, and appreciate its praising the courage of those that lose. There's an inherent fairness in the game in selecting players on the basis of who can win for the team, rather than on the color of some guy's skin. ' As a result, team camaraderie, between and -among players from differing racial, ethnic and religious backgrounds is exemplary. What a great social and working environment this is, for those that are allowed the joys of such luxurious participation. All these things are the highs of course, because back on earth and off the field, the air is a little grainier, and the game is a whole lot dirtier. But what it it in our system allows us to be the greatest democracy in one area, and calculatingly frustrates that democracy in another? I'm sure the black U.S. Air Force Sergeant, who lost both feet recently, asks himself the same question over and over again. Yet what happened to him, is all too much a part of the contradictions in this country, especially when one is dealing with racial matters. According to the sergeant, he was caught without any money in a small town in New Mexico during some bad snows. After being turned down by banks, gas stations and motels in an attempt to cash a check on a California bank, he finally gave up and returned to his cat ';and 'fell asleep i-i. 'y-r : t - Unfortunately temperatures dropped to eight degrees below zero that night, and when the sergeant awoke the next day, his feet were forzen. Thus the amputation of both feet! This is a pretty gruesome story - but it is no more gruesome, less true, or less tragic than what is happening on a daily basis in this society to blacks, who are no longer needed as idols on the football field, the basketball court or the track arena. Controversy still rages for example over employment "under representation" of blacks in our national government. A Federal agency, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which has jurisdiction over such matters, recently calculated a method for com puting "underrepresentation.,' and was hit with the charge that the new method -works to the advantage ofM)lacks, other minorities and women. How such a method can work to the "advantage" of those that are already disadvantaged, is a question even I can't answer. On another front there's the story of an inn in Delaware that has segregated entrances, bar, , and bathrooms. -It also has ,two jukebpxesrone ; plays ,SQuli and. the other, .playsiwiiniand , western! The inn says its black and white cus-' tomers like being segregated. I wonder if they've ever had any other choice? Lastly there's the court ordered school integration efforts in the city of Los Angeles, which the school board fought for ten years, and which has experienced its share of major and minor defections in political positioning, legal maneuverings and white flight. At some point in the scenario, I guess I should say: "Well even though its looks and sounds all bad - it really isn't." Well of course it isn't but we've got a long distance to go before I can add anymore than this to even this very tense reminder. r v CEW! A FUNBHQEOT BY LAURA PARKS It certainly must have been a painful moment for New York states junior senator to admit before the nation's poor that he found life difficult with only his senatorial pay of some . $57,000 a year to live on.' Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan of N.Y., the infamous author of "benign neglect" of the nations minorities and poor, plead ed before a collection of his senatorial peers for the right to earn an .additional $25,000 a years in lecture fees at colleges and other gatherings. The senator's devised a strategem whereby the Moynihan plot to legalize extra outside income was whisked thru the Senate floor within a matter of minutes and without bate. It is certain Moynihan s New York lecture bureau, was once again busy arranging a lec ture tour for this redoubt able neo-conservative. He will certainly demand that U.S. support Isreal with guns and oil, push for even greater military spend ing and continue to ignore the benignly neglected of this nation urban hinder land. The good senators of Washington are probably still wonderling why the nation has lost faith in them and the political process. President Carter acting on the strong advise of his de- that United Nation's Admbassa dor, Andrew Young, decided that the VS. would not send observers to Rho desia for the March 20th elections. The Ambassador advised the President that U.S. observers would have placed the samp of legiti macy on the present white dominated Rhodesian estab lishment. Perhaps the Presdient was hedging his bets and sending signals to the world that in long run there cannot be any peace in Rhodesia without the Pa triotic Front of Nkomo and Mugabee and that he realized this. King Hassan of Morocco, a royal and bosom friend of the Shah of Iran, was recently anger ed by the bold military raids staged by the forces of the Polisario Front of the Western Sahara. The King was unable to do much about the skilled tactics of the Plisario forces, but he compensated for this by withdrawing diplomatic recognition from Ethiopia for their strong diplomatic support of the Polisario. At the same time he also decided to recall his Ambassador to Iraq, for the same reason. The King was recently tormented by the fact that politics and economics forced him to recognize the new Iranian go vernment while at the same time he was giving shelter and politial refuge to the ousted Shah. The South African government rejected the U.N's proposals for conducting the elelctions in Namibia. The South African objections were seen at the UN as another in a long line of stalling measures designed to prevnt Nambia from achieving independence and freedom form the illegal occupation by South Africa. The mood of the U.N. diplomatic community was expressed by the Secretary-Cenral Kurt Waldheim when he angrily rejected the South African arguments. Last' week at the United Nations some of the younger diplomats weresmilingly telling one. another that were smilingly telling one another that they thought that perhaps in a fair fight Vietnam could beat the Russians, the Ameri cans and Chinese all at once, while still managing to re main in Cambodia and organize the dispatching of additional refugees to the United States. These muted remarks, jokingly made over coffee, reflected a sense that some how a potentially grave in ternational confrontation has been averted. It also reflected a growing feeling that the Chinese leadership did not accomplish its military-political objectives which was to force Vietnam to pull out its troops from Cambodia and to master mind a confrontation between the U.S. and the Soviet Russians, which probably would have arisen had the Russians actively intervened militarily. For what ever reason the U.N. Russian were, from the earliest hours of the Chinese Vietnam fighting, confident that Vietnam military and politi cal strength was such that they would effectively deal with the Chinese aloqru By last week there was growing feeling here that contrary to expectations the Chinsese demonstrated their weaknesses and many fr away nation in Africa and elsewhere quietly reassesing the strategic implications of the Vietnam events. fPirltflilBI (USPS 091.380) L.E.AUSTIN Edttor-Publteher, 19J7 1971 PubJlhd every Thursday (datwl Saturday) at Durham, N.C. by United Publlihan, Incorporated Mailing Address: P.O. Box 3826, Durham, N.C ' 27702. Otfiea located at 923 Fayattavilla Street Durham, N. C. 27701. Second Class Postage paid at Durham, North Carolina 27702. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to THE CAROLINA TIMES. P.O. Box 3826, Durhem, N.C. 27702. -SUBSCRIPTION RATES: One year. $8.60 (plus $0.34 sales tax for North Carolina residents). Single , copy . $0.20. Postal regulations REQUIRE advanced payment on subscriptions. Address all communica tions and make all checks and money orders payable to: THE CAROLINA TIMES. . , NATIONAL ADVERTISING REPRESENTATIVE Amalgamated Publishers, Inc., 46 West 45th Street; New York, New York 10038. Member: United Press International Photo Service, National Newspaper Publishers Association, North , Carolina Black Publishers Association. Opinions expressed by columnists In this news paper do not necessarily represent the policy ot this newspaper, This newspaper WILL NOT be responsible for the return of unsolicited pictures.
The Carolina Times (Durham, N.C.)
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March 31, 1979, edition 1
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