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Rage A4-The Chronicle, Thursday, December 26, 1985 Winston-Salem Chronicle Founded 1974 ERNEST H. Pin, Publisher NDUBISI EOEMONYE Co-Founder ALLEN JOHNSON Executive Editor ELAINE L. Pin Office Manager MICHAEL Pin Circulation Manager OUR OPINION This, that and the other Holiday thoughts as alleged snow flurries wreak havoc and skies that were supposed to clear by the afternoon remain threateningly gray: - Kudos to the Board of Aldermen for designating Jan. 20 as a city holiday honoring Martin Luther King Jr. Now it’s up to us to make the day something more than another vacation from work - or an excuse for merchants to hold another sale - by preserving King’s memory and passing on his legacy to our young, too many of whom already don’t seem to know who “The Dreamer” was, much less what he stood for. Dead serious We DON’T fool around when we select our Man and Woman of the Year. We’re very serious about these awards, and we make every effort to ensure that they mean something — not only to the recipients, but to the community at large. That’s why we ask your help in selecting the persons to receive the honor, as well as input from our newsroom and our advisory board, which, in fact, endures the annual agony of narrowing the candidates and conducting addi tional research on nominees, should it be required. Fortunately for our community, the competition is keen because so many invariably do so much each year; thus, the always-tough selection process is a labor we’re more than willing to undertake. We also don’t subscribe to the notion that whoever is honored necessarily has to be a community celebrity. There are scores of unsung heroes and heroines among us who quietly do what needs to be done, sans headlines and accolades. You may be one of them, or you may know one of them. If so, please take the time to fill out the nomination form on Page A5 in this issue of the Chronicle. Remember, the nominees will be judged on their con tributions to Winston-Salem’s black community during the calendar year 1985, and they will be announced in our special Jan. 30 “Year in Review” edition. Last year’s recipients were Dr. Elwanda Ingram, a pro fessor at Winston-Salem State University and a communi ty activist, and NAACP President Patrick Hairston, who will resign officially in January to devote his energies full time to being an alderman. Thanks for your help, and happy holidays. A tale of regrettably similar nations - District Attorney Donald K. Tisdale, who is about as popular in the black community these days as Yasir Arafat is in Tel Aviv, is a member of a United Negro College Fund Telethon committee. Meanwhile, Republican con gressional candidate Stu Epperson sure seems to be spon soring and appearing at a lot of programs lately that focus on the black community. Not only does it look a lot like Christmas, it looks a lot like campaign time, too. This article is the second in a two- part series. FROM THE GRASSROOTS By DR. MANNING MARABLE - The city’s Fair Housing Hearing Board is obviously more than a panel of figureheads who pay only lip service to fighting housing discrimination. Their recent ruling that Grubbs Real Estate and In surance Co. discriminated against a black apartment seeker and their accompanying request that the city file a lawsuit against Grubbs clearly show that the board’s five members mean business. Now the ball is in the aldermen’s court, since they must decide now whether to file the suit. We’ll see then if the aldermen mean business. - “Rocky IV” is one of the worst, most contrived movies we have seen in years. It will also make a bundle of cash for Sylvester Stallone, who does not need the money. Life is not fair. - Winston-Salem State football Coach Bill Hayes was again recently a finalist for a job somewhere else. You may recall that Hayes flirted with the job at Delaware State before deciding to remain here and win another CIAA Southern Division championship. We were torn, as always, with Hayes’ candidacy for both the head coaching jobs at Florida A&M and North Carolina State. On the one hand, if anyone deserves a shot at a higher- level job with more resources and a better salary - it’s Hayes. On the other, we’d sure hate to see him go; the man singlehandedly revived a dormant football program at WSSU. He’d be missed very sorely. HAMILTON, N.Y. - More parallels between black South Africans’ struggle against apar theid and black Americans’ struggle for civil rights: Black labor leaders in South Africa and the United States recognize that one of the greatest barriers to fundamental social reforms is the failure of white wofkihg people to support the principle of racial'equidity. Thembi Mkalipi, a black leader in Port Elizabeth, observes that “apartheid has been promoted by the employers and the govern ment to divide the white workers from the black workers.” White workers “identify themselves with the apartheid system,” he says, “and they are prepared to defend the system at all costs.” The Coalition of Black Trade Unionists, formed in the United States in 1972, has repeatedly made the same observation con,- cerning race relations here. Black labor leader Charles Hayes, cur rently a U.S congressman, and other black trade unionists have noted: “As black trade unionists, it is our challenge to make the labor movement more relevant to the needs and aspirations of black and poor workers.” The goals of full employment, health safety standards in pro duction, equal pay and educa tional opportunities which blacks demanded were also in the objec tive interests of white workers, he said. In both nations, white critics of racial inequality have emerged from the business community. The “willingness” of the cor porate sector to promote racial change can only be understood against the recent pressures ex erted by the “Free South Africa Movement” in the United States and anti-apartheid world opinion generally. More than one dozen U.S'. firms have pulled out of South Africa during 1985. Total U.S. investment has declined more than $500 million. South Africa’s rand has dropped to one-third of its value from 1983. Since April, 26 U.S. colleges have divested from firms doing business in South Africa, and on Oct. 7 Columbia University of New York voted to sell $39 million in apartheid-related stocks. Recently, the largest law firm in Washington, D.C., Cov- Tilting the courts to the radical right NEW YORK - President Reagan has appointed almost 30 percent of all current federal judges; by the end of his second term it is very likely that he will have appointed a majority. Unlike previous administra tions, however, this one is ap pointing judges who meet rigid tests for ideology. The president has stated he will appoint only judges who follow principles of judicial restraint. That’s a code word that really means agreement with radical positions on con troversial social issues. Whatever one’s position on such issues, it is important that the federal judges whose deci sions affect our freedoms not be bound by narrowly conceived ideological litmus tests. In addition, the administra tion’s selecting process has resulted in restricting federal judgeships to affluent, ultra conservative white males. Jimmy Carter selected blacks from 14 percent of the vacancies he filled, but less than 1 percent of Presi dent Reagan’s judges are black. TO BE EGUAL by JOHN JACOB to the literal words in the Con stitution. They should, in his words, “resurrect the original meaning of constitutional provi sions.” And he says “the only reliable guide” to today’s con stitutional controversies are the rn picking judges, the president leans heavily for advice on his at torney general, Edwin Meese, whose ideas about the role of the judiciary are strange, to say the least. Meese seems to want to roll the clock back to 1789. He says judges, when dealing with con stitutional questions, should stick intentions of the authors of the Constitution. Here we are, on the verge of the 21st century, and he wants all constitutional questions decided by what was on the minds of a very diverse group of people who lived 200 years ago and wrote a document that made slavery legal. Does Meese really want to dead document, incapable of guiding us in a modern world. Supreme Court Justice Williaip Brennan recently demolished the Meese argument, which he called “arrogance cloaked as humility.’* Not only is it impossi ble to figure out the intentions of. Please see page A5 CHILDWATCH Group helps fight the odds By MARIAN W. EDELMAN Syndicated Columnist WASHINGTON - Dapl, Busby knows what it takes to si vive as a black single mother And she has passed along “crash course in survivalisi through the Sisterhood of Single Mothers, a New Yoi based group she set up to b these women to help themsel and each other. A black woman raising a fan ly alone today faces very diffici odds. Eighty-five percent of su families headed by women uni 25 are mired in poverty. Te mothers, who are less likely have job skills or experience, fa an especially hard struggle. ington and Burling, terminated its long relationship with South African Airways. International and domestic demonstrations have prodded the South African corporate sector to face reality: the continued sub jugation of 22 million people is not only inherently unstable and breeds constant repression, but in the long run it makes private in- But Busby is helping the young women to fight these odi and so must we. It is vitally i portant for all of us to speak o about the risks of teen pare thood. But we must also dowh we can to help the many you women who are already motlu to make it on their own, i eluding encouraging them carefully weigh a decision to h* a second or third child. The first step toward sel sufficiency for these wome Busby says, is seeing themselv as “a person empowered.’’Ma teen mothers have never been charge of their own lives befori They need to learn “how to h their own advocates,” she say in such everyday matters agettii a landlord to fix the plumbing i it is broken or preventing frieni from disrupting family life. Hi network, which provides free a vice and support from otK mothers, many of them olde has helped many young mothe to learn these skills. vestment in the country highly questionable. A stable democratic government headed by Nelson Mandela would be preferable to a white-minority dictatorship. Finally, there remains one regrettable parallel between the South African and American situations: President Reagan is widely viewed by American blacks as the leader of efforts to Please see page All There are other progran around the country that aij working to help teen mothers. !i wide range of both public anj private groups are reaching outti these young women, offerin them support services to enab them to get their high schoi diplomas and jobs. stick only to what was on the minds of those men in gray wigs? For example, the Teen-ai Pregnancy and Parenting Proje (TAlPP) in San Francisco hel; young women finish their big school education by providit them with needed supports sue as child care, medical care an counseling. The genius of the Constitution they wrote is that it provides a framework allowing succeeding generations to interpret it to meet changing conditions. That’s why we call our Constitution a “living document.” Meese’s theory would make the Constitution a TAPP is especially effecth because it stays in touch with th teen mothers for several ycat long enough for most to gf established on their own. XDther programs focus « preparing teen mothers to con pete for jobs. For example. tl Bridge program in Boston offt career counseling along *>• jED courses. At the Tee Mother Program in Cerrito Calif., students are encour^e to explore career possibilidi with their teachers, and are o fered the option of on-the-jo training at the local cafflp' graphics and office occupatior centers. Some programs go a step ther - matching teen mothei with jobs. The Boston YM has a 10-month “Job Tips” P gram that offers both job trsn ing and follow-up advice on ho to handle on-the-job probleW They place young women lasting, private-sector jobs. These programs are doing P work, but, unfortunately, ih* are reaching only 4" tiny of the teen mothers who nee them. Marum Wright Edelman is xleM of the Children’s Fund, a national voice for P
Winston-Salem Chronicle (Winston-Salem, N.C.)
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Dec. 26, 1985, edition 1
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