4A
EDITORIALS/The Charlotte Post
June 27, 1996
®i)E cijariottE $ost I Justice Dot SO blind in hiring
Published weekly by the Charlotte Post Publishing Co.
1531 Camden Road Charlotte, N.C. 28203
Gerald O. Johnson
PUBLISHER
Robert Johnson
CO-PUBLISHER/
GENERAL MANAGER
Herbert L. White
EDITOR IN CHIEF
The ballot as a weapon
for black freedom
By Ron Daniels
SPECIAL TO THE POST
Up from the dark days of the Post Reconstruction and Southern
apartheid, Black America can now boast of nearly 10,000 Black elect
ed officials (BEO's) in this country. This is a remarkable testimony to
the power of the ballot in the hands of black folks. Despite this
remarkable achievement, however, there is considerable disillusion
ment in Black America, particularly among black poor and working
people £md young people about the value of the ballot in the black
freedom struggle. Some eight million African Americans are not even
registered to vote. And, among those who are registered, disenchant
ment and apathy have resulted in a pattern of low voter turn-out
especially in local and state elections.
, To the proponents of black voter participation this is an alarming
development. A typical reaction to the phenomenon of low voter par
ticipation is to take those who do not vote to task for betraying the
long and bloody struggle to secure the right to vote. It is often
assumed that those who do not vote are simply uninformed and igno
rant of the importance of voting within the American body poUtic. For
many within the ranks of black poor and working people, however,
the queJity of life hais not significantly changed as result of the thou
sands of BEO’s who now occupy various public offices within the sys
tem. Indeed, the quality of life for those at the bottom within the
black nation has actually deteriorated over the last two decades.
There is a prevalent feeling among the black poor that there is no
direct relationship between voting and a change in the quality of
their lives. Mamy young African Americans see a racist and exploita
tive system and question whether it is possible to change that system
by participating in and becoming a part of the system.
This disillusionment with voting/electoral politics is compounded by
the perception that large numbers of BEO’s have simply become tra
ditional “politicians,” who are disconnected from grassroots commu
nities; politicians who have succumbed to the self aggrandizing vote
trading, deal making and corruption which Black political empower
ment was supposed to change. Finally, there is the view that neither
the Democratic or the Republican parties really represents the inter
ests of the masses of black people, that the Democrats take black peo
ple for granted and the Republicans are a repugnant alternative.
This is the rather troubling state of affairs as it relates to Black voter
participation.
In my judgement, though it is a mistake to rely on electoral politics
exclusively, the ballot is still a potent weapon which must be used in
the black freedom struggle. For the ballot to be the potent weapon
which Black America needs to advance its interest, however, black
voter mobilization/participation must be tied to a vision of social
change and social transformation. There must be a clear sense that
voting is about transforming an oppressive system and changing the
quality of life for the masses of black poor and working people and
other oppressed people. Voting must not be reduced to a mundane rit
ual of replacing white faces with black faces in old places. There is a
need for visionary new black political leadership to rise up from the
community and community struggles; a leadership that will remain
rooted in the community and committed to social justice and social
change. Time and time again black folks have demonstrated that
they will vote for hlack candidates whom they feel are genuinely dedi
cated to chsmging the system and the quality of their lives.
Secondly, the ballot must be utilized to advance a progressive, peo
ple oriented political agenda. Black voters must be involved in a
process of identifying the critical issues and concerns which they feel
must be addressed in the electoral arena. Those issues and concerns
should comprise an agenda which must be used as the guide to select
candidates and to hold them accountable once in office.
Third, the black vote should not he the exclusive preserve of either
the Democratic or Republican parties. Allegiance to parties and elect
ed officials should be based solely on the degree to which parties and
elected officials adhere to the black political agenda. 'The black vote
should be positioned as a “third force” in American politics, swinging
behind progressive Democrats and Republicans (if there are any)
when it is in the best interest of the Black community based on the
black pohtical agenda. It is also imperative that a third force promote
and support independent parties and candidates as critical alterna
tives to the estabhshment parties. As a third force, the Black vote can
also seek out other oppressed groups and progressive forces to form
formidable coalitions for firndamental change.
Finally, the ballot should not be seen in isolation to other
tools/weapons in the black freedom struggle. Black America should
never rely on the ballot alone as its primaiy weapon. Protest politics,
mobilizing/organizing around issues, demonstrations, boycotts/eco
nomic sanctions, civil disobedience and strikes should all be used in
tandem with the ballot to promote and defend the black agenda.
When the ballot is properly used as a vehicle to advance a vision of
social justice and social change, it can be a powerful weapon in the
black freedom struggle.
RON DANIELS is an essayist and columnist from East Elmhurst,
NY.
By Richard Carelli
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON - The num
ber of female lawyers continues
to grow but a new study says
the Supreme Court - that bul
wark of equality before the law
- is not an equal opportunity
employer.
The statistical analysis by
Stetson University law profes
sor Mark Brown offers dramatic
“evidence of de facto discrimina
tion against women” in the
selection of Supreme Court law
clerks.
Twenty-three percent of
America's lawyers are women.
By the year 2010, women are
expected to comprise 40 percent
of the attorney work force.
Serving as a high court law
clerk and helping a justice with
research and opinion-writing
virtually assures a young
lawyer of a bright professional
future. There's no hotter ticket
for a career in law.
But women are being left out
in the cold. Brown says in a
study to be published in the
Oregon Law Review later this
year.
“I’m not claiming that the
court as an institution or any
one justice is purposefully pick
ing men and not women,”
Brown said in an interview.
“One can draw that inference
from the statistics. There is an
infinity of other explanations
hut bias, conscious or uncon
scious, is one possibility.'”
Thirty-four men and women
are selected as Supreme Court
law clerks each year. Each jus
tice hires three or four clerks.
Brown’s study, however, says
women's chances of being cho
sen don't match their success
in law schools or even their
record in landing federal
appellate clerkships.
Most high court clerks, t5q)i-
cally high-ranking students
from the nation's premier law
schools, are hired after work
ing a year for a federal appeals
court.
“Somewhere between success
in law school and Supreme
Court clerkships, women are
being screened out,” Brown’s
study states.
The study takes four decades
of hiring into account. In the
1960s, 99 percent of all high
court clerks were men; 89 per
cent in the '70s; 76 percent in
the '80s.
The study cuts off with the
1993-94 court term, but shows
that male dominance
remained steady at 76 percent
for this decade's first five
years. For the last two court
terms, however, the percent
age of male law clerks has
been under 68 percent - 46 of
68.
Brown found Justice David H.
Souter's practice of hiring male
law clerks in his first four court
terms the most extreme - 94
percent were men. Not included
in the study are the seven men
and one woman Souter hired as
clerks over the last two court
terms.
Only Justices John Paul
Stevens and Sandra Day
O'Connor “maintain facially
neutral hiring practices,” the
study says, but notes that
Justices Stephen G. Breyer and
Ruth Bader Ginsburg had not
been on the court long enough
for a significant statistical
analysis.
Over the past two terms,
Breyer and Ginsburg each have
hired four men and four women
as law clerks.
Here’s what the study found
out about how often the court's
other members chose men as
law clerks:
• Justice Antonin Scalia, 91
percent of the time.
• Chief Justice William H.
Rehnquist, 90 percent.
• Justice Clarence Thomas, 86
percent.
• Justice Anthony M.
Kennedy, 84 percent.
• Stevens, 75 percent.
• O'Connor, 61 percent.
Men make up about 70 per
cent of the graduates who are
near the top of their class at the
schools that are the most fertile
spawning grounds for future
clerks.
Some find Brown's study less
than convincing.
Toni House, the Supreme
Court's chief spokeswoman,
declined to comment. But
Maureen Mahoney, a
Washington lawyer who served
as a Rehnquist clerk in 1979,
defended the high court's hiring
practices.
“There may be some under
representation but that doesn't
mean there's been discrimina
tion," Mahoney says.
“It’s unimaginable that the
chief justice is discriminating
against women in the hiring
process," Mahoney says. “And I
have no reason to believe any
other justice is."
Will the justices ever see
Brown’s study? “I can't mail it to
them. As an academic, it's some
thing you just don't do," he says.
But Brown thinks the justices
might benefit from learning of
the statistics. “Maybe they can
fix it,” he says.
RICHARD CARELLI covers
the Supreme Court and legal
affairs for The Associated Press.
wW BStJlDmr W616H&
wiiAT m
Spate of black church burnings is a national wake-up call
Sherman
Miller
As we listen to or read news
reports of yet another black
church being burned in the
South, we want to proclaim that
these cowardly acts are the
result of a racist conspiracy to
destroy the underpinning of the
black community. It is no secret
that the black church is the
strongest institution in the
black community and it is at the
forefront in delivering socioeco
nomic progress to black people.
But all WEtrs are won based on
illusion, thus the burning of the
black church is merely a symp
tom of the most heinous crime of
all: the acceptance of the belief
by the younger generation that
God is dead.
When I was a child, no one
ever thought about stealing
from the church. Most folks
believed that such an act would
surely land one in hell even if
they never got caught and went
to jail for the crime. Today,
churches must be secure or
thieves will take advantage of
them this suggests that the con
cept of things being sacred has
been defrocked in the main
stream America psyche.
America is
hellbent
on
purging any
semblance of
sanctified
institutions.
Vietnam War
memorials are
violated and
we don’t
become overly
distraught by these foolish
actions. We merely watch the
America is hellbent
on purging any
semblance of
sanctified institutions.
veterans make the repairs; then
it’s business as usual.
But what signals are ure send
ing to the rest of the world with
this abolition of our societal val
ues and our passive acceptance
of the incar
nation of a
gangster sub
culture men
tality to guide
our children's
mind set? Are
we now the
ultimate
materialistic
nation where
money and power have become
God? Has everyone been rele
gated to chattel in the eyes of
our new gangster overlords'?
Has (Jod’s House been relegated
to Satan’s shack in the eyes of
America’s youth?
The burnings in the black
churches is a wake-up call for us
to reassess the moral beliefs
that are now pervading
America. These burnings sug
gest that all of our lives have
been devalued because people
no longer feel accountable to a
higher authority for their secret
actions that escape the wrath of
the civil law. Think about it:
today you even hear of murder
on the steps of a church.
America must not merely
write off the burnings of the
hlack churches as a loose plot by
racist extremist groups. We
must look further to see the
moral decay in our national val
ues that these burnings high
light. America must reincarnate
the concept of sanctity if we are
to survive in the 21th century
because only then we folks
accept that this nation is not
run by predators who see the
rest of us as their daily prey.
SHERMAN MILLER is a syn
dicated columnist from
Wilmington, Del.
■3t'.