More than a month. . .

Should there be a Black History Month in the U.S.?

Some would answer "No."

Filmmaker Shukree Tilghman among them, sets out to end Black History Month with his film, More Than A Month. The film will be seen on PBS in February during Black History Month. 

View the video below.  Read the backstory on Tilghman's work here.  Tell me what you think.

I, Too

Langston Hughes is a favorite of mine. 

Many things have changed since he penned his prophetic and challenging poem, "I, Too." 

Reflect.

Give thanks!

New book from William Julius Wilson worth your time

William Julius Wilson writes provocative, groundbreaking stuff.

Included in his bibliography are books like When Work Disappears, The Declining Significance of Race and The Truly Disadvantaged.

Now, Wilson is out with his latest study that promises to be his most important work to date. More Than Just Race tackles the historic debate sparked over four decades ago by the social commentary of Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan in "The Negro Family: The Case for National Action," or the so-called "Moynihan Report."

As would be expected, Wilson comes at the issue from a new perspective that rings true upon reading the first reviews of his latest book. As a matter of fact, I heard a group of young black men speaking in exactly Wilson's terms just last week as we discussed a new project that aimed to create real jobs for their community.

For a sample of Wilson's thinking, take a look at the review from Slate below:

How To Understand the Culture of Poverty

William Julius Wilson once again defies both right and left

By Sudhir Venkatesh

Pop quiz: Who made the following observation? "At the heart of the deterioration of the fabric of [black America] is the deterioration of the [black] family. It is a fundamental weakness of [black Americans] at the present time." Each year, I pose this question to my undergraduate students. Most will guess George Bush, Bill Cosby, Al Sharpton, or Bill Clinton. This is not surprising, given their age. More telling is their perception that such a view might come from the political left or right. It reveals just how commonplace the link of family-race-poverty is in the American mindset.

But there is a little trickery going on: Replace "black" with "Negro" and change the date to 1965. The correct author is Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan. He wrote these words as part of a policy brief to help President Lyndon Johnson understand the distressed social conditions in urban ghettos. "The Negro Family: The Case for National Action" leaked to the press and created a firestorm of controversy with its contention that a "tangle of pathology" engulfed black America.
The so-called "Moynihan Report" brought about a new language for understanding race and poverty: Now-familiar terms like pathology, blame the victim, and culture of poverty entered American thought as people debated whether Moynihan was courageously pointing out the causes of social ills or simply finger-pointing. Moynihan forced a nation to ask, "Is the culture of poor blacks at the core of their problems?"

[read more here]

Reactions???

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Completing the story. . .a struggle

Lots of white Americans remain bewildered by the feelings and comments of some black Americans, especially those of a generation ago (just see the comments on one of my posts from yesterday!). The legacy of segregation, Jim Crow, lynchings, and a system born of prevailing racism shaped all of us as a people, and it infected our systems and institutions where it still lingers today.

Frankly, our national story to date has not been completed, not fully reported, not sufficiently understood and certainly not appropriately honored.

On Monday, I listened to a fascinating report on NPR's new program, "Tell Me More," moderated by Michel Martin. "Built by Slaves: A Capitol History Lesson" is worth your time.

Most of us don't realize that the rotunda of the capitol was built from ground to dome by slave labor.

Did you realize that the statue Freedom atop the capitol dome was the work of Philip Reed, a slave who saw the work of his hand and heart lifted to the top of the dome on December 2, 1863, by which time he had been freed?

Slaves cut the stones of the capitol walls and their masters were paid $5 per month for the labor of each worker.

Eight paintings grace the walls of the Capitol Rotunda.

None include African Americans.

A history frieze is painted around the inner perimeter of the rotunda. The frieze ends with the Civil War. An original painting depicted Abraham Lincoln delivering the Emancipation Proclamation. This painting was later removed and replaced by a portrait of a Union soldier shaking hands with a Confederate soldier.

Not until the Congress acted in the mid-1980s did the Capitol enjoy the presence of a sculpture of any African American national leader. It was at that time that our representatives commissioned the depiction of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. shortly before the establishment of his birthday as a national holiday.

Listen to the report. View the photos. Open your heart of a huge group of people who have reason to be rejoicing today, but who also need us to agree that we will not forget.

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Dr. Caesar Clark and the community of faith

Thanks to KERA 90.1 FM for publishing the text of "Dr. Caesar Clark - A Remembrance" by Rev. Gerald Britt, CDM's VP of Public Policy and Community Program Development.

The text and audio are both available here: http://publicbroadcasting.net/kera/news.newsmain?action=article&ARTICLE_ID=1331124§ionID=1.

Listen in to gain a rich perspective on Dr. Clark's life and legacy, as well as a deepened understanding of the place of the African American Church in Dallas and the nation.

For more on Dr. Clark visit Gerald's blog at: https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=690663941436597612&postID=7123102142307615158.

Or, visit the YouTube site at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gKw3h9xsIkk.

Great insights on a man who will be missed in our city.

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Joe Carter: African American Spirituals

My friend, Don Haymes just keeps hooking me up with valuable, challenging, thought provoking resources.

Check out this conversation with Joe Carter.

The subject: African American Spirituals.

Click on the title line above or go to: http://speakingoffaith.publicradio.org/programs/joecarter/index.shtml.

It will worth you time, I promise. Great "Sunday meditation."

Sweet music, powerful meaning, very powerful. We need to understand this movement music.

Reactions encouraged.

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Resources for Juneteenth

Wonder what might happen if every predominately white church in the nation made some special effort to celebrate Juneteenth this year?

What if just Texas congregations did so?

Just an idea and suggestion for white people of faith to consider.

Here is a wonderful resource page for such plans: http://coramarshall.com/news_juneteenth08.html.

If anyone takes me up on this idea, please let me know!

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Race in America--Part Four

I’ve been breaking down the research of John E. Stapleford that is reported out in his very insightful essay, “A Torturous Journey: The Condition of Black America,” (Christian Scholar’s Review, XXXVII, No. 2, Winter 2008, pages 240ff). You can read my previous posts on his work by backtracking a bit (April 15, 18, 24, 2008).

Our nation is involved in a new and serious conversation about race as we head for the general election in November. Stapleford’s work is important for any meaningful conversation based on hard data and genuine understanding of the issues facing the nation and, more particularly, African Americans.

To conserve space, I have summarized much of what he presents, but all of what follows comes from his work.

The way out of the economic hole facing blacks in the United States was found in access to “the job growth centers and quality education available in the suburbs of our older metropolitan areas. But their wealth deficit, among other factors, prevented ordinary black families from participating in the wave of suburbanization. As sons and daughters of sharecroppers, small farmers and laborers in the South as late as the 1940s, blacks not only had a human capital deficit but had little opportunity to accumulate wealth. Sharecropping and farm labor continued a post-slavery version of white supremacy over blacks. . . .There was little or no opportunity for the accumulation of wealth” (242).

Other key factors that excluded our African American neighbors from the wealth and progress of the nation include:

During the 1950s and 1960s, blacks were excluded from both Veterans Administration (VA) and Federal Housing Administration (FHA) mortgage products.

Numerous (“a wave”) of discriminatory deed restrictions.

The removal of these roadblocks did not offset the lost opportunity for the accumulation of wealth via the rapid appreciation of suburban housing values from which blacks were systematically excluded.

Fact: during the 1990s, nearly 50% of all white families who bought homes got their down payment from family or sources other than their own savings, whereas only one out of 8 African Americans enjoyed such positive options.

Each year a $225 billion intergenerational transfer of wealth occurs in the U. S. For every $1 available for transfer among whites, there is only 10 cents available for transfer among blacks.

The median inheritance of white households is almost 13 times that of black households.

Less than half of black households are homeowners, for whites the number is ¾. Empirical research indicates that renter-dominated urban neighborhoods have a negative impact on health, personal development and school outcomes.

Blacks lack needed transportation to outlying job centers—24% of blacks own no car (7% for whites); this number rises to 70% in high-poverty, inner city neighborhoods; the median value of black-owned vehicles is 42% that of white-owed cars.

From 1960 to the late 1970s, over 22 million whites moved into suburban communities and the white population in central cities declined by 4 million. During the same time frame, black population rose by 6 million in the central cities and the suburbs gained only 500,000 blacks.

Key factors in the creation of the reality we all face today.

[Next: the impact of the decline of urban communities]

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Unions and African American Workers

What follows is an Executive Summary of a report written by John Schmitt, Senior Economist at the Center for Economic and Policy Research (http://www.cepr.net/) entitled, "Unions and Upward Mobility for African-American Workers." To read the full report, click on title link above.

Underwriting for the research came from the Ford Foundation.

Lots to consider here about how social stability is lost and realized, depending on the economic realities in play. I'd love to get your reactions, as always.

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This paper examines the impact of unionization on the pay and benefits of African-American workers. The most recent data suggest that even after controlling for differences between union and non-union workers —including such factors as age and education level— unionization substantially improves the pay and benefits received by black workers.

On average, unionization raised black workers' wages 12 percent --about $2.00 per hour-- relative to black workers with similar characteristics who were not in unions.

The union impact on health-insurance and pension coverage was even larger. African-American workers who were in unions were 16 percentage points more likely to have employer-provided health insurance and 19 percentage points more likely to have a pension plan than similar non-union workers.

These union effects are large by any measure. To put these findings into perspective, between 1996 and 2000, a period of sustained, low unemployment that helped to produce the best wage growth for low-wage workers in the last three decades, the real wage of 10th percentile workers (who make more than 10 percent of workers, but less than 90 percent of workers), rose, in total, about 12 percent. The 12-percent union wage boost for black workers, therefore, was equal in magnitude to four years of historically rapid real wage growth.

Over the same boom period in the 1990s, employer-provided health and pension coverage among the bottom fifth of workers rose only about three percentage points for health insurance (up 3.2 percentage points) and pensions (up 2.7 percent) – only about one-fifth of the impact of unionization on health-insurance coverage and about one-sixth of the impact on pension coverage for African Americans.

The benefits of unionization were even higher for black workers in typically low-wage occupations. Black workers in unions in otherwise low-wage occupations earned, on average, 14 percent more than their non-union counterparts. Unionized black workers in low-wage occupations were also 20 percentage points more likely than comparable non-union workers to have employer-provided health insurance, and 28 percentage points more likely to have a pension plan.

Our findings demonstrate that black workers who are able to bargain collectively earn more and are more likely to have benefits associated with good jobs. We conclude that better protection of workers’ right to unionize would help improve the pay and benefits of African-American workers.


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Prisons and the Destruction of Life and Community

Too many of our men and women, especially African Americans, end up in prison. Too often innocent people land in prison without relief for years and years. Thanks to advances in DNA technology, a number of people enjoy freedom today. But, their release doesn't return the years lost locked up unjustly.

The entire question of prisons and inner city communities is one we face again and again.

On Monday, our own Gerald Britt (VP of Public Policy and Community Program Development) published a strong Op-Ed piece in The Dallas Morning News.

Here's a bit of what he said:

Gerald Britt: Prisoners of the streets At the risk of overstating the obvious, the world was a different place 27 years ago.

There were no cellphones, DVDs were unknown, and VCRs were budget-busting toys. "Green" was just a primary color, the Cold War was still raging, and the Reagan era had just begun. And Charles Allen Chatman was sentenced to 99 years for rape.

On Jan. 3, Mr. Chatman became the 15th man in Dallas County to be released from prison, exonerated by DNA evidence. This will probably be categorized as old news by some readers; others won't even recognize the name or the case. And, for me, that's troubling.

Follow the link above to read the entire essay. Gerald's works are on target, as usual.

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Strange Fruit

Having spent some time considering James Cone's theological reflections on the connection between the Christian cross and the Southern lynching tree--ironically and hypocritically, the form of execution adopted by Whites who claimed to be Christians--I will conclude by simply sharing the lyrics to the moving song, Strange Fruit.

Southern trees bear strange fruit,
Blood on the leaves and blood at the root,
Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze,
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.

Pastoral scene of the gallant south,
The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth,
Scent of magnolias, sweet and fresh,
Then the sudden smell of burning flesh.

Here is fruit for the crows to pluck,
For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck,
For the sun to rot, for the trees to drop,
Here is a strange and bitter crop.

Use this link to hear Billie Holiday's moving rendition of "Strange Fruit":http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h4ZyuULy9zs.

Our nation's legacy of racism and race relations leaves us with much work to be done together, today.

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Juneteenth

Today is Juneteenth!

Celebrations began over the weekend and will certainly continue today here in Dallas, across Texas and, now, around the world!

It was on June 19, 1865, that General Gordan Granger and 2,000 federal soldiers arrived at Galveston Island as part of the plan to take possession of the state of Texas, previously under the control of the Confederate, rebel government.

Upon his arrival, Granger announced his enforcement of the Emancipation Proclamation issued by President Lincoln almost three years earlier on September 22, 1862. Unknown to the slave population of Galveston, Lincoln's executive order went into effect on January 1, 1863.

Standing on the balcony of Galveston’s Ashton Villa, Granger read the federal directive, “General Order No. 3”:

"The people of Texas are informed that, in accordance with a proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all slaves are free. This involves an absolute equality of personal rights and rights of property between former masters and slaves, and the connection heretofore existing between them becomes that between employer and hired labor. The freedmen are advised to remain quietly at their present homes and work for wages. They are informed that they will not be allowed to collect at military posts and that they will not be supported in idleness either there or elsewhere."

Former slaves rejoiced in the streets of Galveston. The next year Juneteenth celebrations began across Texas. All over the state freed African Americans pooled their funds to purchase land to accommodate the annual celebrations. Today the celebrations continue as a community tribute to the arrival of both the news of freedom and the actual beginnings of liberation.

But, freedom was hardly won in 1865. Even the language of the "General Order" bespeaks the continuation of limitations and hedges against complete liberation for African Americans in the United States. One hundred years later black Americans were still struggling for that liberation in the American Civil Rights Movement.

Today the celebrations continue. These times of rejoicing, memory and pride are invaluable not only for the African American community, but for all of us who cherish freedom, liberty and human equality.

The struggle, the sacrifice and the joy of African Americans provides a continuing vision for and appreciation of the best in our national life and memory.

Remember freedom today. Find your own way to join the celebration!

The State of Black America 2007

The National Urban League released its annual report a couple of weeks ago, The State of Black America 2007: Portrait of the Black Male.

You can find the Executive Summary at http://www.nul.org/. You can purchase a copy from their website or via Amazon.com right here on my page (see thumbnail in column to the right that benefits CDM).

The Urban League does the nation a service every year by tracking and evaluating the progress, or lack thereof, among African Americans, as compared to whites, along six "weighted index values," including Total Equality, Economic, Health, Education, Social Justice, and Civic Engagement.

The 2007 report notes that African Americans status stands at 73.3% of whites status in the cumulative index. Economically they are doing 57% as well as whites; 78% as well in terms of health; 79% as well in the area of education; 66% in overall social justice concerns and 105% in the arena of civic engagement, the one category in which they out distance the white experience in America today.

Here are some of the noteworthy facts of life for black Americas in 2007:

++African American men are more than twice as likely to be unemployed as white males (9.5% compared to 4% for whites).

++Among young men (20 to 24-years-old) 76.5 of whites were employed, compared to 68.8% of blacks.

++For blacks over 25-years-old with less than a high school education 60% are unemployed, as compared to 53% of whites.

++African American men earn only 75% as much as their white counterparts.

++For African Americans under 18-years-old, 33.5% live in poverty, compared to 10% of white youths.

++Among black Americans, 47.9% own their homes, whereas 75.8% of whites own homes. In addition, blacks are three times more likely to obtain high-priced mortgages than whites.

++Black men are more than 7 times more likely to be incarcerated than white men.
Average jail sentences for African American males are 10 months longer than for white men.

++Young black men between 15 and 34-years-old are nine times more likely to die of homicide than white men the same age and they are almost seven times as likely to contract HIV/AIDS.

++Black children do well in early childhood--over two-thirds are enrolled in early childhood education programs, such as Head Start, compared to 64% of white children. However, black children, especially males, begin to drop out in middle school and high school at alarming rates.

++Twenty-one percent of teachers in majority black schools had less than three years experience, compared to 10 percent in majority white schools.

++Dollars spent per black student was 82% of those spent per white student.

The Urban League report goes on to suggest a number of steps to improve the lives of African Americans, and black males in particular. The report would be well worth reading.

There is much to do for all of us who seek a nation of opportunity and equal access for everyone.

Thanks to the National Urban League for this important, ongoing research.