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The Panther
MAY, 1968 19
King University
Proposed
By Gene Burt
There is a very great possi
bility of Martin Luther King,
Jr. going down in history as
one of the truly great men our
country has produced. It will
depend on how well the rest of
us, black and white, pick up
the banner of idealism that
Martin Luther King, Jr. carried
so well during the short period
of time he had to live.
What caused the voice of
King and King’s death to have
such an impact upon the Negro
and upon the rest of us? The
Negroes were able to identify
with King more readily than
with other Negro intellectuals
because King spoke their lan
guage. His emotional appeal
was in the temper of the South
ern Negro church which most
Negroes are familiar with and
could relate to. Egoism is na
tural but arrogance is devel
oped, and King exhibited pride
in himself and in his race with
out the detrimental aspect of
superiority. He led; he did not
order. The Negro came to feel
pride in King and, as a conse
quence, pride in himself.
Even though King must have
been a complex man, as all of
us are complex, his singleness
of purpose in his actions caused
the Negroes to feel they knew
him better and helped them to
identify more closely with him.
He won the Nobel Prize wfych
has come to mean so much to
the whites. This gave the Ne
groes pride.
His death dramatized his un
selfish motivation and caused
men of all races to see the
comparison of King’s life with
Christ’s life. This comparison
cannot help but give the Ne
groes pride and cause all men
to question the validity of ra
cial prejudice.
Realistically, the violence
that immediately flared caused
the whites to realize chaos
would reign in our cities unless
the white man responds to this
idealistic appeal of the Negro.
The responsible Negroes real
ize this, also. The ideals in
herent in man are one of the
few things that separates man
from other evolved creatures.
We must pay heed to these
ideals if our nation is to sur
vive.
In honor of Martin Luther
King, Jr. and to further the
ideals he exemplified I would
like to propose that all colleges
and universities in the Atlanta
University Center consolidate
into one university and that
university be named King Uni
versity.
All great universities special
ize in one or two fields even
though they offer many types
of degrees. I would propose
that King University specialize
in the fields of theology and
education. We need the ideals
as represented by our religions
and education can be the means
of causing these ideals to be im
plemented. But just as we see
the need of integration in our
schools we should also see the
need of integration in our reli
gions, and I would further pro
pose that the Theological Cen
ter become an Ecumenical Cen
ter.
Even though we can realize
the integrated school system is
the ideal school system we
must be realistic enough to see
are predominately segregated
and from all indications the
situation will get worse as more
and more of the whites are
moving out of our cities. There
is a need to supply outstanding
teachers to our society and to
these predominately segregated
schools. The greatest need is in
the hypercritical formative
years of elementary education.
I believe that if we devel
oped self motivation in the in
dividual at an early age then he
would learn more and learn it
better than what he presently
learns under our system of in
doctrination and patterning. A
revolution in education has
been going on for the last ten
years but it is surprising how
slowly it progresses. A program
is being developed by the
American Association for the
Advancement of Science for
grades kindergarten through
sixth grade that I feel is the
most important thing to happen
to education since free educa
tion. The teaching of science is
secondary of importance to the
program. The developers of the
program have defined the pro
cesses of scientific thought
which are nothing more than
the reasoning processes such as
observing, classifying, using
numbers, measuring, communi
cating, predicting, inferring and
many others. They have devel
oped experiences for the young
sters to be exposed to that will
develop these processes in the
youngsters. It will benefit all
students who take it, but I
visualize it as having the most
dramatic effect of helping
break the cycle of the economi
cally depressed.
In our present society
youngsters entering school from
many of our economically de
pressed areas have not expe
rienced the wholesome back
ground of more fortunate
youngsters such as love, ap
proval, encouragement with
letters and numbers, indivi
dual exploration and happily
remembered family experiences.
Instead, they get their hands
slapped when they try to ex
plore; they are subjected to
mental and physical abuse from
frustrated parents taking out
their frustrations and hate of
our society on their children.
There is no teaching of the
letters and numbers to these
children. In many cases they
do not even know their full
names when they enter school.
One of the basic premises of
educational psychology is that
success can be built upon suc
cess, but how can these young
sters succeed when they are
placed in competition with
youngsters from more whole
some backgrounds. The letter
grade itself is antithesis to this
basic premise since in our nor
mal curves we give as many
D’s and F’s as we give A’s and
B’s. The C has come to stand
for mediocrity and certainly
cannot be construed as success
even though the majority of
students make C’s.
It would be far better if we
eliminated the extrensic moti
vation of letter grades, reduced
the class load in order to give
more individual attention to
each student, and concentrated
our efforts on developing self
motivation in the individual by
taking each student at his par
ticular level and exposing him
to successful experiences.
In our present school expe
riences many of these young
sters are only exposed to ex
periences denoting failure or
disapproval. Too often they ac
cept this indictment of failure
by our system and live a life
of self castigation. Is it any
wonder that many of them drop
out of school, have children,
and take their frustrations out
on their children — thus con
tinuing the cycle?
The cycle can be broken in
our educational system by de
veloping self motivation in the
individual at an early age, de
emphasizing the importance of
the grade and placing more re
sponsibility of the learning pro
cess on the individual.
Martin Luther King, Jr. had
a dream. I have a similar
dream. I, also, would like to
see our children playing hand
in hand and the end of racial
prejudice, but, looking further,
I would like to see each indi
vidual develop to his full po
tential no matter what his race
might be.
Houston Blacks
Celebrate Black
Easter
Houston, Texas—Over 13,-
000 brothers and sisters par
ticipated in an Easter Sunday
march and rally, which com
pletely shook-up the hunky
powers-that-be in that city. The
march began with only 300
persons at Jefferson Stadium,
and as they made their way
through the Black Community,
thousands joined them, until
their numbers reached 8,000.
Waiting for the marchers at
Emancipation Park were over
5,000 more people. On the
speakers platform were a line
up of Black leaders and spokes
men, including Lee Otis John
son of Friends of SNCC, State
Senator Barabara Jordan, Rev.
William Lawson & Earl Allen.
The mayor and several white
city and state officials were
there to witness the program,
but were not allowed to speak
to the Black Community, which
had turned out 13,000 strong.
Several memorial speeches
were made in honor of slain
Brother Martin Luther King.
The high point of the program
came when Brother Lee Otis
Johnson “made it plain” to our
people as to “where we have
to go from here” and “what
must be done.” He got wild
ovations as he continued to
“tell it like it is.” The crowd
fell out when he told the hunky
mayor, sitting there, that he
was a “functional retard” and
that when he went home “his
mother should come from un
der the porch since she was a
dog.”
Not being able to take
Brother Johnson’s comments,
the mayor sent his goon squad
out “to get” Lee Otis on Tues
day, April 16. Three car loads
of cops came to his home, ar
resting him on five charges,
taking him to jail, and indict
ing him without a hearing.
Bond was set at $2500, and
an attorney from the Black
community bonded him out
later on that evening. Several
Black leaders, including Rev.
Bill Lawson, State Senator
Barbara Jordan, and Earl Al
len are planning to hold a press
conference and other meetings
to expose this frame-up of Lee
Otis and declare their complete
support for his efforts to lib
erate “our” people.
The University I visualize,
with the campus stretching to
include all of the present col
leges and universities within
the Atlanta University Center,
can play a leading role in the
education revolution taking
place at present and can help
break the chains of the eco
nomically oppressed. What
more fitting memorial can we
leave Martin Luther King, Jr.
than this?
Memphis
By Mike McDaniel
Staff Writer,
College Heights Herald
Western Kentucky University
Memphis, Tenn., is a stero-
type of the American city.
Walking around the town,
one can easily spot the incon
gruities that prevail in a town
this size — dirty avenues with
new street signs, elegantly-dec
orated bars with dirty windows,
wooden shacks near massive
concrete structures.
A shot rings out — a black
minister is killed. And a white
American sports car creeps
away in the darkness.
At the end of historic Beale
Street, in a park named for the
famous composer of Dixieland
blues, the statue of W. C. Handy
stands in a vigil, appearing to
pray for the restoration of peace
in the city he loved so well.
Beale Street, where the strains
of Dixieland jazz once drove
both white and black into an
other world. The joints are gone
now, largely replaced by pawn
shops and small businesses run
by Jews and Negroes.
Downtown, the concrete,
mortar and brick of the Peabody
Hotel encases a horrid homo
genization of faces and voices
and minds which have long since
been trained to speak. “I’m glad
somebody finally got rid of that
damned “Communist,” says a
salesman. The hotel barber, al
ways on top of the news, replies,
“Yeah, maybe now those peo
ple will know their rightful
place . . .”
The search continues for an
assassin. The Tennessee-Arkan
sas Bridge haunts the commun
ity with an awesome steel struc
ture while down in Orange
Mound a young Negro shouts,
“Let’s go get them honkies!
At the National Guard Arm
ory, the Memphis Belle, a plane
flown in World War II, sits
permanently grounded, wonder
ing like an old soldier why peo
ple can’t notice that the Amer
ican sky overhead is peaceful
Out in Whitehaven, a subdi
vision made famous by the resi-
indence of Elvis Presley, a pro
minent homeowner tells his wife
and children, “It should have
been Stokely Carmichael or H.
Rap Brown . . .”
There have been strange feet
milling around the grounds of
Booker T. Washington High
School and the same strange
feet at Melrose High and tearful
whispers ask, “Why, baby, why?
White America will pay . . .”
At Overton Park a marble
doughboy hears the strains of
“When Johnny Comes March
ing Home” running rapidly
through his head, and passersby
notice an imaginary tear trick
ling down his cheek.
Millington Naval Base, holds
trained or semi-trained seamen
who feel saddened, ashamed for
the world of the civilian.
And at Germantown, where
the horse farms house the
famous Tennessee Walker, the
animals sleep, peacefully un
aware, soon to awake to a bright
day to be spent grazing and
basking in the sun.
Memphis, a city of contrasts,
not any different from any other
piece of metropolitan America.