Newspaper Page Text
8
July 27, 1995
GOING PLACES
Making anti-racism strides
s one who tries to be sensitive to and
Aappreciltiva of others, especially
those who are both to me, may 1
thank those readers who have followed the
“Going Places” column over the past 47
years, and who took time out to compli
ment last week's presentations?
It is important to note that the centenni
al of the Olympics will celebrate itself in
our state next year and that the 21st cen
tury will reach us in just five years and, for
whatever it is worth, “Going Places” will
soon have seen 48 years of continuous
publication. This is the oldest of its partic
ular kind in Georgia, I've been told by
Publisher Scott, cofounder of the Atlanta
World in 1928.
Well, the NBC television network has
“kicked the bucket over” again with its
well-received morning documentary Black-
White Anger. It is being featured on the
Today Show, all this week, 6:30 a.m to 9
a.m. It deals with several delicate but im
portant aspects of race relations. Unfortu
nately, some American citizens donot wish
to talk about these subjects or, even worse,
wish to push these vital topics which face
our everyday life under the carpet.
Yes, there are many solvable problems
facing all of us. But do we have the will
power and courage to work together to
solve them?
Already this television gala documenta
ry has engendered many series of discus
sion and seminars throughout the entire
land. NBC has instituted a call-in polling
service within its network. A Fortune 500
correspondent on the air urged all Ameri-
TO BE EQUAL
The “preference” stigma
arlier this spring I visited the
E Wharton School of Business at the
University of Pennsylvania and en
countered the “preference” stigma up close.
While there, I was approached by a fret
ful African-American first-year M.B.A. stu
dent. She confided that a number of her
black classmates, who had been admitted
under affirmative action, were dismayed
that they weren’t doing all that well aca
demically. They worried that the stigma
associated with preferential admission was
undermining their self-esteem.
Was it worth it, they wondered, to have
been admitted in the first place?
When I asked whether she or any of her
black friends had flunked out, she replied,
“No,” to which I replied that they therefore
“belonged” at Wharton because they were
there to work. Only if they were in over
their heads academically should they ques
tion whether they belonged.
Next, I asked whether she thought any of
the white students who were clustered
around them in the class ranking were
agonizing over whether they belonged.
Icouldn’timagine this to be the case. Nor
could she, from what she’d observed.
On this very point, I'll never forget the
ruckus that erupted at Georgetown Law
School a few years ago.
A white law student working in the ad
missions office charged that blacks were
being admitted with college grades and
law school entrance exam scores lower
than those of whites. Moreover, many had
gravitated toward the lower quarter. The
clear implication was that they didn’t be
long at Georgetown in the first place.
Obviously,low classrankings aren’t cause
for celebration. Our students should strive
to excel. But why were the black students
the only ones in the bottom quarter said
not to belong? What about the white stu
dents there with them in the lower quar
ter?
It’s patently unfair to imply that our
young people who aren’t academic super-
Since 1981
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1143 Laney Walker Blvd.
Augusta, GA 30901
724-7855
WAL
AUGUSTA FOCuUS
"Yes,” notes J. Philip Waring,
“there are many solvable prob
lems facing all of us. But do we
have the will power and cour
age to work together to solve
them? After all, America is the
greatest democracy on this
planet.”
cans to forget emotionalism and get facts
and figures, and then carry on dialogues,
discuss plans to solve these problems to
gether — male and female, white, black,
Hispanic, Asian and Native American,
young, middle-aged and elderly. After all,
America is the greatest democracy on this
planet, he said.
Business affiliates of the Fortune 500 have
made bold steps forward in solving personal
challenges of the aforementioned groups.
Now, for affirmative action discussions
as enumerated by the 5-to-4 split decision
ofthe U.S. Supreme Court — it has engen
dered numerous serious dialogues, semi
nars and discussions in the business, me
dia, civic, educational, political, civil rights
and similar communities. They look at it as
a public issue, not as a narrow partisan
political situation.
The question has arisen: will one of the
largest interracial betterment groups in
the Augusta area be able to sponsor a
monthly luncheon meeting and discuss
affirmative action?
Notes Hugh B. Price, "It's
patently unfair to imply that our
young people who aren’t aca
demic superstars, but who none
theless haven't flunked out,
don’t “belong’ — when the
same isn‘t said of white students
who are near them in the class
rankings.”
stars, but who nonetheless haven’t flunked
out, don’t “belong” — when the same isn’t
said of white students who are near them
in the class rankings.
Black students must resist this assault
on their self-esteem.
To those who question their bona sides,
our youngsters should cite the limited pre
dictive power of gatekeeping tests and
grades, and then reply that they look for
ward toreconnectingat their 20th reunions
to compare professional achievements and
W-2 forms. For further rebuttal, they should
cite the wide array of supposedly race
neutral preferences that universities, em
ployers and contracting authorities rou
tinely use to favor whites with less than
stellar credentials.
As Nathan Glazer of Harvard notes, they
employ geography, alumni legacy, golfing
friendships, fraternity and country club
membership, family and social connections,
wealth, seniority, nepotism, extracurricu
lar activities, proficiency with the oboe,
social class and such, to tilt decisions overt
ly or imperceptibly.
Thebeneficiaries ofthese non-racial pref
erences seldom if ever suffer a demeaning
loss of self-esteem.
For all these reasons, it is quite wrong to
accept a preference stigma against Afri
can-American students who are perform
ing. The ultimate test is how they perform
in the labor market and in life.
Editorial
Charles W. Walker
Publisher
Frederick Benjamin
Managing Editor
Dot T. Ealy
+ Marketing Director
Rhonda Jones
Copy Editor
Rhonda Y. Maree
Reporter
Jimmy Carter
Distribution
Derick Wells
Art Director
Sheila Jones
Account Representative
Regina Floyd
Account Representative '
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CIVIL RIGHTS JOURNAL
Bottling black economic power
| here’s an old saying
| I labout finding some
thing good and then
bottling it. It's a saying that
J. Bruce Llewellyn must
have taken to heart as a
young man because he made
it into a reality as an adult.
J. Bruce Llewellyn was
born in Harlem to parents
who had immigrated from
Jamaica. When he was only
16 years old, he joined the
U.S. Army, was made com
pany commander at 19
years old. When he left the
army two years later, he
opened a retail store in
Harlem while attending col
lege at night. After earning
abachelor’s degree from the
City University of New
York, Llewellyn earned a
law degree from New York
Law School, an MBA de
gree from Columbia and a
degree in public adminis
tration at New York Uni
versity.
As a young black man in
the 19605, Bruce Llewellyn
turned to government and
politics. While he served in
significant positions in the
city and federal govern
ments, somehow he must
have known that his real
strength was in business.
Bruce Llewellyn is an en-
THIS WAY FOR BLACK EMPOWERMENT
Waco 1s a Black issue
n July 19, the House
OSubcommittees on
Crimeand on Nation
al Security, International
Affairs and Criminal Justice
opened two weeks of hear
ings on the 1993 tragedy in
Waco, Texas, in which over
80 people died — most of
them women and children.
The ostensible purpose ofthe
hearings is to try to deter
mine whether the actions
taken by federal law enforce
ment agencies against the
Branch Davidian religious
group in Waco produced the
tragic outcome there.
Many Americans, myself
included, feel that our gov
ernment has never sufficient
ly accounted for an opera
tion that led to such a disas
trous loss of life. We have
long called for such hearings,
both as an opportunity to
finally learn the truth, and
as a basis for avoiding such
debacles in the future. More
over, our experience in the
government-sponsored
bombing ofthe headquarters
of MOVE in 1985 made clear
that any time law enforce
ment disregards constitu
tional rights, the Black com
munity is in serious danger.
It is important to remem
ber that almost all of those
who died at Waco — like
those who died on Osage
Avenue in Philadelphia —
were men, women and chil
dren who had been charged
with no crime. Another, lit
tle-publicized fact about
thosewhodied is that alarge
number of the slain church
Says Bernice Powell Jackson, "Bruce
Liewellyn is living proof that African Americans
can excel in business and, when given the
chance, can become successful entrepre
neurs. Now, if we can only bottle his experi
ence, his gifts, his savwy and his ability to over
come discrimination and stereotypes, eco
nomic development in the African-American
community could become a reality.”
trepreneur par excellence.
In 1969, Llewellyn bought
Fedco Foods Corporation,
which was then a chain of
10 food stores in the south
Bronx with gross sales of
$lB million annually. Oth
er buyers had shied away
from this potentially lucra
tive business because it was
located in a poor and pre
dominately black and His
panicsection of the city. But
Bruce Llewellyn knew that
poor people buy food too and,
by 1984, when he sold Fedco,
it had become the nation’s
largest minority-owned re
tail business with 29 super
markets and 900 employ
ees and grossing SIOO mil
lion annually.
Today Bruce Llewellyn is
the Chairman and a major
ity stockholder of the Phila
Another, little-publicized fact about those
who died is that a large number of the slain
church members were people of color. In
my opinion, the Waco situation raises consti
tutional issues that should be of serious
concern to the black community, and to
our Black leadership.
members were people of col
or. In my opinion, the Waco
situation raises constitution
al issues that should be of
serious concern to the black
community, and toour Black
leadership.
Unfortunately, the hear
ings have already incited a
lot of partisan strife in the
Congress. The Democrats,
with Rep. Charles Schumer
(D-NY) in the lead, are con
demning the hearings as
merely a Republican attempt
to embarrass the Clinton
Administration, and curry
favor with the National Rifle
Association, which has fund
ed many Republican cam
paigns. (The National Rifle
Association, however, has
been an outspoken and con
sistent critic of the agencies
targeted by the hearings: the
Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco
and Firearms.)
The hearings may reveal
that Bill Clinton,Janet Reno
and other White House staff
ers acted improperly, but in
two years since the Waco
tragedy, the Democrats in
Congress have shown virtu
ally no concern for those who
diedinthespectacularlybun
delphia Coca-Cola bottling
Company, which he bought
in 1983. Five years later he
bought the Coca-Cola bot
tling operation in
Wilmington, Delaware. The
Philadelphia Coca-Cola
Bottling Company has 1,000
employees with $290 mil
lion in sales annually.
Bruce Llewellyn’s busi
ness expertisé has not been
. confined %o the food and
beverage industries, how
ever. In 1986, he became
the principal stockholder
and chairman of the ABC
television network affiliate
in Buffalo, New York and
from 1989 until 1994 he
served as the chairman of
Garden State Cablevision,
Inc., one of the largest cable
systems in the country.
His public service career
gled Federal police assaults
on Waco. They seem more
interested in covering up for
the Attorney General and the
President than in discover
ing what really happened in
Waco. The conduct of the
BATF and the FBI in the
initial raid and subsequent
siege violated basic constitu
tional rights to due process,
religious liberty, and free
dom from unreasonable
search and seizure — issues
that the Democratic Party
used topretend tocareabout.
And yet not one Democrat —
not even the members of the
Congressional Black Caucus
— heeded the many pleas by
national organizations and
grassroots groups alike to
hold a serious congressional
investigation. .
Now the Republicans have
co-opted thisrighteousissue.
While they pursue their pre
dictable partisan agenda,
they will a * --+ ~ffard us
the opportunity to ass uie
questions we have about
what our government did at
Waco. Why did the ATF
choose the “dynamic entry”
tactic that unnecessarily en
dangered their own agents
3Y SORGMAN 7R THE CINCINNATI ENQUIRER
has continued throughout
hisbusiness career. In 1977
he was named president of
the Overseas Private In
vestment Corporation and
he currently serves as a
member of the President’s
Advisory Committee for
Trade Policy and Negotia
tion and is chairman of the
U.S.Small Business Admin
istration Advisory Council
on Small Business.
Inthe midst ofall his busi
ness accomplishments,
Bruce Llewellyn has always
maintained a commitment
to his community. The
founder and former chair
man of 100 Black Men, he
has played an important
role modeling and mentor
ing for many young black
men.
Bruce Llewellyn is living
proof that African Ameri
cans can excel in business
and, when giventhe chance,
can become successful en
trepreneurs. Now, if we can
only bottle his experience,
his gifts, his savvy and his
ability to overcome discrim
ination and stereotypes, eco
nomic development in the
African-American commu
nity could become a reality.
Then we’d have real black
power.
and innocent civilians? Why
didthe FBI use lethal CS gas
against civilians, including
women and children, when
it has been banned by inter
national treaty even for mil
itary use? Who gave Attor
ney General Janet Reno the
falseinformation about child
sexual abuse among the
Davidians? Why did the gov
ernment’s tanks keep ram
ming the Davidians’ home
until the walls and staircas
es collapsed, crushing peo
ple inside? Why did the gov
ernment bulldoze the site of
the fire, destroying evidence
of what happened there?
Rep. Schumer is obviously
too busy slamming the Na
tional Rifle Association (no
doubt to appease his own
political patrons and cam
paign contributors), to make
sure these questions are an
swered. But there is no good
reason why the CBC
shouldn’t weigh into the dia
logue and make sure the
hearings address the consti
tutional and human rights
concerns shared by our peo
ple.
In the next week I will be
visiting members of the
CBC in the company of two
Black women — Branch
Davidians who were at the
Waco compound and who
lost their friends and fami
ly in the tragic fire. Togeth
er we will urge these lead
ers to make sure that this
country receives a full ac
counting of what was done
by this government to the
people at Waco.