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The Augusta News-Review, January 4, 1973 ■Walking, I I i I ■ Dignity i ■ Iby Al Irby . NATIONAL SPIRITUAL DECADENCE SEEMS TO STARE AMERICA IN THE FACE. PATHETICALLY THE UNITIATIVE PAYS THIS TURBULLENT CONDITION NO HEED. THE NATION’S VALUE SYSTEM IS RUNNING SCARED, THEY ARE BLAMING THE COUNTRY’S APATHY UPON THE SALACIOUS CONDUCT OF OUR LEADERS. AN EASTERN CARTOON, RECENTLY CORROBORATED THE SOPHISTRY OF THIS FALLACY.” A MAN SITTING AT A BAR, SAID, LOOK HERE, NIXON IS NO DOPE. IF THE PEOPLE OF AMERICA REALLY WANTED MORAL LEADERSHIP, HE’D GIVE THEM MORAL LEADERSHIP.” With the advent of “73” America must make a bold attempt to revitalize itself spiritually. There will be a concerted effort, this year of all the major religious faiths to strengthen the moral fiber of the nation. The national sickness is not just in the central cities, and ghettoes. Depravity and hypocritical immorality are rampant in government and even global industrial conglomerates. This anticipated ecclesiastical project will need dedicated zeal to put this nation back on a moral even-keel. There is little we can tell our young people, until there is sincere penitence among all the segments of our nation. President Nixon attributes this great spiritual crisis to the failure of upper-middle-class leaders to adapt the old values to changing times. A point that touches upon this premise was brought forth in a recently broadcasted sermonby Rev. C.S. Hamilton of Tabernacle Church. The perspicacious clergy made this statement in essence: He exhorted, “that educated blacks should get involved in the black community action.” This was a pithy suggestion that certainly should be heeded. Too long has the black “talented tenth” utilized its skills and training only as tools to become affluent. The black communities have become human cess-pools of glaring iniquity. The embryonic black family ties are just about impotent. Teen-age gangs are on the up-rise, especially in black communities. Chicago gangs are receiving grants from certain “Foundations.” These gangs of young hoodlums are preying upon senior citizens by simply strong-arming the elder people and taking their money ard welfare checks. Also ghetto parents are afraid to send their children to the stores; these human vultures beat-up kids after robbing them, and dare the parents to report them to the police. (PROVE WHO IS THE BADDEST - - AND DIE) The Watts district of Los Angeles is a typical city, that is infested with these gun-toting teen-age gangs. In spite of the millions of dollars spent there for recreation and rehabilitation since the 1965 riot, this community has become an asphalt jungle. The gang killings have parents forming vigilante committees, and organizing armed patrols. The young thugs brag about their bloody pranks and threaten the relatives of the victims, if they go to the police. Almost every day someone is shot; and the worst part is that the bad ones really dig the bloody mayhem. The killings jokingly are called the baddest. (THE WHITE COMMUNITIES DO NOT ESCAPE FROM THIS JUVENILE PI AGUE - CRIME AND SIN ARE COLOR BLIND) The concern of the nation’s deterioration of it s moral values are non-racial and bipartisan. Nixon’s enemies agree that moral and spiritual break down engulf the nation, and they see the president as its image. The Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton lambast Nixon’s Prayer Breakfasts as sacrilegious. Dr. Robert N. Bellah, an authority on the sociology of religon at the Institute, explodes with indignation at the President’s religious hypocrisy, when he pretended to be a man of morality, at the same time he turned his B-52s loose against a tiny country attempting to flatten it into national obscurity. Herman Kahn, director of the Hudson Institute Inc., a New York think tank, asserts in an interview in Intellectual Digest: “As a nation we have grown fat, indolent, and apathetic, we try to twist the truth and right to suit our fancy.” The Hudson Institute has made a heroic effort to determine the character of the nation as a whole, thus providing many clues to the decadence. The results were recently published in the “Forgotten American.” A comprehensive survey of values, beliefs, and concerns of the majority. (THERE IS MUCH RATIONALIZING ABOUT THE SORDID CONDITION OF THE NATION) The Supreme Court’s Gault decision in 1967 gave juveniles all of the Constitutional rights afforded to adults, which turned formerly custodial and guidance oriented juvenile proceedings into traditional courtroom adversary proceedings. Another High Court decision greatly increased the rights of probationers. Law fficials are confused about what to do with youthful hoods and killers. There . re critics of the police and the cour s, but these young criminals understand the ineffectiveness, and the confusion of the juvenile systems. The cops can arrest a known killer, and take him downtown, and he’ll be back on the street the same day. (TODAY’S KIDS WHO 1 NK THEY HAVE ALL THE ANSWERS TO LIFE-ALSO jEAL IN DEATH) The rash of kill gs do not have any set patterns, not against the school systems, or fights for control of neighborhoods; or even attempts to corner the flourishing drug traffic. The situations are similar all over the nation; generally, the larger the city, the larger the number of gangs, and greater the butchery. Los Angeles police have recorded 19 major gangs with better than 2,000 members. The names of these honor groups are interesting and revealing: Brims, Bounty Hunters, Ace Deuce, Godfathers, Hoover Groovers, Vikings, and Cripples are just a few. Are we doomed as a civilized society? Maybe the answer and the solution can be found in the Christ Child, whose philosophy of “LOVE” has never been seriously applied - not sitting piously in Church on Sunday, but lived in the everyday market-place. BLACK POWER is in the voting box this year. Page 2 department of f BLACK MEMBER OF U. S. PAROLE BOARD VETERAN OF CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM “I’ve had enough of prison life. I want to go home.” “My wife and children need me at home. I don’t belong here.” “I’ve learned my lesson. I want to get out of here.” These are typical of the remarks Curtis C. Crawford hears every time he visits a Federal prison as one of the eight members of the U.S. Department of Justice’s Board of Parole. On a recent trip to the Federal penitentiary in Atlanta, he heard 116 pleas for parole. “I can only hear one case at a time and I judge each case on its individual merits,” Mr. Crawford explains. “This is one business in which two plus two doesn’t necessarily make four. There are no set standards by which you can judge whether an individual is ready to return to society because he or she falls in a certain criteria.” Regardless of their pleas for freedom, the inmates have learned in dealing with Mr. Crawford that they can’t “con” the man with the thin mustache and the affable smile. Mr. Crawford is not boasting when he says he has heard most of the stories prisoners tell in trying to win their IB V ' < Crawforf Chances are good that if Mr. Crawford didn’t hear the plea as a defense attorney while in private law practice in St. Louis, he probably heard it as a prosecutor. He was trial attorney in the St. Louis Circuit Attorney’s office from 1956 to 1964, serving as chief assistant for two years. If he missed the story as a prosecutor or defense attorney, he got a third chance while serving as a provisional judge in St. Louis’ Court of Criminal Corrections. “I feel I have a better than average background to review parole applications.” Mr. Crawford says. “I am familiar with police, FBI reports, and all phases of legal proceedings. So when I see a man’s record, I have a pretty good idea of his background. I don’t have to leave too much to assumption or misconception.” Os the eight members on the Board, only Mr. Crawford and Mrs. Paula A. Tennant have law degrees. But Mr. Crawford feels he has another advantage: he is the only black on the Board. “I firmly believe that a black is in a position to understand the problems of blacks,” he says. U.S. Bureau of Prisons statistics show that there are some 5,250 blacks among the more than 21,500 inmates in Federal institutions. “You ought to see their faces light up when they see me,” Mr. Crawford says. “They probably feel that a black man can understand them better, and to a certain point they are right. It’s true that blacks speak English, but out in the ghetto, you know, we speak a THE AUGUSTA NEWS-REVIEW PUBLISHED EVERY THURSDAY Mallory K. Millender Editor and Publisher Mailing Address: Box 953 Augusta, Ga. Phone 722-4555 Second Class Postage Paid Augusta, Ga. 30901 SUBSCRIPTION RATES Payable in Advance One Year in Richmond County $5:00 tax incl. 6 Months $2.50 tax incl. Ohe Year elsewhere $6.00 tax incl. ADVERTISING DEPARTMENT Classified Advertising Deadline 12 noon on Tuesday Display Advertising Deadline 12 noon On Tuesday News Items Printed Free different kind of language. If you are black and you were brought up there, it helps to understand their cases.” Mr. Crawford was appointed by President Nixon to the $35,480 post on November 9, 1970. He is the third black to serve on the Board of Parole. The other black members were Scovell Richardson and Homer Benson, who served from 1955 to 1958, and 1962 to 1969, respectively. Mr. Crawford doesn’t mince words when he says that more blacks and other minority members are needed in all areas of corrections. Pointing to the Attica, N.Y., prison riot in 1971, he says, “More than half of the inmates were black, yet there were few black guards or counselors. It’s only fair that we should have more minorities represented in the corrections system.” Mr. Crawford notes that the Board of Parole releases about 45 per cent of the eligible inmates, a record of which he is proud. “We hear much of some few inmates returning to prison, but we don’t hear of the thousands who make good back in society.” he adds. Working toward the betterment of minorities is nothing new for the 51-year-old lawyer. Before being appointed to the Board of Parole, he was district director of the Small Business Administration (SBA) office in St. Louis. He recalls that four months before his appointment, the office had processed only nine loans. In the ensuing sixonths, the office processed 161 “and is still doing a great job as far as I know.” He also served as director of the Legal Aid Society of the city and county of St. Louis. A graduate of West Virginia State College, Mr. Crawford obtained his law degree from Lincoln University in 1951. An unsuccessful candidate for circuit attorney in 1964 and for Congress in 1968, he admits he loves the political arena and hopes to return to it some day. In the meantime, he says he “thoroughly enjoys” his job as a member of the Board of Parole “simply because I know I can do a good job at it.” He and his wife, Joan, have a son and a daughter. JUSTICE DEPARTMENT ACTS TO SECURE MISSISSIPPI PENITENTIARY REFORMS WASHINGTON - The U.S. Department of Justice has helped inmates of the Mississippe State Penitentiary obtain a landmark court decision for reform of the institution, Attorney General Richard G. Kleindienst said today. According to a recent ruling by a Federal district judge in Mississippi, racial segregation at the penitentiary violated the Fourteenth Amendment and substandard conditions constituted cruel and unusual punishment, a violation of the Eighth Amendment. More than 1,3000 of the 1,900 inmates at the correctional facility are black. To remedy the , situation, Justice Department lawyers will present comprehensive proposals to the court at a conference scheduled for October 16 by the Federal judge, Willian C. Keady. The judge’s ruling resulted from a year-long investigation of the prison by the Justice Department after inmates filed suit against the State of Mississippi. West Point, Mississippi; a tavern in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida; a restaurant in Labadieville, Louisiana; and a case in Saluda, South Carolina. Signing consent decrees agreeing to provide equal service to all patrons were the owners of the Ft. Lauderdale tavern and the Saluda case, and a case in Camden, Alabama, which had been sued earlier by the Department. Based on the voluminous evidence assembled by the Justice Department’s new Institutions and Facilities Section of the Civil Rights Division, the court found that black inmates are discriminated against in work assingments, vocational training, and punishment. In addition, the court found that housing, sanitary facilities, food, and medical treatment are inadequate and that armed inmate trusties are used as guards. The Justice Department proposal will deal with charges in mail censorship, disciplinary procedures, corporal punishment, maximum security confinement, racially discriminatory practices, and inmate trusty assignments. Housing first offenders with persons convicted of violent crimes also will be dealt with, as well as medical and house-keeping practices. The Mississippi case was the Justice Department’s first effort to obtain reforms at a penal institution based on constitutional grounds. The Justice Department was also involved in a variety of other civil rights activities last month, Mr. Kleindienst said. CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS Six law enforcement officials were charged during September with imposing a summary punishment on citizens in violation of their constitutional rights. FAIR HOUSING A corporation that owns or manages 17 apartment complexes containing more than 600 units in Orange County, California, signed a consent decree to expand apartment rental opportunities for blacks. The decree enjoins the corporation from engaging in any racially discriminatory Federal grand juries indicted the white mayor of Wellston, Missouri, on a charge of beating a black man he arrested; the white chief of police of Morton, Mississippi, on charges of shooting a black college student and beating a white minister; a white Texas highway patrolman on charges of beating a white man he arrested; and the former chief of police of Questa, New Mexico, on a charge of beating a Mexican-American. In addition, a white policeman in Catoosa, Oklahaoma, was charged in a criminal information with blackjacking a white man. PUBLIC ACCOMMODATIONS The Justice Department filed six suits last month to eliminate racial segregation in places of public accommo dation. The defendents were owners of a roller skating rink in Plant City, Florida; a case in Magee, Mississippi; a truck stop in housing practice and from failing to recruit and hire employees without regard to race. The Justice Department also charged a Chicago suburban board of realtors and two of its member firms with violating a 1970 court order designed to eliminate discrimination against black home buyers. A government motion said the real estate firms honored racial preferences of home sellers and steered black and white buyers to areas in which their races are predominant. The Department of Justice filed a consent decree today requiring a North Carolina trucking firm to make SIIO,OOO in back payments in an employment discrimination case. Attorney General Richard G. Kleindienst said the consent decree was entered in U. S. < District Court in Greensboro,, North Carolina, resolving a suit against Pilot Freight Carriers,’ Inc. < Pilot operates in 13 states < and has its headquarters in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. It has 2,500 < employees. < The Justice Department filed a civil suit against the 1 trucking company on June 28, 1971, charging that blacks were discriminated against in hiring, transfer and promotion policies. The consent decree requires Pilot to distribute the back pay to some 125 blacks, most of whom were rejected job applicants, and to offer jobs to those who were rejected. In addition, the company is required to allow qualified black employees to transfer to higher paying road-driving jobs and to fill future road-driving vacancies with an equal number of black and white employees. The International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Warehousemen and Chauffeurs, a defendant in the original suit, is not a party to the consent decree. Seniority issues affecting the union will be decided by the court. Four New Jersey men were indicted by a federal grand jury on civil rights charge today in the beating of a Black patron at an all-night diner in Newark last September 30. Attorney General Richard G. Kleindienst said a two-count indictment was returned in U.S. District Court in Newark. Indicated were Robert Bisaccia, 37, and Nicholas P. Stefanelli, 30, both of Belleville; Sam L. Corsaro, 30, of Nutley; and Louis Fulco, 20, of Bloomfield. They were charged with assaulting Robert L. Chavers, 36, at Ed’s Diner. Nine stitches were required to close a cut on his forehead. One count charged them with conspiring to injure and intimidate Chavers in the free exercise of his legal right to use the facilities of a public place. The other count charged them with carrying out the conspiracy. The maximum penalty upon conviction is 10 years in prison and a SIO,OOO fine on each count. WANTED NEWS BOYS Good Pay CALL News—Review Office 722-4555 | SUBSCRIBE | TODAY ■ 111 THE AUGUSTA NEWS-REVIEW P. O. BOX 953 AUGUSTA, GEORGIA 30903 Eg* SUBCRIBER |T| ADDRESS 111 CITY ______ —- One year (in county) ssioo -'j One year (out of county) $6.00 I jk 5 years (in County) $20.00 5 years (out of county) $25.00 TO BE iBHKSi EQUAL NEW YEAR SHOULD BE NEW BEGINNING by Vernon E. Jordan, Jr. The year 1972 ended in much the same spirit of confusion in which it began. It was a year that brought few victories to black people and to other minorities, and some setbacks. It was a year that saw the nation adrift, without that sense of purpose that has categorized other, better years in its history. The mood of drift and confusion was highlighted by a Louis Harris poll that reported early in December that over four in ten Americans “still feel largely alienated toward the system under which they live.” The poll found large numbers of Americans afflicted with feelings of powerlessness and of being exploited. Such feelings ran strongest among several key groups in the population - young people, union members, poor people, and blacks. No country can afford such widespread alienation, least of all a country with such tremendous world-wide responsibilities and impact as the United States has. But instead of taking steps to relieve the divisions in our society, many events in the past year only reinforced them. Instead of concentrating its energies on improving education and on creating new job opportunities, the nation became obsessed by| such artificial issues as busing and quotas. Many of the country’s actions seemed out of touch with reality. For example, unsubstantiated reports of racial killings by a black murder gang were headlined for many days a few months ago. We are still waiting for any evidence of truth to such malicious allegations. But while this was a leading topic for the media, the real truth about racial violence came toward the close of the year, when a blue-ribbon investigating panel found that two black youths had been killed at Southern University through the irresponsible actions of police officers. The next day, New York City’s Commission on Human Rights reported that there was a dangerous pattern” of violence against blacks in some sections of the city. This confirms what observers have often noted - that the North is showing signs of adopting some of the pathological signs of racism it had long charged the South with showing. In 1972, the biggest outbursts against school desegregation were in Michigan and New York, not in Alabama and Mississippi. While the nation seems to be slipping away from its past commitment to racial justice, the problems are still with us and are still in desperate need of resolution. I was reminded of how much unfinished business there is still before us while attending the ceremonies and symposium commemorating the opening of the civil rights archives of The Lyndon Baines Johnson Library in Texas, last month. There, many people active in the civil rights movement, in law, the social sciences and politics, tried to assess the accomp lishments of the 1960’5. Some very great things were done in those few short years - official segregation was abolished, significant economic and political advances were made by minorities, etc. But the atmosphere of the nation has changed so drastically since that time that it seemed as if we were discussing an era long past. As we enter 1973, I believe there will have to be a determined effort to recapture, if not the specifics, then at least the mood of the 1960’5. The new year should mark a new beginning, a rededication to the goals of freedom and justice for all. The spiritual vacuum must be filled by concern for the problems of poverty, of racial disadvantage, and social progress. The reason for the drift and confusion among so many people is their perception that the society is rigid and unwilling to make the constructive changes so necessary and so long overdue. We enter 1973 divided and troubled but firm leadership, a rediscover of democratic values, and definite action to deal with our real problems, can help turn that attitude around. It’s time to start fresh.