Newspaper Page Text
VoL 7, No. 20
Don King cleared
of any wrongdoing
Boxing promoter Don King
said he was very happy to be
cleared of any wrongdoing
concerning his suspended
United States Boxing
Championship tournament but
he was still worried by the fact
that false charges almost
destroyed his dream.
“It’s nice to be proven
innocent. I’m not surprised,
but I’m thankful that it’s now
coming to light King said.
“The thing that worries me
though is that they almost
Election to test Jackson’s
Black-white balancing act
By MARC LEVINSON
Pacific News Service
ATLANTA, Ga.,
Four years ago, before most
people had ever heard of
Jimmy Carter, Maynard
Jackson became the shining
symbol of the “new South” by
winning the mayor’s office in
Atlanta-the first Black mayor
of a major southern city.
Today, the symbol is
tarnished a bit-the same Black
sanitation workers who helped
elect him are now wearing
green T-shirts proclaiming
“Maynard’s word is garbage.”
But despite the opposition
from former supporters,
Jackson has accomplished what
few believed possible a short
four years ago: he has
consolidated a powerful
Ethel
Waters
Dies
\ ‘. 11
r ■
Ethel Waters
LOS ANGELES-Ethel
Waters, star of stage, screen,
vaudeville and radio for over
50 years, died Thursday, Sept.
I, at the age of 76.
Miss Waters, who became
internationally famous when
she introduced tie song,
“Stormy Weather” at the
Cotton Club in New York, has
appeared in many stage plays
and films. One of her most
famous roles was in the
Broadway production of
“Member of the Wedding.”
Another of her famous roles
was in “Mamba’s Daughters.”
Miss Waters was a nightclub
and vauderville blues singer
before she hit the “big time.”
In her latter years, she
became a gospel singer and was
a regular member of the Billy
Graham Crusade Team.
Miss Waters was bom Oct.
31, 1900, in a hovel in Chester.
See “ETHEL WATERS”
Page 6
Paine College Library
fl r Augusta, GA 30901
Augusta ixviiTH-iapiijrut
P.O. Box 953
destroyed a dream. I had a
dream to help young American
boxers. I wanted them to make
money and gain fame. They
deserve it. I almost lost that.
That’s frightening,” he said.
The tournament was being
backed by the American
Broadcasting Co. which put up
$1.5 million to establish.
United States Boxing
Champion is a tournament
promoted by King. The
network suspended the
coalition of the Black and
white power structures that
provides him with one of the
most solid political bases of
any metropolitan mayor in the
country.
Observers here predict that
Jackson, 39, will be a shoo-in
for a second term in Atlanta’s
October election.
His major opponents are
former city official Emma
Darnell, an outspoken Black
woman, and Fulton County
Commissioner Milton Farris,
who is white.
Among his chief
accomplishments, Jackson
proudly points to the solid
support of the downtown
business community, the
appointment of a Black police
commissioner under whose
tenure the crime rate has
dropped, and a series of
innovative programs designed
to revitalize the neighbor
hoods.
Says Comer Hawkins, a
conservative white stockbroker
who considered a race against
Jackson, “I’ve had a hard time
raising money. Everybody
seems to think Jackson’s got it
all locked up, and I think they
may be right.”
Jackson’s support in the
downtown business
community, which has always
Equal Education - the doors are
By BILL SIEVERT
Pacific News Service
Many Black Americans of
college age won’t be heading
off to campus this fall. And
that has more than a few Black
educators worried.
After a decade of increased
educational opportunities won
through the civil rights
struggles of the 19605, the
doors to higher education for
Blacks seem to be slamming
shut again. The result, many
educators fear, could be a
Festival to sponsor
Trinidad Steel band
The Augusta Black Festival,
Inc. will present the Trinidad
Steel Band in concert at the
Augusta College Performing
Arts Theater on Sunday. Sent.
18, at 6 p.m.
The Trinidad Steel Band has
played for the Kennedy
Family, former President
Lyndon Johnson and for
President Jimmy Carter’s
inauguration. The band has
worked with Sammy Davis Jr.,
Count Basie, Gloria Lynn, and
other artists. The band will be
seen this fall on a nationally
tournament last February
following a succession of
allegations of kickbacks,
incorrect ratings of fighters and
other charges. The allegations
against King and the
tournament began after
heavyweight boxer Scott
LeDoux lost a bout by a
controversial decision.
ABC appointed a special
investigator into the charges
who last week reported that
King was not guilty of any
wrongdoings.
played a decisive role in local
politics, has grown stronger
even as his base in the Black
community has wavered.
Richard Kattel, president of
the Atlanta Chamber of
Commerce and of the state’s
largest bank, Citizens and
Southern National Bank, has
taken a prominent public role
in fund-raising and campaign
activities.
“He has brought Black and
white citizens of Atlanta
together,” Kattel says.
“Maynard told me one time,
‘Dick, I don’t need the business
community get elected, but I
need the business community
to govern.’ We have the
opportunity to continue for
another four years that feeling
shared between the mayor and
the business community.”
Two years ago, Jackson
angered much of the business
community by insisting that
Blacks get a share of city
contracts. White firms bidding
on city projects were pushed to
demonstrate equal
employment practices.
Despite the controversy,
Black firms still have less than
three per cent of city
contracts, an increase from 0.5
per cent four years ago.
Dr. Charles King, a Black
theologian and race relations
serious reversal in the drive by
racial minorities to achieve their
slice of the American pie.
ARE STATISTICS MISLEADING
The Census Bureau recently
reported that, as of last fall,
Blacks comprised 10.7 per cent
of all American college
students, more than double the
4.6 percent level of 1966.
With Blacks representing
about 11 per cent of the U. S.
population, the figures seemed
to indicate that Black people
were finally achieving equality
televised program on
Educational Television.
The band’s repertoire ranges
from Broadway hits and
popular American tunes to the
Classics and popular music of
Trinidad.
Tickets are 51.50 for
students; $3.00 for adults; and
$5.00 for patrons. Tickets are
available at the Festival office
at 2061 Milledgeville Road.
Tickets may also be purchased
at Jack Levine’s Men’s Shop on
Broad Street. Call 724-9712
for further information.
September 8, 1977
I was just waiting for the
day that I was vindicated. I will
fight for the tournament’s
return and I don’t see any way
that ABC cannot give young
American fighters a chance to
gain fame and money.
“I’m proud to be
exonorated. The thing that
bothers me though is thinking
about how close one can come
to being destroyed even though
they haven’t done anything
wrong.”
-
7 , f L’
.*
K
Mayor Maynard Jackson
expert who often has been at
odds with the mayor, argues
that Jackson’s reelection is
necessary to preserve good race
relations in the city.
“Whatever Jackson’s
shortcomings, he has done
well, and so has the city,” King
says. “It is alive and kicking,
vibrantly so. To now hurl the
charge of ‘white sellout’ is to
deny the necessity for
Black-white coalitions.”
with whites in college
opportunities.
But Black educators are
charging that the statistics are
misleading. They point to
another statistic in the same
Census Bureau report: the
number of Black students
showed no increase between
the 1975 and 1976 academic
years.
In fact, the Federal Office
for Civil Rights reported last
year that the percentage of
undergraduate minority
students actually dropped in
seven states between 1972 and
1974, the last year for which
full statistics are available.
Os even greater concern, the
educators point out that Black
students are disproportionately
represented in two-year
community colleges and trade
schools, while they remain
drastically under-represented in
the more selective four-year
institutions.
And, as a result of the
controversial Bakke decision of
the California State Supreme
Court (now under appeal to
the U.S. Supreme Court) to
end the University of
California’s special admissions
program for minorities, the
number of Blacks applying to
the prestigious schools of law
and medicine has “declined
drastically,” according to
university officials.
U.C.-Berkeley sociologist
Harry Edwards, a Black
Charles Harris Charges
Dent fails residents
of second ward
i‘ Jt" %
Charles Harris, Sr.
Key Blacks planning
attack on ‘neglect’
By Charlayne Hunter-Gault
NEW YORK-In response to
what many Blacks believe to be
a worsening racial situation in
the United States, 15 Black
leaders met here yesterday and
agreed “to launch a
counterattack on the callous
neglect of Blacks, the poor and
America’s cities.”
Their statement of accord,
issued through James D.
Williams, National Urban
League spokesman, said that
“consenus issues of critical
concern” for the civil rights
leaders included “full
employment, rebuilding our
cities, welfare reform,
affirmative action, economic
development, and the
rejuvenation of moral and
social purpose in this nation.”
The purpose of yesterday’s
meeting, which was the first
since the 1960’s and was
intended to be the first in a
series of conferences, was to
coordinate the strategies and
closing
professor who recently won a
contentious battle for tenure,
notes that educational
obstacles for minorities persist
even in the highest ranks of
academe. His research reveals
that the number of Blacks o
the university faculty is
declining generally, and that
three-quarters of Black faculty
members are denied tenure,
compared to just 37 per cent
of whites.
NOT ‘WHO’ BUT WHERE’
Black students, the group
charges, are systematically
being “tracked” into cheap
community colleges and
trade-oriented schools, while
prestigious four-year colleges
remain as “elite” institutions
for middle-ar.d upper-class
whites.
“The real issue of access is
not who goes to college, but
who goes to college where,”
says Alexander W. Austin,
professor of education at
UCLA and author of “The
Myth of Equal Access in Public
Higher Education.”
His research shows that up
to 45 per cent of the Blacks
who enroll in some kind of
post-secondary institution
attend either a community
college or vocational school,
such as barber colleges or
See "EQUAL EDUCATION”
Page 6
Charles G. Harris Sr. told
the News-Review he does not
feel that City Councilman B. L.
Dent has represented the
second ward properly and that
is the reason he is running
against Dent in the Oct. 12
election.
Harris said he has no
animosity against Dent and he
thinks that Dent is “a
wonderful man.” But,Harris
added,“l don’t think Dent has
represented the people in the
second ward properly. It is
time for a change, and 1 think I
can do a better job.”
Harris, owner of Harris
tactics of the groups whose
leaders attended.
Numerous calls over the
years for a summit meeting of
Black leaders have been
blocked by conflicts over
strategy among the half-dozen
or so major organizations and
the lack of anyone to take the
lead. The last major
cooperative effort by Black
groups was the March on
Washington led by the late
Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King
Jr. in August, 1964.
ANNIVERSARY OF MARCH
“Yesterday marked the 14th
anniversary of the march on
Washington. Dr. King at that
time raised the proposition of a
dream for the nation,”
remarked the Rev. Jesse L.
Jackson after the meeting.
“Fourteen years later, the
challenge is to fulfill that
dream with economic parity
and political development.”
said Mr. Jackson, who was an
aide to Dr. King and is
president of Operation PUSH
(People United to Save
Humanity).
The meeting yesterday grew
out of Vernon E. Jordan Jr.’s
criticism in July of the Carter
Administration, which many
Blacks feel owes its existence
to their votes. Jordan attacked
the Administration for what he
saw as its failure to “launch a
massive attack on the problems
confronting Black people and
the cities in which they live.”
At the meeting in addition
to Mr. Jordan, were Benjamin
Hooks, the new executive
director of the National
Association for the
Advancement of Colored
People; Jackson; the Rev.
Joseph Lowery, head of the
Southern Christian Leadership
Conference, and
Representative Parren J.
Mitchell, chairman of the
Congressional Black Caucus.
Williams, the Urban League
spokesman, said as he was
handing out the formal
statement that a “rebirth of
what took place during the
60’s” is now under way, as a
result of this meeting.
The total strength was not
being completely utilized for
lack of this kind of
organization,” he said.
Others leaving the meeting
declined to elaborate on what
specific plans were made
because of a “lack of an agenda
at this time.”
NO SINGLE LEADER
Much of this attitude
apparently stemmed from the
leaders’ sensitivity to the
failure to hold such meetings in
Less Than 75% Advertising
Restaurant and Catering on
Laney-Walker Boulevard, paid
the SIOO campaign fee to Clerk
of Council Charles O. Phillips
prior to Tuesday’s council
meeting.
Harris is a retired teacher,
having taught in Richmond
County schools for 17 years. He
taught at Murphey Junior High
School before he retired.
Harris announced plans in
1968 to run for council, but the
Richmond County Board of
Education ruled it to be “a
conflict of interest” for a
teacher to serve on council, so
Harris dropped his candidac y.
Harris said Tuesday he wants
the past and the desire not to
put forward any one leader of
the civil rights movement.
Indeed, while Jordan’s
initiatives led to yesterday’s
meeting, which was held at the
headquarters of the National
Urban League at 500 East
62nd Street, he, too. seemed to
want to de-emphasize any
individual’s leadership role.
Moreover, Williams stressed
that at future conferences the
site and the presiding officer
would change from meeting to
meeting. There are no
permanent officers.
Williams also emphasized
that the existence of ongoing
coordination among the groups
“did not imply any restrictions
on the independence of
operations of the other leaders
or their freedom to pursue
their own programs in the
manner they deemed
appropriate.”
In addition to those already
mentioned, other participants
in yesterday’s meeting
included: M. Carl Holman,
president of the National
Urban Coalition; Dorothy 1.
Height, president of the
National Council of Negro
Women; Richard G. Hatcher,
head of the Conference of
Mayors and Mayor of Gary’,
Ind; the Rev. Leon Sullivan,
founder and chairman of the
Opportunities Industrialization
Center; Baynard Rustin,
president of the A. Philip
Randolph Institute; Berkeley
Burrell, president of the
National Business League;
Julius L. Chambers, president
Public works bill
$4 billion available
to local communities
The $4 billion Local Public
Works Bill (LPW) recently
passed by Congress is now
available to qualified local
communities. At least ten per
cent participation in this
program is assured through
contracts and sub-contracts to
minority vendors and
contractors by the U.S.
Department of Commerce.
The LPW program will be
discussed at a public meeting
sponsored by the Economic
Development Administration
(EDA), the Office of Minority
Business Enterprise (AMBE),
and the CSRA Business
League. The meeting is
to see urban renewal programs
for black neighborhoods
increased. Neighborhood
rehabilitation work is under
way in the Pinch-Gut and May
Park neighborhoods, Harris
said, but he added hewants to
see more work done in the
some of the other
neighborhoods as well.
Harris advocates walking
beat police to help curb drug
dealers and muggings. Police on
foot can better identify with
residents and businessmen and
spot potential trouble sooner
than officers in automobiles,
Harris said.
of the NAACf Legal Defense
and Educational Fund Inc.;
Jesse Rattley of the National
Council of Local Black Elected
Officials; Eddie N. Williams,
president of the Joint Center
for Political Studies; and
Coretta Scott King, president
of the Full Employment
Action Council, Martin Luther
King Center for Social Change.
Only two of those invited
did not attend the meeting.
They were Wallace D.
Muhammad, chief Eman of the
World Community of Islam in
the West, and Carlton
Goodlett, president of the
National Newspaper Publishers
Association.
One participant who did
respond briefly to questions
after the meeting was Mr.
Jackson, who said that this
loose coalition “could bring
effective pressure by coming
together and by putting into
perspective the agenda of our
pepole.”
“Carter has the message that
Blacks are dissatisfied with his
Administration,” he said,
adding that “we didn’t quite
put Nixon in office but we
would not settle for benign
neglect from him and we will
not settle for callous neglect”
from the Carter
Administration.
Jackson said that at some
future time various
representatives from the
organization within the
coalition would be confronting
Mr. Carter” with “an agenda
for jobs and the rehabilitation
of American cities.”
scheduled to begin at 7:30
p.m. in the Wallace Branch
Library Auditorium, 1237
Laney/Walker Blvd., Sept. 8.
Construction and
professional firms, and other
service related businesses will
have the opportunity to have
their questions answered
regarding work availability and
qualification requirements by
representatives from Economic
Development Enterprise and
the Office of Minority Business
Enterprise.
Call Harvey L. Johnson at
722-0994 for further
information.
25 c