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News-Review, August 19,1971 - THE NEWS-REVIEW i PUBLISHED EVERY THURSDAY i S3O Gwinnett Street - Augusta, Georgia Mallory K. Millender Editor and Publisher Mailins Address: Box 953 Augusta, Ga. Phone 722-4555 Application to mail at Second Class postage rate| is pending at Augusta, Ga. 30901 I SUBSCRIPTION RATES Payable in Advance One Year in Richrtiond County $2.50 tax incl. One Year elsewhere $3.00 tax incl. ADVERTISING DEPARTMENT Classified Advertising Deadline 12 noon On Tuesday Display Advertising Deadline 12 noon On Tuesday Office Hours -10:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. Mon. thru. Fri. Vwwww WPWWWWWW wwwwwwwJ Human Relations Commission Deserves Community Support At this week’s race relations seminar at Augusta College where the topic was “The Role of Local Government in Improving Community Relations,” the mayor was asked why he did not make regular tours through the black community so as to be better acquainted with the problems of blacks and to develop healthier attitudes between the mayor’s office and the Black citizenry as New York’s mayor Lindsay often does. Mayor Beckum replied that if Lindsay took better care of garbage collection in New York City he would be a better mayor. This response by the mayor was not a novel one. For, similarly, when our school officials visit our public schools they are usually more concerned with how much paper is on the floor than they are with the schools academic programs. Positive human relations is our greatest protection from social unrest - not bigger guns or more police. More guns and police also call for higher taxes and accomplish nothing. Positive human relations cost nothing and help to create an atmosphere wherein individuals can develop to their full potential and live at peace with each other. It is unfortunate that some of our leaders seem to place more value on clean floors and clean streets than they place on clean hearts and clean minds. Let us hope that the new Human Relations Commission will have the courage to take the aggressive leadership role that has been so long missing in our community. The Commission, without subpoena power, will be weak, of course. However, it is up to the well meaning citizens of Augusta-Richmond County to see that the Commission gets the community support that it so desperately needs and so richly deserves. GUEST EDITORIALS Divide And Rule Every day one can hear and read about "lazy Negroes who will not work, etc.". What are the facts? Billions of dollars are spent by the Federal government from tax funds for construction. Yet, Black citizens, many of whom are veterans who risked their lives for this Republic, are unable to get either training or jobs in the construction and building fields. The News-Review presents a special series of feature articles on this subject. P.I.C. NEWS By Stephen Clapp, Staff Writer The Labor Department’s minority hir ing plan to integrate the building trades unions have produced few new black con struction workers. In fact, whether in Washington or Philadelphia, Chicago or New York, Buffalo or San Francisco, min ority hiring plans fail to come to grips with most unions’ calculated policy of exclud ing outsiders and discriminating against blacks. What the hiring plans have done is increase animosity between blacks and the labor movement, which has been used to political advantage by mayors and gover nors. Some critics believe this is what the Nixon Administration intended all along. Bayord Rustin, director of the A. Philip Randolph Institute, recently called the Philadelphia Plan “part and parcel of a general Republican attack on labor” that includes embarrassing the unions and or ganizing public pressure against them “The advantages to the Republicans from this kind of strategy should be ob vious,” he states. “Nixon supports his friends among the corporate elite and hurts his enemies in the unions. He also gains a convenient cover for his anti-Negro policies in the South, and above all, he weakens his political opposition by aggravating the dif ference between its two strongest and most progressive forces—the labor movement and the civil rights movement.” As evidence of this thesis, there is Geo. Meany, president of the AFL-CIO, describ ing the Philadelphia Plan as “a concoction of a bureaucrat’s imagination” while Her bert Hill, national labor director of the NAACP denounces “racist hard hats (who) arc the potential street fighters of Amer ican fascism . . . acting with the support of both Nixon and Meany.” There are, of course, valid reasons for attacking discrimination in the building trades. Racial imbalance in the building trades is dramatic, and well-documented. Figures compiled by the Labor Department in 1967 showed that nation-wide there were only 61 black asbestos workers, or roughly one per cent of union membership. There were 33 black elevator constructors, 92 black sheet metal workers and 177 black lathers. In the laborer category, by contrast, blacks had 81,457 members, or roughly 30 per cent of union membership. Moreover, construction is a fast-grow ing industry that receives millions of fed eral dollars. Labor economists estimate that the industry will require a minimum of 800,000 additional workers over the next decade. Wages in the industry are high-, and construction should provide new job opportunities at good pay for large num- Page 2 Walking . WITH KgfM DIGNITY by ijL jjByLB AI IRBY (UNION LEADER’S GREED AND AVARICE ARE DRIVING INDUSTRY AND ORGANIZED LABOR OUT OF BUSINESS) American labor leaders are forcing entire segments of industry and their unions into idleness and bankruptcy. By demanding higher wages at every round of negotiation, they are pricing themselves out of the labor market. Foreign competition and mechanization are putting American workers into a production squeeze. Labor leaders must take a long hard look at the economic facts of life or organized labor as we know it today is doomed. The latest steel contract is a prime corroboration of my contention. The big price rise is the first result of a huge jump in wages. The labor peace reached recently will come at a high price to the economy and the hard-pressed steel industry, even to the steelworkers themselves. The big steel people lost no time in raising prices and passing it on to the consumers. The price boost is the largest ever made in one move. The price of steel was upped 8% on all steel products. These inflated prices will be passed on to cars, appliances, and many other items. There are more serious ramifications, than higher prices; there are economic pressures that probably will force reshaping of the entire industry, if it is to survive. It is the consensus of a commission composed of top flight economists, steel officials, financial analysts, and a group of conservative union members that the price rise inflicted dangerous psychological damage to the already creeping economic recovery. Mill executives fear a terrific slump and a ruinous drop in profits. John L. Lewis, the old tiger of the harassed mining industry, caused many industries to transfer to other fuel energy, by his bully-boy tactics, and left coal-mining almost bankrupt. Experience is a crazy teacher for the labor leaders in America. Now, the steelmakers are considering closing down some old mills, and phasing out of the least-profitable lines, also merging some of the smaller companies to Cut over-head expense, thus more men will be laid off. More Steelmen are thinking seriously of moving mills over-seas, where wages are low. (THE STEEL INDUSTRY IS GOING TO BE BRUTAL TO GREEDY LABOR TO OFF SET THE 1971 WAGE HIKE) A long-reach reduction will be coming from these various moves by the steel industry. One top official made this taut statement: “You will see one hell of a reduction in manpower over a period of time.” These predictions are based on the hard economics of this troubled industry. The industry’s chief negotiator, R. Heath Larry of the U.S. Steel, estimates that the current hike cost for hourly employees was up 15% for the first year of the three year pact, at a cost of 650 million dollars. The first year cost of the present contract would exceed the total 1970 profits of all the major steelmakers combined. That’s the reason that many furnaces that were banked in preparation for a strike will be practically dead for the next 10 to 12 weeks. As a result many thousands of steelworkers will not begin drawing the newly-fattened paychecks for a long time. The bers of unemployed or underemployed black workers. To maintain job security and high wages, craft unions in recent years have developed elaborate apprenticeship pro grams to limit the number of persons avail able to work. It can take longer to become a hardhat than it takes to become a doctor or lawyer. Even though most white con str-.ictii-n workers have never gone through an apprenticeship program—some have never even completed primary school many unions now require candidates to undergo four-or five-year apprenticeship programs before joining the union as journeymen. Official AFL-CIO policy is non discriminatory, but various local unions have adopted procedures that present oppor tunities for discrimination. Blacks are often subjected to a more extensive training pro cess than their white counterparts. Some apprenticeship programs only exclude minority candidates; others practice nepo tism. Still other apprenticeship committees Employ inappropriate or purely subjective tests. A graduate of a Washington, D.C. training program recently took the elevator constructors’ apprenticeship test. He was asked complex questions on air flow and ventilation. “None of us could have passed that test,” his instructor reported. Yet there is no way to determine whether white applicants were given the same examination. The elevator constructors union in Washing ton has 128 members, of whom 6 are black. When young blacks and Puerto Ricans taught by the Workers Defense League in New York City scored in the top 10 per cent of candidates for sheet-metal apprenticeship openings in 1965, the local unions threw out the results. The Workers Defense League had to take the union to court to get the applicants accepted. “The whole setup is designed to discourage black interest,” says Clifford Alexander, former head of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. “You try to con vince some black kids to go into a six-month preapprenticeship program, then four years of apprenticeship. It’s ridiculous. That kid is either going to go to college or sign on as a laborer.” Part 2 Next Week KNOW YOUR BLACK HISTORY by Larry Thompson Years before the American Revolution took place, a Black man named Crispus Attucks made his dash for freedom. Attucks, escaped from his master in Framingham, Massachussetts, September 30, 1750, just twenty years before he was killed in what is known as the “Boston Massacre”. Crispus Attucks, the first martyr of the American Revolution, was born around 1723 into slavery in Massachussetts. After’ escaping in 1750, he found work on the sea as a sailor. At the time of the American Revolution Attucks was forty-seven years old. The “Boston Massacre” of 1770 was significant because it was the first time the colonists openly showed their resentment and hostility to England’s oppressive taxation laws. The Massacre should be significant for another reason also it pointed out the ironic flight of the Americans struggling to free themselves from England’s oppression, while they were at the same time guilty of being oppressors of the Black race. Yet it was a Black man, who led these citizens in their attack against the British soldiers, at the risk of his own fife. Attucks was the first of 5 victims on that day. His fame was spread by the public funeral held for him days later, after a public procession from Faneuil Hall, where his body had lain in state. He and the other Blacks who participated in the “Boston Massacre” played an important role in starting the War, and Blacks played an equally important role in fighting the Revolutionary War. Thousands of Blacks flocked to the lines with hopes of gaining their freedom. Blacks served at Lexington and Concord. Lemuel Haynes, Samuel Craft, Pomp Blackman, Peter Salem, are only a few who were present there. At Breed’s Hill, usually referred to as the Battle of Bunker Hill, the British were attacking wave after wave, when Peter Salem, the hero of the day, shot Major Pitcairni, the British Commander, who I had urged the British troops onward by shouting, “The day is ■ ours.” ■ Prince Hall, the Black man who established the first Black B masonic Hall in America, also fought bravely at the Battle of B Bunker Hill. Others fought in that Battle: Pomp Fisk, Cuff B industry has ordered its section foremen to convey to the workers H words to this effect: “Look pals, we gave you the raise, now we E gotta shut down those old obsolete mills to pay for it.” Some I industry men see a repeat of the cut-back of the early 1960’s I when steel demands slumped after the 116 day strike in 1959. II Labor won these outrageous wage boosts, but since the national B. repercussion it’s running scared. £| In Youngstown, U.S. Steel temporarily closed its 2700-man I Ohio works, due to lagging orders; USW local officials were so B upset that they pulled political strings all the way to Washington. K Responding to their frantic appeal, their Congressman contacted B Rep. Wilbur Mills, head of the house Ways and Means Committee, B who persuaded U.S. Steel chairman to promise that the closing II would be only temporary. A chilling threat to the unions is the H possibility that American Steelworkers will establish mills abroad. IS Labor’s greed for exorbitant demand in wages without a I’: relative hike in production was the paramount reason for the B| companies to seek to move their mills outside the United States. B Armco Steel Corp, is far along on its building of a huge mill in E Australia. S USW with its 1.2 million members had better obey the simple B economic law of life or many thousands of these innocent, but H honest, workers will be on dole. ™ I WjOT AUGUSTA’S PIONEER I I Ww ALL BLACK programmed! I ™ RADIO STATION I THERE’S LOTS OF TALK GOING AROUND ABOUT COOKIES MR with black outsides and white insides...and radio EES STATIONS DOING GREAT THINGS FOR YOU... LET US GIVE YOU A FEW FACTS...WTHB RADIO HAS EH TAKEN MONEY OUT OF THE WHITE BUSINESSES AND THROUGH ITS BLACK PERSONEL RETURNED OVER UT BBT $250,000.00 INTO THE BLACK COMMUNITY. WHTB THROUGH IT’S HAPPY CLUB AND BUCK BUCKET CONTESTS HAS DISTRIBUTED MORE THAN $4,000.00 bMMM THROUGHOUT THE BLACK COMMUNITY. WTHB HAS JUST MB MH CARRIED A BUS LOAD OF YOUR CHILDREN TO ATLANTA tS MR RH FOR A “BRAVES” BASEBALL GAME. WTHB RADIO HAS ACTUALLY DONE THESE THINGS. WE DON’T TRY TO FOOL TMOgßfc. YOU. WHAT HAS ANY OTHER RADIO STATION DONE FOR YOU EXCEPT TALK? NOW IF YOU ADD IT ALL UP...YOU WILL SEE THAT IT COMES TO LOTS OF DOLLARS AND NO NON-SENSE. ■ I MONDAY THRU FRIDAY - LISTEN TO ALL THESE FAVORITES PLAYING ALL THE HITS .... Bf ALLYN LEE - SUNNY SOUL - MISS SOUL - HOWARD WADE Hayes, Salem Poor, and many, many more. The two Salems, Peter Salem and Salem Poor, distinguished themselves by performing “above and beyond the call of duty.” Poor was cited by fourteen officers for his conduct, bravery and galantry as a soldier. The Blacks served in nearly every capacity in the American Revolution. Black seamen, soldiers and pilots distinguished themselves in the Navy. One such man was Caesar Terront, who was pilot of the Virginia vessel, the “Patriot” and was cited for his bravery in action. Another was Captain Mark Starlin, the only Black captain in the history of Virginia. Starlin fought gallantly in this war for American freedom, making bold, daring raids on the British ships, only to be reclaimed as a slave after the war and died as a slave. There were Black undercover agents and spies. Two of the better known Black spies were Pompey and James Armistead. Pompey gained vital information by pretending to be ignorant. In 1799, he learned the British password in this manner, and thus played a significant role in the capture of Stony Point Fort in New York in 1799. Armistead, a Black man from Virginia, was instrumental in the trapping of Gen. Cornwallis. General Lafayette sent him to Cornwallis’ camp to obtain vital information of the battle plans and strategy. Armistead proved to be so successful as a spy that Cornwallis hired him to spy on Lafayette. So Armistead was free to move in and out of the two camps as he pleased, carrying vital information to Lafayette and false reports to Cornwallis. Career Training Institute LADIES TO BE TRAINED IN IBM KEYPUNCH. NO EXPERIENCE NECESSARY, WE TRAIN. ONLY SINCERE NEED APPLY. Call 724-0249 “THE COMPANY THAT CARES” WE TRY A LITTLE HARDER— —BECAUSE WE ARE BLACK !!! 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