
          Black Political Participation in the 1980's: Challenged by
Conservatism
          By Willingham, AlexAlex Willingham
          Vol. 4, No. 4, 1982, pp. 5-11
          
          Assessing the state of black politics today requires a
fundamentally different approach from what would have been appropriate
even ten years ago. For one thing we have the administration of Ronald
Reagan which seeks to curb federal policies designed to promote racial
advancement. For another, there has been a significant increase in
black political power throughout the country.
          We are now confronted with new problems: the recruitment and
staying power of black candidates; performance in public office; rates
of participation among the general black population, and white
response to the exercise of political authority by blacks. Where, in
years past, American liberalism has pegged the quality of its racial
commitment to its own ability to deliver (i.e., through appeals to the
national conscience and through federal enforcement), now the vitality
of American liberalism itself is dependent on the effective
participation of this newly enfranchised group.
          Nowhere has the change been more dramatic than in the American
South, long the laboratory for creating structures to retard equal
participation and still the symbol of white supremacy in
politica. During the 1970's, Atlanta, Memphis and Houston each sent
blacks to Congress. In each case the election reflected successful
coalitions and broke patterns that had prevailed since
Reconstruction. From beyond these Southern cities came a further
message. Important changes began to appear in the towns and rural
places where hard-core opposition to black participation remains and
where the appeal of white racial politics has been strongest.
          
            Reagan's Radicalism
          
          The potential of black politics must be understood against an
uncertain background in which levels of participation stand to be
lowered by threats to the rules that are supposed to protect and
reward participation. The Reagan Administration's threats represent a
single-minded effort to radically redirect the energies of
government. Insofar as this effort succeeds, civil rights enforcement
will suffer. Clearly, the President intends to lead the federal
government out of its established role in promoting equal
opportunity.
          Reagan's actions reverse a trend in executive behavior going back
at least to Executive Order Number 8802--a wartime measure signed by
Franklin Roosevelt prohibit-

ing discriminatory hiring by federal
defense contractors. Over the next four decades the role of the
federal executive remained integral to the liberalization of race
relations. It was a forceful complement to Congressional legislation
and court decisions and resulted in a formidable array of orders, laws
and decisions. Signed by Lyndon Johnson during his presidency,
Executive Order Number 1124 updated and expanded the earlier Order and
created the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs
(OFCCP). The first direct action on civil rights by the Reagan
Administration was to weaken the OFCCP.
          Characteristically, the New Right and the Reagan candidacy
recognized the systematic forcefulness of civil rights
protections. During the presidential campaign and the transition
period, special attention was devoted to developing a nullification
strategy which did not overlook the "civil rights establishment."
Consequently, there was a successful effort to place into key
executive positions people who accepted the charge to dismantle the
enforcement mechanism.
          
            Is Ronald Reagan a Racist?
          
          The retreat from enforcement is qualitatively different from the
espousal of crude white race supremacy. The Administration claims that
the status of American minorities is a by-product of the economy. Once
formal assumption of biological equality is made, so the argument
goes, no strictly racial attention is necessary. A troubled economy
becomes the reason for citizen dissatisfaction. Salvation of that
economy means less government activity. "Supply side" economics
describes government activity as intrusive and burdensome. Because the
growth of public agencies is seen as intrinsically negative,
maintenance of adequate enforcement activity is inconsistent with the
desired limited government. By this line of reasoning, matters of race
decline in significance; racial preoccupation is made to seem
juvenile. In black studies this is the familiar argument associated
with Booker T. Washington and other New- South spokesmen who used it
to rationalize their accommodation to the disfranchisement of black
citizens at the turn of the century.
          Yet for all of their diminution of the importance of race, the
Reaganites operate with a definite view about the status of black
citizens. They believe that white institutional leaders--including
those in the South--have. cleansed themselves of prejudice and will
hire, for example, qualified persons without regard to
race. Reaganites also make a harsh distinction within the black
population itself. They claim that we should be less concerned about
race because of the number of successful blacks who are now gaining
jobs, promotions and decision-making responsibility before whites with
the same qualifications. That experience shows, they say, a perverse
benefit black Americans now enjoy because of past racism. They are
aware of the multitudes of poor blacks who have not cracked the elite
world of work and play. But, they say, this results from slovenliness,
poor work habits and lack of competitive drive--the legacies of
slavery and of the false promises from the welfare state. To mount
effective opposition to Administration policies it is important to
recognize their deceptive mixture of half-truths and
distortions. Reaganite rationales do not disturb white race supremacy
but are disarming because they appear to be "non-racial."
          
            Reagan's Plan of Attack
          
          An administration so intent on taking government out of the
business of race relations pursues a variety of tactics. In the past
two years these have included budgetary cutbacks, deregulation,
dismissal of seasoned civil rights officials, and the withholding of
leadership. In responding to the Reagan challenge, I want to focus
attention on three areas of domestic policy: revision of federal
implementing regulations; weak or selective enforcement of the Voting
Rights Act, and extension of the block grant method of providing
federal support to local government. The first of these--federal
regulations--involves the classic role of the federal government in
civil rights enforcement. The other two differ in that they have
direct implications for the quality of participation at local
levels. They are especially significant in our expectations about the
future of black participation.
          Implementing Federal Regulations. Immediately after the November
1980 election, the Reagan Administration suspended Carter-approved
regulations in the Department of Labor that had been designed to
strengthen the OFCCP's affirmative hiring program. A "full review" of
OFCCP regulations resulted in the not unpredictable conclusion that
there was a need to reduce the compliance burden. In August 1981,
Ellen M. Shong, Reagan's appointee to head OFCCP, issued substitute
regulations that were designed to weaken the agency's power in civil
rights work. During the first two years, the Administration, working
through Shong, has held back on previously approved regulations and
issued new ones in employment, child labor and rulemaking itself that
if approved, would limit federal enforcement.
          Perhaps the boldest move of the Administration was in January 1982,
with its support of tax-exempt status for racially segregated
education. This move reversed a twelve-year policy and demonstrated
that traditional advocates of racial segregation (e.g., Trent Lott,
Strom Thurmond, and Jesse Helms) would have a strong voice 

on racial
policy. The move was particularly disheartening to those Reagan
apologists who had proclaimed him more innocent than mean on racial
matters.
          Along with the revision of existing regulations comes lax
enforcement even when the regulations remain intact. At the
U.S. Office of Revenue Sharing, for example, very effective
regulations bar discrimination by local governments that receive
revenue sharing money. These are nullified, however, by soft
enforcement attitudes.
          The revision of regulations not only shows the seriousness of the
Reaganites--they leave no stone unturned--it dovetails well with
so-called "racially neutral" de-regulation and thus avoids the more
difficult task of acting directly to repeal civil rights
legislation.
          Selective Enforcement of the Voting Rights
Act. From the beginning months of the new Administration it
appeared that New Right conservatives would make the Voting Rights
extension a test of their effectiveness. Portions of the Act were
scheduled to expire in 1982. What finally happened is illustrative of
the politics of deception.
          From the President on down there were early and forceful statements
of support for the Act. Reagan himself was heard to support a simple
ten-year extension. Parallel to these public statements of support was
a well-defined move to take the teeth from the Act by opponents within
the Administration and their allies. Three tactics were planned:
calling for application of the Act nationwide, thereby creating an
administrative nightmare; amending its Section Five to include an easy
"bailout" provision to allow local governments to exempt themselves
from the Act; and amending Section Two so that remedies to citizens
suffering from discrimination in local government could only be
provided if such victims could prove an intent in the action.
          Passage of these amendments in any combination would have
undermined the Act while allowing politicians to appear to support
it. In time the President dropped his original position in favor of
the more devious tactic.
          These maneuverings failed to prevent extension of the Act. Early,
persistent and generally unified lobbying action by civil rights
groups, thorough hearings in the House, and key compromises by
moderate Senators overcame the opposition. Reagan signed an extension
into law that may make the Act more effective in removing racial
barriers.
          Extension of an amended Voting Rights Act kept in place the most
crucial portion of civil rights legislation having to do with
political participation. The problem has become one of selective
enforcement. In several cases where local jurisdictions were charged
with violations of the Act, the Justice Department has either
abstained or actually supported the offending government. Take, for
instance, the Mobile, Ala., case in which Senator Jeremiah Denton
sought to censor the wording of the government's position against the
city. The Administration responded to Denton's interference by making
the changes he wanted.
          In Edgefield County, South Carolina, where county commissioners
changed to an at-large system of elections, the local blacks objected,
saying the plan diluted black voting strength. The Justice Department
agreed with these citizens and prepared to support them in federal
court. Yet on the eve of the court appearance, the Department was
ordered not to proceed with its case. This time in deference to
Senator Thurmond.
          Another situation involved Burke County, Georgia. Here, Justice was
preparing to make a dramatic move. Both the federal district court and
the appeals court had ruled that the at-large system in Burke was
unconstitutional. The Justice Department had entered the case before
the appeals court with extensive argument against the Burke
system. The Burke County case reached the Supreme Court after the
first Mobile decision. It attracted extraordinary attention as an
occasion to get some clarification of the Court's very divided opinion
in Mobile. Between the appeals hearing (which was argued before Reagan
took office), and the Supreme Court argument, Justice not only
withdrew from the Burke case, but initiated efforts to present an
argument in support of the county--a contradiction of its earlier
position. Ultimately, Justice abstained from joining the case at the
Supreme Court level.
          Just where the Justice Department decides to place its support has
enormous importance for the success of cases brought to challenge
discrimination in the electoral process. Usually these cases pit local
black civic groups against city or county officials. And even though
local citizens do often get support from other groups--Legal Services,
the ACLU, the Southern Poverty Law Center, or, less often, from the
private bar--they never have the resources available to their
adversaries who have direct access to the public dole. Because some
measure of equity is brought when the Justice Department's resources
are involved, decisions not to support the victims of discrimination
may result in the persistence of prejudicial systems.
          Block Grants and New Federalism. If defeat of
the Voting Rights Act would have resulted in less pressure upon local
officials who discriminate, the block grant concept means more power
to them. The central characteristic of the block grant system is the
removal of oversight of how federal funds are spent by local
governments. At present these proposals have not evolved into a
coherent national policy. There are, however, five features in an
emerging structure:
          1) Block grants already approved by Congress. Although there is
some confusion on the exact number of these, the programs are outlined
in the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1981 (Public Law
97-35). Examination of the Act shows that Congress has approved at
least eight block grants.
          2) Block grants selected for implementation by the states. States
had a year in which to decide whether to choose any given block grant
program.
          3) The Primary Care Block Grant and the Education Block Grant
scheduled to go into effect in fiscal 1983.
          4) A new round of block grants proposed in the Reagan fiscal 1983
budget.
          5) The whole "New Federalism" proposal initially outlined in the
1982 State of the Union speech. There has been some action on this
proposal--including negotiations with local officials and hearings in
the Senate--but the final outcome has not been settled.

          The civil rights implications of block grant proposals are
several. Not only would block grants undercut the use of federal funds
as an inducement to end discrimination in local communities, they
would enhance the power of local politicians who continue to
discriminate. A state by state, crazy-quilt pattern of administration
will inevitably result, adding to the burden of community-based groups
and weakening national advocacy groups who have been accustomed to
centralized lobbying in the relatively friendly confines of
Washington. These factors may well result in effective denial of
benefits to eligible populations.
          In general, block grants now in place are covered by the provisions
of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 which forbid
discrimination in the use of federal funds. However there is really no
"Block Grant Civil Rights Provision," as such. Nondiscrimination
provisions are included in the separate grants already approved with
the exception of Social Services and Education. Yet in Title XVII of
the Act, where there is general language governing all block grants
(e.g., audit requirements, public hearings, state plans,
certification), there is no nondiscrimination language--a troubling
and perhaps telling oversight.
          In proposing the 1982 New Federalism plan, the Administration
indicated a willingness to funnel federal money through the Office of
Revenue Sharing. That would subject funds to model civil rights
provisions and an experienced investigative staff. Such a tactic would
be important in addressing the problem of detailed enforcement
procedures but would leave open the question of the adequacy of
enforcement resources. Limited enforcement resources plague ORS
already and would surely grow with the administrative changes under
New Federalism.
          Insofar as block grants are concerned, we are
somewhere out in the stream between the fading categorical grant forms
and a New Federalism on yonder shore. New Federalism avoids the
appearance of meanness; it taps the rhetoric of pure democracy and
engages our emotions about the beauties of local control. Yet the
enhancement of a local authority which does not measure up to national
standards of openness or of fairness in the delivery of services is
irresponsible.
          
            The Ghost of Federalism Past
          
          New Right ideologues who decry the role of public expenditures
should look at the way local governments have often used federal
resources in violation of the spirit of the programs. Local
communities receiving community development block grants or Farmers
Home or Urban Development Act Grants (UDAG) have found ways to go
about spending these monies without providing equal services to their
constituencies. Sometimes this has entailed dubious participation
schemes involving low-income blacks who had no real understanding of
the programs or the process.
          In one town I worked in, personal efforts to check the level of
participation of black members listed on the town's Community
Development Block Grant Advisory Committee drew puzzled looks and
blank responses. Yet an application had been made for the entitled
money, it had been approved and nearly a half-million dollars had been
spent. William Boone and I found a similar level of non-participation
among minority "members" of multi-county planning and development
(A-95 Review Agencies) throughout the Southeastern states.
          If the track record is so bad in programs such as these where
minority and low-income participation is mandated, it is only
reasonable to expect the same or worse in block grant programs with a
minimum of regulation. In General Revenue Sharing that, indeed, has
been the case. Local governments have used this money for a variety of
schemes of little benefit to their low-income citizens. The Civil
Rights Division of the U.S. Office of Revenue Sharing had a 1981
backlog of over thirteen thousand complaints concerning misuse of
money nationwide. The experience of the Revenue Sharing Enforcement
Project of the American Civil Liberties Union suggests that the number
of complaints would be substantially higher in Southern towns if the
regulations were well-known among local groups.
          
            The fact is that local governments have been
beneficiaries of unrestricted funds for nearly a decade and have shown
little real commitment to, or imagination for, using this money to
redress accumulated inequalities.
          
          
            The Southern Struggle for Political Equality
          
          Recent events have had their effect upon slowing nearly fifteen
years of steady political advancement by blacks. In Richmond, Va., the
town's first black mayor, Henry Marsh, has been engineered out of
office by a downtown clique of white business people opposed to his
local politics and national standing. They were aided by the national
Republicans. In Atlanta, long the symbol of enlightened Southern
attitudes, Andrew Young's election to mayor exhibited a pattern of
racial bloc voting that was disquieting both to that city's official
boosters and to some longtime black observers. In Georgia's Fifth
Congressional District (the Atlanta area), a large contiguous black
population was recently ignored by white legislators in drawing voting
lines. So blatant was this move that Reagan's Justice Department
objected under provisions of the Voting Rights Act. In New Orleans,
incumbent Mayor Ernest Morial was returned to office by a record
turnout and support from the black electorate. Yet, intensive
opposition to the Morial reelection rose from the Governor's office to
former New Orleans Mayor and HUD Secretary "Moon" Landrieu.
          The elections in both Atlanta and New Orleans turned out record
numbers of black voters. In both cities, prominent blacks accepted the
rumors that serious efforts were being made to "return" the cities to
white mayoral leadership. After each election the cities' media
offered much somber analysis saying that no white could ever win a top
office again.
          In Houston, black voters joined a dynamic coalition there to elect
the city's first female mayor, Kathy Whitmire. She secured the
appointment of a black, Lee Brown, to head the city's notorious police
department. Now that city is going through a familiar scene in which
an entrenched white police element is arrayed against a black
appointee and his affirmative action and reform efforts.

          Away from the cities, in the Southern small towns, not only has
economic and political opportunity been slow to arrive, but whim and
custom sometimes provide formidable obstacles even to the extension of
modern marketplace principles. "Good business practices" alone
compelled urban banks, for example, to at least moderate their racism,
and treat customers according to their financial utility to the
bank. The opponents of equal opportunity programs are correct in their
argument that market rationalism had no small part to do with the
affirmative hiring and training programs of corporations. That
rationalism also enabled A&P, Kroger, Safeway and many mom and pop
stores to treat the food stamp as cash.
          Such principles have been slow to reach the towns. In one case in
Georgia, the locally owned bank simply refused to cash a government
check for one black community group involved in political conflict. In
another instance, in Arkansas, where a town had diverted revenue
sharing money away from services in the black sections, the woman who
exposed this situation backed out of her formal complaint when told
that her unemployment check would be stopped. In Burke County,
Georgia, it is still the custom for white creditors to stand
prominently near the polls on election day.
          But even these indirect forms of intimidation give way to more
direct attacks. In Vienna, Gal, Tom Shaw has worked to bring change
throughout his county. He filed an election suit against the county
commission, the school board and called for official investigation
into the local use of revenue sharing money. Over the years his
actions led to desegregation of the school system, biracial membership
on the school board and county commission and affirmative hiring plans
for the county and its municipalities.
          Tom Shaw never quite became a hero among some of his neighbors,
however. Today he sits in the Dooly County Jail sentenced to thirty
years.
          Shaw's jailing came because of a conviction for his role in a
confrontation with a local police officer. Charged with aggravated
assault (firing a pistol around an officer) and robbery (taking the
pistol from the officer), he got a hung jury at his first trial. He
argued that his involvement resulted from an effort to defuse a
dangerous situation. When the second trial came, he had not been able
to settle on legal counsel. The judge refused a continuation and
appointed a local public defender who admitted that he had
insufficient knowledge of the case. Shaw then tried to defend
himself. This time, he was easily convicted and given a near maximum
sentence of fifteen years for each charge. He was ordered to serve his
time consecutively and has been denied bail bond while the appeal
takes place. Needless to say, it was Tom Shaw's political activities
that caused his problems.
          In Tchula, Miss., Eddie Carthan, the properly elected black mayor,
found himself in a similar situation. He and six others (the Tchula
Seven) face three-year terms in Parchman penitentiary resulting from
an incident provoked by the refusal of a white police chief to step
down for a Carthan appointee. Efforts to enforce his orders led to
physical confrontation and assault charges against the mayor. Carthan
was also charged with forgery in applying for federal aid and has been
indicted for conspiracy in the mysterious death of Roosevelt
Granderson, a black town councilman and a Carthan opponent. Carthan's
election as mayor of this majority-black town spurred intense
opposition from the traditional white rulers and resulted in the
series of harassing actions that left him under a cloud of politically
motivated indictments and too dispirited to offer for re-election. The
town has been restored to white political leadership.
          In Greenwood, also in Mississippi, David Jordan was fired by the
school board for canvassing on election day. It seems that Jordan, a
high school math teacher and president of the Leflore County Voters
League, had not agreed to ask his group to endorse the favorite
candidate of the school board members.
          In Albany, Gal, both John White, a member of the state General
Assembly, and Don Cutler, a member of the county board of
commissioners, are facing school board regulations that seek to force
them to discontinue their jobs as a condition for holding elected
political office.
          In Pickens County, Alabama, two elderly black women--Maggie Bozeman
and Julia Wilder--were sentenced to state prison terms for violations
during a voter registration campaign among elderly black voters. The
Southern Christian Leadership Conference led protests in support of
the women and drew national attention by pointing to the harsh
sentences given these women and the refusal of state executives to
give a pardon.
          By far the most aggressive attempt to retard affirmative community
work in the rural South was the year-long fight between the Federation
of Southern Cooperatives ,(FSC) and numerous government agencies,
including the 

General Accounting Office, the FBI, and the
U.S. Attorney and federal grand jury in Birmingham. The investigation
resulted from complaints made by political adversaries in Sumter
County, site of the Federation's Rural Training Center. The conflict
took place over a two-year period, including more than a year of
formal proceedings before the grand jury. In a classic "fishing
expedition," the authorities, claiming to be investigating misuse of
federal money, demanded to look at nearly all of the FSC's
files. Numerous, sometimes antagonistic appearances before the grand
jury required extensive time of FSC employees and counsel. In the end
no formal charges were brought and the case was dropped.
          The ease with which official institutions can harass political
opponents is made possible by the continuing domination in elected
office of traditional white elites resentful of bi-racial
governance. Black groups in Black Belt counties continue to find it
difficult to turn their majorities or near majorities into effective
political clout. In only one of the nearly twenty-five majority black
counties in Georgia, for instance, is there a black sheriff.
          In part, this state of affairs results from a continuation of past
habits. The voter registration and turnout rates by race in these
places continue to show wide disparities to the detriment of black
candidates. But the situation is also maintained by electoral
chicanery. While physical intimidation is not usually employed,
registration officials have declined to adopt measures to encourage
registration among under-participating populations. Flexible
registration hours, scatter site or neighborhood registration and
deputy registrars have not been widely adopted.
          In Edgefield County, South Carolina, there are no black elected
county officials. This is due to the change to at-large elections
mentioned above. In Alabama, the old tactic of a challenge and purge
system has been reinstated through a process called
"re-identification." Registration of all voters in selected counties
is suspended until they have "re-identified" themselves. This local
legislation passed the state legislature under the sponsorship of
white lawmakers. It is widely acknowledged to have a disproportionate
effect on black political activity. In Brunswick, Ga., a city-county
consolidation system would create a new jurisdiction just at the stage
when black voting strength has improved in the city.
          From the Atlantic seaboard to Delta Mississippi, expensive counsel
has been retained by counties, school boards and townships to defend
all-white governments that make public policy in communities of
bi-racial population. Losing at one level, these attorneys continue to
appeal. After the Burke County, Gal, County Commissioners lost their
round in U.S. Appeals Court and announced their intention to carry the
case further, one lawyer took the news in stride: "If they lose in the
Supreme Court, they'll probably request an opinion from the House of
Lords."
          
            The Changing Prospects for Change
          
          In spite of the obstacles we have surveyed, active advocacy
survives. The Federation of Southern Cooperatives was exonerated in
its battle. A multi-million dollar law suit against the Port Gibson,
Miss., NAACP was reversed. Court action has saved other jobs and
initiatives.
          But the problem confronting black participation in the South today
is whether such victories may be merely hollow when weighed against
the longer campaigns of resistance which delay, deflect and
retard. That, after all was the agenda of the old Southern
segregationists: to buy time, to deny full equality as long as
possible. If this assessment is correct, then advocates of democratic
reform will be tested until the final vestige of privilege is
removed.
          If we lament the intransigence of the white power clique in Burke
County, we should also note that in Wayneboro, the county seat, the
town's white mayor led the way to a negotiated settlement that did
away with the at-large system and resulted in the election of blacks
to the town council. In Greene County, Alabama, a black slate has
governed since 1968 holding all of the county commission and board of
education seats and pursuing personnel and administrative policies of
their own.
          And there have been other cases of exemplary advances. In the
Fourth Congressional District in Mississippi, Wayne Dowdy pulled
together a winning coalition of Democrats, labor, blacks and
small-town whites. In his campaign, Dowdy took unequivocal positions
on labor, extension of the Voting Rights Act and Legal Services.
          Finally, another positive sign comes from the potential for
changing the make-up of government officials at the local
level. Non-traditional groups--women, blacks, labor, educational and
environmental activists--are moving to contest directly for political
office. Although the South Carolina Senate remains a conspicuous
exception, there have been dramatic increases of blacks in Southern
legislatures. Final reapportionment under the 1980 population figures
should increase the number even more. Parallel to the increase in
elected officials has been an increase in the number and status of
blacks in the states' administrative bureaucracies.
          
            The Challenge of Conservatism
          
          Starting with the social programs of the New Deal and continuing
into the present, government's "safety-valve" function has attempted
to resolve social ills that private business and industry either would
not or could not handle. The clients of the "welfare state" have
included white middle-Americans, but have been disproportionately
racial and ethnic minorities. Having limited resources, these latter
groups turned to the government for improvements in education, jobs,
housing, health and so on.
          In one sense, particularly striking after the mid-1960's urban
rebellions when black people lost their legendary "invisible" status,
one of the half-truths of the New Right was confirmed. The government
did become, however limited, a vehicle for advancement. Yet, even
during these years, some progressive social critics thought this
change in black status seemed too one-dimensional--resulting in the
dependency of too many middle- and low-income blacks on public works
and federal services. There was skepticism as to whether such
developments, positive in an immediate sense, would actually lead to
the structural changes needed for full democratization.
          Frankly, this "safety-valve" strategy for change reflected a belief
by an ascending liberalism that the race 

problem required a
concentrated public investment as a precondition for final systemic
integration. In this, liberalism was reformist, not visionary, and
betrayed its wont to design social change without regard to new forms
of dependency, or to the extra-racial inequities intrinsic to market
relations in modern capitalism.
          So two decades of New Frontier and Great Society programs from
model cities to community and urban development became as crucial to
the advancement of minorities as the more familiar judicial and
administrative measures we readily associate with racial
progress. Those programs did their jobs. At the highest national level
they gave us a number of individuals to command bureaucratic posts
once limited to whites. In small and medium-sized places, blacks who
have any professional executive experience often obtained it as head
of a federal program or of the local department handling federal
money.
          The New Right conservatives--such as George Gilder, Martin Anderson
or Thomas Sowell--who have discovered these relationships are
Johnnie-come-latelies. Not only do they miss the historical intention
of corporate state strategy, they also find- themselves in the classic
contradiction of American conservatives who--living in a nation of
historic, expansive, rapacious, change have to argue, in the name of
that nation, to stop all change. Specifically, with regard to black
people--whom they accept as the typical victims of American
democracy--they are caught in the hyprocrisy of celebrating a new
middle class created by the use of government resources while decrying
the mechanism that created it; they celebrate the end-product of
liberal policy while repudiating liberalism; they acknowledge the
concrete benefits of these programs but say they cannot be helpful to
lower income blacks, who remain victims, to native Americans or newly
arriving immigrants. They fear that realization of the need to
completely emancipate America's black population will shatter the
illusions that sustain an unspoken tolerance of suffering as a feature
of national life. Thus they point to success as a reason to eliminate
the public's role in equal opportunity! This programmatic ambiguity
reflects a moral bankruptcy in American conservatism that has never
been more plain than today--at the hour when its influence on the
national agenda is greater than at any time since the Great
Depression.
          Notes on Sources
          The philosophical perspectives of the New Right and their racial
implications may be found in George Gilder's Wealth and
Poverty (New York: Basic Books, 1981) and Thomas Sowell,
Black Education (New York: McKay, 1972) or
Knowledge and Decisions (New York: Basic Books,
1980).
          Statements of the government's role in protecting the rights of
minorities and the opportunities created are in E. Richard Larson and
Laughlin McDonald The Rights of Racial Minorities (New
York: Avon, 1980); and Larson, Sue Your Boss (New York:
Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 1981).
          Conservative strategies to reverse the enforcement mechanism are
discussed in Charles L. Heatherly, (ed.) Mandate for
Leadership (Washington, D.C.: The Heritage Foundation,
1980). After a year in power, conservative evaluation of its efforts
were mildly enthusiastic. See Richard N. Holwill (ed.) A
Mandate for Leadership: The First Year (Washington,
D.C.: 1982), and Chester E. Finn, Jr. "'Affirmative Action' Under
Reagan," Commentary (April, 1982).
          The role of the federal executive in civil rights is reviewed
extensively in two congressional reports taking opposite views of the
matter. A positive attitude is in "Report on Affirmative Action and
the Federal Enforcement of Equal Employment Opportunity Laws," a
report of the House Subcommittee on Employment Opportunities
(February, 1982). The negative view is in "Committee Analysis of
Executive Order 11246," by the Senate Committee on Labor and Human
Resources (April, 1982).
          Efforts to document and counter the declining enforcement have been
numerous. See Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, Without
Justice: A Report on the Conduct of the Justice Department in Civil
Rights. 1981-1982 February, 1982); Affirmative Action
in the 1980s: Dismantling the Process of Discrimination
(U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, November, 1981); "Statement of
Principles on Affirmative Action,: adopted by the Congressional Forum
on Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action (February 1982).
          Two very different modes of harassment are represented in the
Bozeman-Wilder incident and with the ordeal of the Federation of
Southern Cooperatives. See Thomas W. Ottenad, "Stiff Sentenees in
Alabama Case," St. Louis Post-Dispatch May 14, 1982;
Kelly Dowe, "Paying the Price in Pickens County," Southern
Changes, June/July, 1982,and Thomas N. Bethell, Sumter
County Blues (Washington D.C.: National Committee in Support
of Community Based Organizations, 1982).
          Problems of political participation are discussed in Voting
Rights in the South: Ten Years of Litigation Challenging Continuing
Discrimination Against Minorities (New York: American Civil
Liberties Union, 1982); Frank R. Parker and Barbara Y. Phillips,
The Justice Department and Voting Rights Enforcement: Political
Interference and Retreat (Washington, D.C.: Lawyers Committee
for Civil Rights Under the Law, 1982); The Voting Rights Act
Unfulfilled Goals (U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, 1981)
Voting Rights in Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, and South
Carolina (State Advisory Committees, U.S. Commission on Civil
Rights, 1982); Raymond Brown, The State of Voting Rights in
Georgia in 1982 (Atlanta: Southern Regional Council, 1982).
          
            Alex Willingham has been Director of the Revenue Sharing
Enforcement Project of the American Civil Liberties Union. He will
begin teaching political science at Dillard University in New Orleans
in the fall. He is editor of SPECTRUM, a forthcoming
publication of the National Conference of Black Political
Scientists.
          
        