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Restitution for Black Farmers

A New York Times Editorial
Published:

July 27, 2004

In 1999, African-American farmers won a major civil rights settlement

against the United States Department of Agriculture. They had argued that the loans and subsidies they

received were substantially lower than those for comparable white farmers. What made matters worse was

the fact that Reagan-era budget cuts closed the U.S.D.A.’s civil rights office for 13 years, so most

of the complaints filed during that time were never heard. To its credit, the department conducted an

internal investigation and discovered that racial discrimination had not only occurred but had also

been structurally and historically embedded in its operations.

What looked like a

good settlement, promising prompt payment to black farmers, now looks like a failure, according to a

new investigation by the Environmental Working Group, an advocacy group. Again and again, these farmers

have run up against procedural hurdles that have effectively blocked most of them from receiving

payments that were supposed to be automatic. Because of poor record-keeping, the U.S.D.A. seriously

underestimated the number of farmers who had been discriminated against. It also did a terrible job of

seeking out farmers who might qualify for payments. And it did nothing to help them get the documents

needed to demonstrate the loan and subsidy support that neighboring white farmers had

received.

This is discrimination by a different name – a continuation, in effect, of the

racism historically entrenched in the U.S.D.A. The department’s resistance and the inherent

inadequacies in the original settlement have caused a staggering rate of farm failures among small-

scale black farmers: three times the rate for white farmers. That has sped up the loss of farmland to

development. In the past few decades, the U.S.D.A. has paid only lip service to the survival of small

farms. It apparently pays only lip service to civil rights as well. The remedy for this inequity will

not be found at the department. Carrying out the settlement with fairness and accountability will

require the intervention of Congress.

See: TAEX Basics at:

http://pages.prodigy.net/gmoses/tcrr/taex.htm

To view copies of the Aug. 29 report from the 2003 Task Force on

Admissions, please go to the Open Records section via the menu at your upper

left.

The Truth you Can’t Hide From

By Greg Moses

I once asked a

student what percent of the American population did he think was Black. “At least sixty percent!” He

said eagerly.

“Are there any other guesses?” I asked the class. How was I going to

talk this young man down?

In fact, 77 percent of voters in the Bush-Kerry-Nader

election were white. It is the most obvious reason why the election turned out the way it

did.

For white voters and their pundits, however, the stupidity of the election would be

experienced as an expectation of politics as usual. “Of course, it’s a stupid election,” they would

tell you. “Aren’t all elections stupid?” OK. But every great stupidity has its personality. And

not enough folks are talking about the personality of the white vote in the wake of this most recent

election.

In fact, the stupidity of American elections to date has been heavily imprinted

with the specific personality of white America. Imagine, for instance, any other race of a candidate

acting as stupidly as George Bush, performing as poorly, and yet–among white voters–being so well

liked.

But if you live in white America, George Bush’s stupidity is the very form of

mind necessary and sufficient to constitute political power. That’s why white folks in America could

serve up a majority for Bush, unlike Black, Latino, and Asian voters–who would not have re-elected

him.

And if I’m wrong about this, why else do you think the South was considered

untouchable all year long? The solid South is not solid without a big, fat, white vote. So among

elites who claim their latitude to bypass the American South, it sounds like a far better idea to work

around this problem. Pressures are enormous to find some other thing to talk about. Take

responsibility for transforming the white vote and do it in the South, too? Do you have any idea what

you’re talking about?

Only Howard Dean was willing to talk about the Confederate Flag

waving white voters down in Dixie. Dean is occasionally discredited on that account (for example, see

Chait’s column in today’s LA Times [Nov. 26]). Now that we are four years away from the next

Presidential election (Lord willing and the creek don’t rise) it is not yet too late in the election

cycle to raise the question–what are we going to do about the white vote? No white Democrat without

an answer is smart enough to lead.

“But white voters will dominate the electoral process

for decades,” reports Aurelio Rojas in a preview of the California vote. There, Kerry wins 47 percent

of the white vote compared to Bush’s 51. In New York, Kerry gets 49 to Bush’s 50. Compare the margins

of the Kerry losses among white voters in those progressive states to Texas, where Bush got 74 percent

–of the white vote. In none of these states (nor in Illinois for that matter) do white voters favor

Kerry, but in the blue states a significant bloc of white voters present themselves to the Democratic

Party.

A Massachusetts liberal is such a dangerous spectre to raise among white voters

(who are not Massachusetts liberals) because white voters in Massachusetts behave differently. They

actually gave a majority to Kerry.

Tom Hayden in a recent essay encourages anti-war

activists to “become more grounded in the everyday political life of their districts, organizing anti-

war coalitions including clergy, labor and inner city representatives to knock loudly on congressional

doors.” But I wonder if this outreach to “inner city representatives” doesn’t hide the political

problem that anti-war activists actually have, that is, convincing white voters to favor less

belligerent politics.

Perhaps Hayden means to say that anti-war activists should get

more grounded in their existing political base. The Congressional Black Caucus, for example, does very

well on the war issue already. The CBC and the NAACP were two groups who early on expressed “strong

opposition to war” (writes the Associated Press in 2002, archived at NathanielTurner.com). So if it

were up to “inner city representatives” there would be no need for an anti-war movement in the first

place. And if it were up to black voters, Bush would never have been elected.

So, yes,

it was a stupid American election, and many of us did stupid things along the way. Let’s not be so

stupid again as to quit working on the transformation of the white vote–especially in the South–until

we’ve made Massachusetts liberals of them all.

Back to my student. Obviously, he was an

urban youth. For him, sixty percent of life was Black life. And God bless him for not imagining

things any differently. I can still recall, after hearing several guesses from the class, that I

looked back at him and gave him Perlo’s numbers on percent Black in the USA. It was a cruel moment

for the same reason that the election was cruel. And white folks who scoff at Massachusetts liberals

should think about the eagerness that falls out of a person’s eyes when he realizes there’s no getting

around white folks in the

USA.

LINKS

NathanielTurner.com

http://www.nathanielturner.com/pol

lwaragainstiraq.htm

Published at

Counterpunch

The War on Civil Rights
What Gives Texas A&M the Right?

By GREG MOSES

[Editors’ Note: During February the Texas Civil Rights

Review uncovered documents from a specially appointed task force at Texas A&M that recommended strongly

in favor of affirmative action on Aug. 29, 2003. That finding was over-ruled by the President and

buried from public view. Following is the cover story that will appear for the next month at the Texas

Civil Rights Review.] During the Fall Semester of 2003, Texas A&M University President Robert Gates

put the Civil Rights Act in his pocket and he left it there until people thought it was his. And when

he refused to take it out of his pocket ever again, people said, okay, he can do that. But can he?

Can the President of a University pocket-veto the Civil Rights Act? Ultimately this is

a question for the federal government to decide. It would make a fine question for our Presidential

candidates. If elected president, Mr. Kerry or Mr. Edwards, will you enforce the Civil Rights Act in

College Station, Texas?

It was because of the Civil Rights Act that the Office of Civil

Rights visited Texas in 1978 to determine if de-segregation had been accomplished. But de-segregation

had not been accomplished in the higher education system of Texas.

At that point the OCR

had the power to make an adverse ruling against the state of Texas, which would have caused serious

difficulties with federal funding. And so, once again, because of the Civil Rights Act, Texas was

feeling some heat.

It is well documented in records kept by Texas A&M, and by analysis

that was produced at the time, that Texas A&M University Regents adopted affirmative action as a way to

show federal authorities that the Civil Rights Act has a meaning they were bound to

respect.

It made plain sense in 1980 that affirmative action in admissions was one

necessary means that a University under federal supervision for de-segregation should adopt. The state

of Texas then entered into a series of agreements, under federal supervision, for de-segregation. These

facts are plain as one can find. They are also plainly evaded.

In 1997, OCR returned to

Texas, found de-segregation still a work in progress, and in the summer of 2000 received from Governor

Bush assurances that all available means would be used to advance the de-segregation process. Then in

the summer of 2003 the Supreme Court restored the Constitutionality of affirmative action in Texas with

the Grutter ruling.

Where it is plainly agreed that a University should undertake every

means necessary for de-segregation, where that same University has previously agreed that affirmative

action serves as a baseline commitment of good faith toward de-segregation, and where affirmative

action is clearly vindicated by the Supreme Court as a Constitutional means to de-segregation, there

can be no plainer conclusion at hand as to what a University should be doing. But the conclusion is not

at hand. It is in the pocket of President Gates.

Soon after the Grutter ruling,

President Gates called together his best and brightest, and he asked them to consider what should be

done. By the end of the summer, his own hand-picked committee strongly recommended a return to

affirmative action.

Not only did President Gates put that report in his pocket, but he

failed to consult with state regulators about his responsibilities under the Civil Rights Act. Folks he

asked he ignored, folks he should have consulted, he did not.

If during this Black

History Month we are going to share platitudes about the meaning of America, if during this traditional

month of celebration for Lincoln’s birthday we are going to speak of one nation, and if the Civil

Rights Act actually happened and is really law in America, and in Texas, too, then, we have to say:

give back the Civil Rights Act President Gates, or step aside and give us a University President who

respects the laws and Constitution of the United States.

There are perhaps a thousand

ways to cut the argument for affirmative action in admissions. But given the peculiar circumstances in

College Station, Texas, crucial considerations have not yet been addressed. What is the meaning of the

Civil Rights Act? Is the federal Constitution still a framework that a Texas University President is

bound to respect?