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Louis Armstrong: A Forgotten Voice in Civil Rights

Sunday, September 23, 2007
Posted by Steve Amoia

Please note:

All original content posted in this blog is also Copyrighted © 2007 by Steve Amoia.

Most of us, when we hear the name of Louis “Satchmo” Armstrong, think of two things: His melodious trumpet, along with his distinctive voice. What many may not know was that Mr. Armstrong voiced strong views about race relations during a time when the mainstream was wearing ear plugs.

In September 1957, nine black children were barred from going to Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. During a playing tour in Grand Forks, North Dakota, a young journalist, Larry Ludenow, had an interesting interview with Mr. Armstrong, who rarely before discussed his feelings about being black in America.

“As Mr. Armstrong prepared to play that night — oddly enough, at Grand Forks’s own Central High School — members of the Arkansas National Guard ringed the school in Little Rock, ordered to keep the black students out. President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s meeting with Governor Faubus three days earlier in Newport, R.I., had ended inconclusively. Central High School was open, but the black children stayed home.

Mr. Lubenow was first told he couldn’t talk to Mr. Armstrong until after the concert. That wouldn’t do. With the connivance of the bell captain, he snuck into Mr. Armstrong’s suite with a room service lobster dinner. And Mr. Armstrong, wearing a Hawaiian shirt and shorts, agreed to talk. Mr. Lubenow stuck initially to his editor’s script, asking Mr. Armstrong to name his favorite musician. (Bing Crosby, it turned out.) But soon he brought up Little Rock, and he could not believe what he heard. ‘It’s getting almost so bad a colored man hasn’t got any country,’ a furious Mr. Armstrong told him. President Eisenhower, he charged, was ‘two faced,’ and had ‘no guts.’ For Governor Faubus, he used a double-barreled hyphenated expletive, utterly unfit for print. The two settled on something safer: ‘uneducated plow boy.’ The euphemism, Mr. Lubenow says, was far more his than Mr. Armstrong’s.

Mr. Armstrong bitterly recounted some of his experiences touring in the Jim Crow South. He then sang the opening bar of ‘The Star-Spangled Banner,’ inserting obscenities into the lyrics and prompting Velma Middleton, the vocalist who toured with Mr. Armstrong and who had joined them in the room, to hush him up.” (1)

Shortly thereafter, President Eisenhower, using a military force of 1200 paratroopers from the 101st Airborne to “drop in” on Little Rock, gave the nine children a passage way into Central High School. This must be difficult to imagine, but I have cited several instances where Mr. Douglass was denied the opportunity to read, organize study groups, and even forcibly banned from teaching the Gospel at Sunday Schools during his years as a slave.

For his efforts, a week later, young Mr. Lubenow parted company with the Grand Forks Herald. The reason? He disobeyed his editor by injecting political discourse into the interview. But thanks to the work of this young journalist, America read the true feelings of Mr. Armstrong.

Frederick Douglass recounted his experience when he attempted to teach fellow slaves how to read.

“I taught at first on our own farm. All were impressed with the necessity of keeping the matter as private as possible, for the fate of the St. Michaels attempt was still fresh in the minds of all. Our pious masters at St. Michaels must not know that a few of their dusky brothers were learning to read the Word of God, lest they should come down upon us with the lash and chain. We might have met to drink whisky, to wrestle, fight, and to do other unseemly things, with no fear of interruption from the saints or the sinners of St. Michaels. But to meet for the purpose of improving the mind and heart, by learning to read the sacred scriptures, was a nuisance to be instantly stopped.

The slaveholders there, like slaveholders elsewhere, preferred to see the slaves engaged in degrading sports, rather than acting like moral and accountable beings. Had any one, at that time, asked a religious white man in St. Michaels, the names of three men in that town whose lives were most after the pattern of our Lord and Master Jesus Christ, the reply would have been: Garrison West, class-leader, Wright Fairbanks and Thomas Auld, both also class-leaders; and yet these men, armed with mob-like missiles, ferociously rushed in upon my Sabbath-school and forbade our meeting again on pain of having our backs subjected to the bloody lash. This same Garrison West was my class-leader, and I had thought him a Christian until he took part in breaking up my school. He led me no more after that.”

Source: Life and Times of Frederick Douglass, Chapter XVIII.

Reference

(1) “The Day Louis Armstrong Made Noise,” The New York Times, 23 September 2007 by David Margolick.

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Senator Hillary Clinton Announces Universal Health Care Initiative

Sunday, September 16, 2007
Posted by Steve Amoia

Tomorrow in Des Moines, Iowa, Senator Hillary Clinton will propose her plan to remedy a significant issue: Universal Health Insurance coverage for all Americans. According to a statistic reported by the New York Times, over 47 million Americans have no medical insurance. Many others, due to the rising costs of monthly premiums, have less than adequate coverage. Catastrophic medical expenses are among the leading causes of bankruptcy filings in the United States of America.

“Mrs. Clinton’s purpose, they said, is not only to cover the 47 million people who are uninsured but to improve the quality of health care and make insurance more affordable for those who already have it…

Previewing her speech, Clinton aides said she would assert on Monday that there was a moral imperative to ensure that ‘every single American has quality affordable health coverage,’ just as she contends there is an economic imperative to rein in costs…

Mrs. Clinton will not try to impose an overall limit on national health spending, the aides said. But she is prepared once again to do battle with insurance companies, which she has said ‘ spend tens of billions of dollars a year figuring out how not to cover people’ and ‘how to cherry-pick the healthiest persons, and leave everyone else out in the cold.’ ” (1)

Frederick Bailey never had to worry about losing his medical coverage. Or whether or not moving from one place of employment to the next would interrupt his coverage. Slaves in 19th Century Maryland did not have any protection if they became ill or disabled. In many respects, they were treated worse than their master’s stable of horses. Note how much Colonel Lloyd cared about the health and welfare of his horses.

“The colonel also kept a splendid riding equipage. His stable and carriage-house presented the appearance of some of our large city livery establishments. His horses were of the finest form and noblest blood. His carriage-house contained three splendid coaches, three or four gigs, besides dearborns and barouches of the most fashionable style.

This establishment was under the care of two slaves–old Barney and young Barney–father and son. To attend to this establishment was their sole work. But it was by no means an easy employment; for in nothing was Colonel Lloyd more particular than in the management of his horses. The slightest inattention to these was unpardonable, and was visited upon those, under whose care they were placed, with the severest punishment; no excuse could shield them, if the colonel only suspected any want of attention to his horses–a supposition which he frequently indulged, and one which, of course, made the office of old and young Barney a very trying one. They never knew when they were safe from punishment. They were frequently whipped when least deserving, and escaped whipping when most deserving it.

Every thing depended upon the looks of the horses, and the state of Colonel Lloyd’s own mind when his horses were brought to him for use. If a horse did not move fast enough, or hold his head high enough, it was owing to some fault of his keepers. It was painful to stand near the stable-door, and hear the various complaints against the keepers when a horse was taken out for use. ‘This horse has not had proper attention. He has not been sufficiently rubbed and curried, or he has not been properly fed; his food was too wet or too dry; he got it too soon or too late; he was too hot or too cold; he had too much hay, and not enough of grain; or he had too much grain, and not enough of hay; instead of old Barney’s attending to the horse, he had very improperly left it to his son.’

To all these complaints, no matter how unjust, the slave must answer never a word. Colonel Lloyd could not brook any contradiction from a slave. When he spoke, a slave must stand, listen, and tremble; and such was literally the case. I have seen Colonel Lloyd make old Barney, a man between fifty and sixty years of age, uncover his bald head, kneel down upon the cold, damp ground, and receive upon his naked and toil-worn shoulders more than thirty lashes at the time. Colonel Lloyd had three sons–Edward, Murray, and Daniel,–and three sons-in-law, Mr. Winder, Mr. Nicholson, and Mr. Lowndes. All of these lived at the Great House Farm, and enjoyed the luxury of whipping the servants when they pleased, from old Barney down to William Wilkes, the coach-driver. I have seen Winder make one of the house-servants stand off from him a suitable distance to be touched with the end of his whip, and at every stroke raise great ridges upon his back.”

Source: Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, Chapter III.

Reference

(1) “Clinton to Propose Universal Health Care,” New York Times, 16 September 2007 by Robert Pear.

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Are Books An Endangered Species?

Sunday, September 9, 2007
Posted by Steve Amoia

Due to the advances in technology, some think that books may be a thing of the past. E-books, or books that can be downloaded electronically and read with computers or other devices, have made gains in the marketplace. But will most of us who grew up with a hardcover books ever migrate and/or accept this new format? How do you “curl up” with an e-book?

“Hopes for e-books began to revive last year with the introduction of the widely marketed Sony Reader. Sony’s $300 gadget, the size of a trade paperback, has a six-inch screen, enough memory to hold 80 books and a battery that lasts for 7,500 page turns, according to the company. It uses screen display technology from E Ink, a company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, that emerged from the Media Lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and creates power-efficient digital screens that uncannily mimic the appearance of paper.

Sony will not say how many it has sold, but the Reader has apparently done well enough that Sony recently increased its advertising for the device in several major American cities.

‘Digital readers are not a replacement for a print book; they are a replacement for a stack of print books,’ said Ron Hawkins, vice president for portable reader systems at Sony. ‘That is where we see people, on the go, in the subway and in airports, with our device.’ ” (1)

It would be interesting to imagine someone with the prolific writing skills of Frederick Douglass with a computer. What would he think of electronic books? He learned to read and write in Baltimore. Initially, he was instructed by his master’s wife, Mrs. Sophia Auld, on the rudiments of reading the English language.

“The frequent hearing of my mistress reading the bible for she
often read aloud when her husband was absent soon awakened my
curiosity in respect to this mystery of reading, and roused in
me the desire to learn. Having no fear of my kind mistress
before my eyes, (she had then given me no reason to fear,) I
frankly asked her to teach me to read; and, without hesitation,
the dear woman began the task, and very soon, by her assistance,
I was master of the alphabet, and could spell words of three or
four letters. My mistress seemed almost as proud of my progress,
as if I had been her own child; and, supposing that her husband
would be as well pleased, she made no secret of what she was
doing for me. Indeed, she exultingly told him of the aptness of
her pupil, of her intention to persevere in teaching me, and of
the duty which she felt it to teach me, at least to read the
bible.”

Source: My Bondage and My Freedom by Frederick Douglass, Chapter 10.

When his master learned what his wife was doing, young Frederick’s lessons came to an abrupt halt. But that did not deter his thirst for knowledge. With the assistance of local street children, along with the Webster’s spelling book, he learned how to read.

“I lived in the family of Master Hugh, at Baltimore, seven years,
during which time–as the almanac makers say of the weather–my
condition was variable. The most interesting feature of my
history here, was my learning to read and write, under somewhat
marked disadvantages…

Seized with a determination to learn to read, at any cost, I hit
upon many expedients to accomplish the desired end. The plea
which I mainly adopted, and the one by which I was most
successful, was that of using my young white playmates, with whom
I met in the streets as teachers. I used to carry, almost
constantly, a copy of Webster’s spelling book in my pocket; and,
when sent of errands, or when play time was allowed me, I would
step, with my young friends, aside, and take a lesson in
spelling. I generally paid my tuition fee to the boys, with
bread, which I also carried in my pocket. For a single biscuit,
any of my hungry little comrades would give me a lesson more
valuable to me than bread. Not every one, however, demanded this
consideration, for there were those who took pleasure in teaching
me, whenever I had a chance to be taught by them.”

Source: My Bondage and My Freedom by Frederick Douglass, Chapter 11.

Reference

(1) Are books passe? Web giants envision the next chapter, International Herald Tribune, 06 September 2007 by Brad Stone.

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At IBM, Every Day Can Be A Holiday

Saturday, September 1, 2007
Posted by Steve Amoia

At global leader and blue chip IBM, workers are encouraged to take time off. As much as they need. At IBM, every employee receives at least three weeks of vacation, or paid time off, regardless of seniority. And they can take it whenever they want. With a few caveats.

“Instead, for the past few years, employees at all levels have simply made informal arrangements with their direct supervisors, guided mainly by their ability to get their work done on time. Many people post their vacation plans on electronic calendars that colleagues can view online, and they leave word about how they can be reached in a pinch.

‘It’s like when you went to college and you didn’t have high school teachers nagging you anymore,’ said Mark Hanny, the vice president of independent software vendor alliances at the company. ‘Employees like that we put more accountability on them.’

But the flip side of flexibility, at least at IBM, is peer pressure. Hanny and other IBM employees, including his assistant, Shari Chiara, say that while on vacation they frequently check their e-mail and voice-mail messages. Bosses sometimes ask subordinates to cancel planned days off to meet deadlines.” (1)

Vacation and paid time off were foreign words in the lexicon of an American slave. By the accounts of Frederick Douglass, an average slave “enjoyed” one week without the usual rigors of their normal lives. But this time off was far from the idyllic images of sandy beaches, mountain vistas, and relaxation that most of us associate with the word “vacation.” At least before the advent of voicemail, cellphones, and wireless Internet. ;-)

“The days between Christmas and New Year’s day are allowed as holidays; and, accordingly, we were not required to perform any labor, more than to feed and take care of the stock. This time we regarded as our own, by the grace of our masters; and we therefore used or abused it nearly as we pleased. Those of us who had families at a distance, were generally allowed to spend the whole six days in their society. This time, however, was spent in various ways. The staid, sober, thinking and industrious ones of our number would employ themselves in making corn-brooms, mats, horse-collars, and baskets; and another class of us would spend the time in hunting opossums, hares, and coons. But by far the larger part engaged in such sports and merriments as playing ball, wrestling, running foot-races, fiddling, dancing, and drinking whisky; and this latter mode of spending the time was by far the most agreeable to the feelings of our masters. A slave who would work during the holidays was considered by our masters as scarcely deserving them. He was regarded as one who rejected the favor of his master. It was deemed a disgrace not to get drunk at Christmas; and he was regarded as lazy indeed, who had not provided himself with the necessary means, during the year, to get whisky enough to last him through Christmas.

From what I know of the effect of these holidays upon the slave, I believe them to be among the most effective means in the hands of the slaveholder in keeping down the spirit of insurrection. Were the slaveholders at once to abandon this practice, I have not the slightest doubt it would lead to an immediate insurrection among the slaves. These holidays serve as conductors, or safety-valves, to carry off the rebellious spirit of enslaved humanity. But for these, the slave would be forced up to the wildest desperation; and woe betide the slaveholder, the day he ventures to remove or hinder the operation of those conductors! I warn him that, in such an event, a spirit will go forth in their midst, more to be dreaded than the most appalling earthquake.

The holidays are part and parcel of the gross fraud, wrong, and inhumanity of slavery. They are professedly a custom established by the benevolence of the slaveholders; but I undertake to say, it is the result of selfishness, and one of the grossest frauds committed upon the down-trodden slave. They do not give the slaves this time because they would not like to have their work during its continuance, but because they know it would be unsafe to deprive them of it. This will be seen by the fact, that the slaveholders like to have their slaves spend those days just in such a manner as to make them as glad of their ending as of their beginning. Their object seems to be, to disgust their slaves with freedom, by plunging them into the lowest depths of dissipation. For instance, the slaveholders not only like to see the slave drink of his own accord, but will adopt various plans to make him drunk. One plan is, to make bets on their slaves, as to who can drink the most whisky without getting drunk; and in this way they succeed in getting whole multitudes to drink to excess. Thus, when the slave asks for virtuous freedom, the cunning slaveholder, knowing his ignorance, cheats him with a dose of vicious dissipation, artfully labelled with the name of liberty. The most of us used to drink it down, and the result was just what might be supposed; many of us were led to think that there was little to choose between liberty and slavery. We felt, and very properly too, that we had almost as well be slaves to man as to rum. So, when the holidays ended, we staggered up from the filth of our wallowing, took a long breath, and marched to the field,–feeling, upon the whole, rather glad to go, from what our master had deceived us into a belief was freedom, back to the arms of slavery.”

Source: Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, Chapter X.

Reference

(1) “IBM’s un-vacation policy: All you need, All the time,” International Herald Tribune, 31 August 2007, by Ken Belson.

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International Slavery Museum Opens in Liverpool, England

Saturday, August 25, 2007
Posted by Steve Amoia

A few days ago in Liverpool, England, a new museum opened to remind present day Britons of their slave holding past. This year marks the 200th anniversary of the abolition of slavery in Great Britain.

The museum was the vision of Mr. Richard Benjamin, who manages the facility.

“Benjamin, 35, who recently earned his doctorate at the University of Liverpool, has explored black identity through the prism of archaeology in his scholarly work. Based on that research, and his interest in being a mentor to Liverpool students from diverse ethnic backgrounds, he says he wants the museum to be a tool for ‘empowerment.’

‘If I had to choose one word for the museum, it would be resistance,’ he said as he escorted a visitor past displays that were being given last-minute touches by curators. ‘Trans-Atlantic slavery was not such a passive thing. Africans kept their culture. We want to educate people to understand that black people does not equal “oppression.” (1)

Due to the notoriety surrounding the publication of “The Narrative,” the newfound freedom of Frederick Douglass was in imminent danger. He decided to spend a few years abroad in Great Britain. Here were some recollections from his experience in England.

“As I have before intimated, the publishing of my “Narrative” was regarded by my friends with mingled feelings of satisfaction and apprehension. They were glad to have the doubts and insinuations which the advocates and apologists of slavery had made against me proved to the world to be false, but they had many fears lest this very proof would endanger my safety, and make it necessary for me to leave a position which in a signal manner had opened before me, and one in which I had thus far been efficient in assisting to arouse the moral sentiment of the community against a system which had deprived me, in common with my fellow-slaves, of all the attributes of manhood.

I became myself painfully alive to the liability which surrounded me, and which might at any moment scatter all my proud hopes and return me to a doom worse than death. It was thus I was led to seek a refuge in monarchical England from the dangers of republican slavery. A rude, uncultivated fugitive slave, I was driven to that country to which American young gentlemen go to increase their stock of knowledge, to seek pleasure, and to have their rough democratic manners softened by contact with English aristocratic refinement…

My visit to England did much for me every way. Not the least among the many advantages derived from it was the opportunity it afforded me of becoming acquainted with educated people and of seeing and hearing many of the most distinguished men of that country. My friend Mr. Wendell Phillips, knowing something of my appreciation of orators and oratory, had said to me before leaving Boston: ‘Although Americans are generally better speakers than Englishmen, you will find in England individual orators superior to the best of ours.’ I do not know that Mr. Phillips was quite just to himself in this remark, for I found few, if any, superior to him in the gift of speech. When I went to England that country was in the midst of a tremendous agitation. The people were divided by two great questions of “Repeal”–the repeal of the corn laws and the repeal of the union between England and Ireland.”

Source: “The Life and Times of Frederick Douglass,” Chapter VI: Impressions Abroad.

Reference

(1) “Slavery: Resistance amid the horror,” by Jane Perlez, International Herald Tribune, 23 August 2007.

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Technology Tracks Chinese Citizens of Shenzen

Friday, August 17, 2007
Posted by Steve Amoia

In Shenzhen, China, a city of over 12.4 million inhabitants near Hong Kong, a new technology has been designed to encode vast amounts of personal data on a computer chip. Residency cards must be carried by all citizens of this sprawling city. The chip was developed by China Public Security, a Chinese firm that has been incorporated in the American state of Florida. Most of its venture capital was derived from two investment funds: Pinnacle Capital and Pinnacle Capital Fund of Plano, Texas.

Here is what the technology can monitor:

“Data on the chip will include not just the citizen’s name and address but also work history, educational background, religion, ethnicity, police record, medical insurance status and landlord’s phone number. Even personal reproductive history will be included, for enforcement of China’s “one child” policy. Plans are being studied to add credit histories, subway travel payments and small purchases charged to the card.

Security experts describe China’s plans as the world’s largest effort to meld cutting-edge computer technology with police work to track the activities of a population and fight crime, but they say the technology can be used to violate civil rights.

The Chinese government has ordered all large cities across the country to apply technology to police work and to issue high-tech residency cards to 150 million people who have moved to a city but not yet acquired permanent residency…

All police officers in Shenzhen now carry global positioning satellite equipment on their belts. This allows senior police officers to direct their movements on large, high-resolution maps of the city that China Public Security has produced using software that runs on the Microsoft Windows operating system.” (1)

One can only imagine what 21st century technology would have provided to the already significant imbalance in power for the slave masters and handlers of 19th century Maryland. GPS technology instead of blood hounds and a determined mob to catch runaway slaves? Perish the thought. In this excerpt, Frederick Douglass described one of his early overseers, Mr. Severe.

“There were no beds given the slaves, unless one coarse blanket be considered such, and none but the men and women had these. This, however, is not considered a very great privation. They find less difficulty from the want of beds, than from the want of time to sleep; for when their day’s work in the field is done, the most of them having their washing, mending, and cooking to do, and having few or none of the ordinary facilities for doing either of these, very many of their sleeping hours are consumed in preparing for the field the coming day; and when this is done, old and young, male and female, married and single, drop down side by side, on one common bed,–the cold, damp floor,–each covering himself or herself with their miserable blankets; and here they sleep till they are summoned to the field by the driver’s horn. At the sound of this, all must rise, and be off to the field. There must be no halting; every one must be at his or her post; and woe betides them who hear not this morning summons to the field; for if they are not awakened by the sense of hearing, they are by the sense of feeling: no age nor sex finds any favor. Mr. Severe, the overseer, used to stand by the door of the quarter, armed with a large hickory stick and heavy cowskin, ready to whip any one who was so unfortunate as not to hear, or, from any other cause, was prevented from being ready to start for the field at the sound of the horn.

Mr. Severe was rightly named: he was a cruel man. I have seen him whip a woman, causing the blood to run half an hour at the time; and this, too, in the midst of her crying children, pleading for their mother’s release. He seemed to take pleasure in manifesting his fiendish barbarity. Added to his cruelty, he was a profane swearer. It was enough to chill the blood and stiffen the hair of an ordinary man to hear him talk. Scarce a sentence escaped him but that was commenced or concluded by some horrid oath. The field was the place to witness his cruelty and profanity. His presence made it both the field of blood and of blasphemy. From the rising till the going down of the sun, he was cursing, raving, cutting, and slashing among the slaves of the field, in the most frightful manner. His career was short. He died very soon after I went to Colonel Lloyd’s; and he died as he lived, uttering, with his dying groans, bitter curses and horrid oaths. His death was regarded by the slaves as the result of a merciful providence.”

Source: Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, Chapter II.

Reference

(1) Big Brother gets high-tech help in Shenzen, International Herald Tribune, 12 August 2007, by Keith Bradsher.

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What Does it Mean to be French?

Friday, August 10, 2007
Posted by Steve Amoia

In an interesting article published today by the International Herald Tribune, Jon Frosch examines one of the more diverse countries in the world: France. A new social contract, called the “Sarkozy Law,” requires new members of French society to assimilate. But on the terms of the French government, and not the new immigrants. Formal classes are held, and the immigrants must sign a contract.

“What brought them there (formal classroom) was an agreement each had signed with the government of France: They would try to integrate into society, accept French values and learn the language, and France would help them along the way.

The contract ‘of welcome and integration’ has been mandatory since January for all people from outside the European Union applying for long-stay visas, except for students and seasonal workers. It is part of a package of immigration rules known as the ‘Sarkozy law,’ passed in July 2006, when Nicolas Sarkozy, now the president, was interior minister.

The routine procedures for a prospective long-stay visa holder include a medical examination, an interview and a language assessment. But the contract adds a new requirement: a day of civic training, regardless of the applicant’s language fluency and the length of time spent in France.” (1)

The civic classes comprise eight hours of instruction in the following areas: French colonial history, revisionist history of French involvement in World War II, French laws, political parties, and information about the European Union (EU which comprises 27 European nations).

“But Sarkozy’s emphasis on national identity and ‘Frenchness’ is unsettling to some migrants and political critics, who feel he is fundamentally hostile to immigration. After all, his detractors say, this is the man who stepped up the deportation of illegal immigrants and courted far-right voters by evoking (with slightly more tactful language) a slogan used by Jean-Marie Le Pen, leader of the anti-immigrant National Front party: ‘France, love it or leave it.’ ” (2)

The above quote sounds very American. “Love it or Leave it.” By the way, President Sarkozy spent his summer holidays in New Hampshire.

Frederick Douglass was keenly aware of the importance of full citizenship for former slaves, along with all members of the African-American population born freely in the United States. He also lobbied strongly for black free men in the North to join the Union forces during the Civil War. But in the following commentary made late in his life, Mr. Douglass discusses the plight of his fellow citizens regarding the importance of voting in an upcoming election:

“In view of this fact its importance can not be overestimated or understated; and no class of citizens have a deeper interest at stake or a more solemn responsibility resting upon them in choosing between these parties than the colored people in the doubtful states. For it may involve not only the loss of the elective franchise, but the loss of citizenship itself.

We take it for granted, fellow citizens, that not any of the statements here made, or the facts here narrated, will be questioned or denied. They are prominent points in the political history of our country. Conspicuous on its page, they are equally forcible in the lesson they teach and the duty they make plain. No man will likely go wrong who studies this history and who wishes to conserve his blood-bought liberty in this Republic.

Unfortunately, one reason we have for addressing you is the fact that the lesson of this history does not seem to have impressed all of our people as it should. For the first time in all the years of our political enfranchisement, we are confronted, in the pending Presidential campaign, with the strange and unnatural spectacle of a colored Democratic party organized with a view so to dispose of its voice as to defeat the Republican party, and, if possible, to make Democratic rule permanent. No position ever taken by any class of colored people in this country seems to us more inconsistent, illogical, and disastrous to our civil rights than this.

Nevertheless, we must assume that the men associated with this are honest and really hope to accomplish something for the welfare and advancement of the race, and we therefore invite attention to some reasons in favor of a different course.

First, we ask them to observe that the Republican Party has inscribed, over the very gateway of its platform, renewed devotion to the rights and liberties of our people in common with all others. It holds to the sovereign right to every lawful citizen, rich or poor, native or foreign born, white or black, to cast one free ballot in all public elections and to have that ballot duly counted…”

It might surprise present day political leaders, along with the rest of us, that Mr. Douglass said, “I am a Republican, a black, dyed in the wool Republican, and I never intend to belong to any other party than the party of freedom and progress.”

Source: The Frederick Douglass Papers at the Library of Congress: “Address to the Colored Citizens of the United States,” pages 2 and 3.

References

(1 and 2) “Would-be migrants must undergo classes in what it means to be French,” International Herald Tribune, 09 August 2007.

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The Ancient Art of Mapmaking Collides with the New World Order

Friday, August 3, 2007
Posted by Steve Amoia

Nova Rico is a mapmaking company outside of Florence, Italy. They produce over one million custom designed globes each year.

“‘The problems of cartography are the same that exist in diplomatic relations,’ said Stefano Strata, co-director of Nova Rico, which has been producing custom globes for 50 years in Impruneta, near Florence. For mapmakers like Nova Rico, disputes over geography are commonplace. For a Turkish customer, Cyprus is shown split in two, a division that Greek Cypriots do not recognize. In one globe, Chile gets parts of Antarctica that on another globe go to Argentina. And in much of the Arab world, Israel is nonexistent…

When working on a commission, Strata and his business partner, Riccardo Donati, get precise instructions, sometimes at governmental level. In the 1980s, Saddam Hussein, then the president of Iraq, commissioned Nova Rico to draft a globe with all Arab countries colored orange and the rest of the world yellow. Iraqi military advisers came to Impruneta to monitor production. ‘It was clearly a political globe,’ Strata said.” (1)

When Frederick Bailey escaped the rigors of slavery from a Maryland plantation, he did not have a globe, atlas, map, route numbers, or any of the navigational tools that we take for granted in today’s world. He used his knowledge of the Chesapeake Bay and Baltimore, along with the rudiments of astronomy.

“Our house stood within a few rods of the Chesapeake Bay, whose broad bosom was ever white with sails from every quarter of the habitable globe. Those beautiful vessels, robed in purest white, so delightful to the eye of freemen, were to me so many shrouded ghosts, to terrify and torment me with thoughts of my wretched condition. I have often, in the deep stillness of a summer’s Sabbath, stood all alone upon the lofty banks of that noble bay, and traced, with saddened heart and tearful eye, the countless number of sails moving off to the mighty ocean. The sight of these always affected me powerfully. My thoughts would compel utterance; and there, with no audience but the Almighty, I would pour out my soul’s complaint, in my rude way, with an apostrophe to the moving multitude of ships:–

You are loosed from your moorings, and are free; I am fast in my chains, and am a slave! You move merrily before the gentle gale, and I sadly before the bloody whip! You are freedom’s swift-winged angels, that fly round the world; I am confined in bands of iron! O that I were free! O, that I were on one of your gallant decks, and under your protecting wing!

Only think of it; one hundred miles straight north, and I am free! Try it? Yes! God helping me, I will. It cannot be that I shall live and die a slave. I will take to the water. This very bay shall yet bear me into freedom. The steamboats steered in a northeast course from North Point. I will do the same; and when I get to the head of the bay, I will turn my canoe adrift, and walk straight through Delaware into Pennsylvania. When I get there, I shall not be required to have a pass; I can travel without being disturbed.

The plan we finally concluded upon was, to get a large canoe belonging to Mr. Hamilton, and upon the Saturday night previous to Easter holidays, paddle directly up the Chesapeake Bay. On our arrival at the head of the bay, a distance of seventy or eighty miles from where we lived, it was our purpose to turn our canoe adrift, and follow the guidance of the North Star till we got beyond the limits of Maryland. Our reason for taking the water route was, that we were less liable to be suspected as runaways; we hoped to be regarded as fishermen; whereas, if we should take the land route, we should be subjected to interruptions of almost every kind. Any one having a white face, and being so disposed, could stop us, and subject us to examination.”

His first attempt in 1835 resulted in failure; actually, he was betrayed by one of his friends before the escape could be attempted. However, the resolute will of Frederick would not remain deterred. Three years later, he tried again, and was successful. He decided not to describe the event in great detail because it might compromise the safety of future attempts.

“On the third day of September, 1838, I left my chains, and succeeded in reaching New York without the slightest interruption of any kind. How I did so,–what means I adopted,–what direction I travelled, and by what mode of conveyance,–I must leave unexplained, for the reasons before mentioned.”

Source: Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave: Chapters X and XI.

Reference

(1) “In mapmaking, disputes over geography,” International Herald Tribune, 02 August 2007.

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David Beckham Hops Around The Kangaroo Boot Controversy

Friday, July 27, 2007
Posted by Steve Amoia

Last Monday, the California Supreme Court banned future sales of a particular soccer shoe (or boot as it is known in soccer circles). The shoe is made by adidas, and is called the Predator. Some of its models feature kangaroo leather from Australia. The California ruling bans the sale of derivative products that come from three specific breeds of Australian kangaroo: the Eastern Gray, the Western Gray, and the Red. Despite the ruling, Australia had already removed the three breeds from their endangered species list.

In the past, the Predator had been endorsed by global soccer icon, David Beckham; however, after pressure from Viva!, an animal rights group in England last year, he decided to wear a synthetic leather version of the product.

“The issue around the footwear is long running. The Predator boot was invented in 1993 by Craig Johnston, an Australian who played for Liverpool. He improvised prototypes with rubber from table tennis bats on the outside.

The boot enables the good player to apply bias to the ball the way a table tennis player does. And when adidas developed the product, Beckham became the obvious marketing man. Bend It Like Beckham grew into a trendy item that costs close to $200 a pair, or 10 times the cost of a cheap pair of soccer shoes.

Johnston had nothing to do with the culling of kangaroos for his boot. He had sold the patent and moved on. Beckham spent countless hours in the adidas wind tunnel, helping to tweak the design and to select the soft leather “feel” that top pros go for. But in early 2006, hounded by the British animal welfare group Vegetarians International Voice for Animals, or Viva!, and ironically with time on his hands because of a broken bone in his foot, Beckham was shown film of kangaroos being shot, baby kangaroos being cut from the pouch and bludgeoned to death in the Outback allegedly to provide the material for the sportswear.

His name sells the kangaroo Predator, his feet do not run in them.” (1)

Frederick Douglass never wore kangaroo leather shoes, or any other type of product that involved protected species. The only thing endangered for young Frederick were his own feet. In this excerpt, he described the monthly ration of food, along with the yearly allowance for clothing:

“Here, too, the slaves of all the other farms received their monthly allowance of food, and their yearly clothing. The men and women slaves received, as their monthly allowance of food, eight pounds of pork, or its equivalent in fish, and one bushel of corn meal. Their yearly clothing consisted of two coarse linen shirts, one pair of linen trousers, like the shirts, one jacket, one pair of trousers for winter, made of coarse negro cloth, one pair of stockings, and one pair of shoes; the whole of which could not have cost more than seven dollars. The allowance of the slave children was given to their mothers, or the old women having the care of them. The children unable to work in the field had neither shoes, stockings, jackets, nor trousers, given to them; their clothing consisted of two coarse linen shirts per year. When these failed them, they went naked until the next allowance-day. Children from seven to ten years old, of both sexes, almost naked, might be seen at all seasons of the year.”

Source: The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, Chapter II.

Reference

(1) Beckham tries to sidestep the boot controversy, International Herald Tribune, 24 July 2007, by Rob Hughes.

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Pratibha Patil Becomes the First Elected Woman President of India

Saturday, July 21, 2007
Posted by Steve Amoia

In their 60th year after independence from British rule, a historic event occurred today in India. Mrs. Pratibha Patil, the former governor of Rajasthan, became the first elected woman to hold the elected office of President. She won over two-thirds of the vote among state assemblies, along with members of the Indian Parliament who were eligible to vote.

“Mrs Patil’s supporters say her election to the largely ceremonial role will be a boost to millions of Indian women. The BBC’s Sanjoy Majumder, in Delhi, says that while some see her victory as an important step towards gender equality in India, many view it as only a symbolic gesture. Millions of women in India face discrimination and poverty often linked to age-old traditions which require the parents of a bride to pay a large dowry to the family of her eventual husband.” (1)

Mrs. Patil had the following message to her supporters, along with the Indian people:

“I am grateful to the people of India and the men and women of India and this is a victory for the principles which our Indian people uphold.” (2)

Frederick Douglass was a champion for women’s suffrage, which was the term in his era for women’s rights. Here were his thoughts about the future influence of women as leaders:

“If intelligence is the only true and rational basis of government, it follows that that is the best government which draws its life and power from the largest sources of wisdom, energy, and goodness at its command. The force of this reasoning would be easily comprehended and readily assented to in any case involving the employment of physical strength. We should all see the folly and madness of attempting to accomplish with a part what could only be done with the united strength of the whole. Though his folly may be less apparent, it is just as real when one-half of the moral and intellectual power of the world is excluded from any voice or vote in civil government. In this denial of the right to participate in government, not merely the degradation of woman and the perpetuation of a great injustice happens, but the maiming and repudiation of one-half of the moral and intellectual power of the government of the world. Thus far all human governments have been failures, for none have secured, except in a partial degree, the ends for which governments are instituted.

War, slavery, injustice and oppression, and the idea that might makes right have been uppermost in all such governments, and the weak, for whose protection governments are ostensibly created, have had practically no rights which the strong have felt bound to respect. The slayers of thousands have been exalted into heroes, and the worship of mere physical force has been considered glorious. Nations have been and still are but armed camps, expending their wealth and strength and ingenuity in forging weapons of destruction against each other; and while it may not be contended that the introduction of the feminine element in government would entirely cure this tendency to exalt woman’s influence over right, many reasons can be given to show that woman’s influence would greatly tend to check and modify this barbarous and destructive tendency. At any rate, seeing that the male governments of the world have failed, it can do no harm to try the experiment of a government by man and woman united.”

Source: The Life and Times of Frederick Douglass, Chapter XVIII, Honor To Whom Honor.”

References

(1 and 2) First Female President for India, BBC News, 21 July 2007.

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