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FREEDOMWAYS    THIRD QUARTER 1966

"Don't sweat it, man. A year, two years from now you won't even remember my name....You're not the first fay cat who ever dug being around spades, and you won't be the last. And you'll be like all the rest. You make the scene for a while, get some black pussy, smoke a little pot, then you cut out and go back where you belong." 

And that's just what he does in the last scene with a prostitute who tells him about another girl that fled a narcotics raid and probably headed for Chicago.

"'Yeah,' he said, knowing he too, would soon be going to Chicago."
John Henry Jones

SOME FACTS - NO REVELATION

NEGRO POLITICS. By James Q. Wilson.. The Free press, New York. 342 pages. $2.45.

JAMES Q. WILSON'S Negro Politics is far more limited study than one would assume from the title. It is a study of Negro social and political action in Chicago in the late 1950's based on interviews with "leaders" and "outstanding citizens.

What do the data reveal? The data reveal that times have changed a little. The old order consisted of accepted, prestige leaders who fought for generally agreed upon ends in sporadic and poorly organized fashion. Since the fifties the professional organizers and specialists in race relations have replaced the token Negroes and Uncle Toms. The ministry is less influential, the middle class more militant, the Dawson machine has become dedicated to self-perpetuation. The basic problem: lack of effective action (despite the high percentage of Negro organizations) to combat an anti-Negro American society.

Despite the tendency toward increased militancy cited by this study Wilson notes a sense of futility about their status among black people. And finally, an almost buried observation about the nature of protest: "It is difficult to see how Negroes can perform the protest function without utilizing tactics...that in different circumstances would be considered improper. It is inherently contradictory to look for 'responsible' militants who will lead a 'reasonable' protest movement."

Which is okay, as far as it goes. But it doesn't go very far; even

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Transcription Notes:
---------- Reopened for Editing 2024-02-09 13:32:11 don't notate italics, bold, etc. ---------- Reopened for Editing 2024-02-09 13:44:24