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COALITION'S THE THING                     DELLUMS
from Mississippi, a brown man from Arizona, a red man from Oklahoma and a white boy from Georgia on the same podium, castigating the economics of this country, he had to die-he opened the box.
Now let me try to develop that a little further in a story that I made up, so I can't vouch for how true it is. Because it's a story to try to tell you where I think we ultimately have got to go, and how to define the nature of the hypocrisy of the rhetoric that is taking place under the guise of "political debate" in this country.
Once upon a time there was a white sharecropper, eking out an existence on four acres of barren land. The land was so barren it couldn't even grow grass-either kind. (Am I in New York?) He was married, with twelve children, wife pregnant with the thirteenth, very little money, very little food, the land difficult to yield. One day at high noon, sweat pouring from his brow, he looked out and saw his children running tattered and torn across their miserable dwelling. He saw his wife sweating, trying to eke out some kind of meal for the family. He looked at his mule. He looked at his land. He looked out way across the field and he saw this big beautiful white mansion and he said, "There the landowner lives. I gotta put down my plow and go talk to 'im and ask 'im will there ever come a day when I won't live in such misery, along with all of my children and my family."
So the white sharecropper put down his plow and he walked for a mile. Suddenly he was in front of this tall, gigantic white mansion, with white columns. He went up the stairs and he knocked on the door, and the door opened. He was met by a tall distinguished white gentleman with gray hair, white shoes, white suit and a mint julep. He said, "Suh, I'm the sharecropper down the road. My family and I are living in sub-human circumstances. Can you tell me something that makes me keep going? I don't need to live in all this splendor and luxury, but will there ever come a time when I will live as a human being?"
The landowner took a drink, cleared his throat. "That's a very good question. Let me say this about that. There will come a time when your life will be enhanced-I pledge you that. But right now we got a problem."
"We got a problem, boss?"
"Yeah, we got a problem."
"What is it?"
"The 'niggers."" 
"The 'niggers?""
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Transcription Notes:
---------- Reopened for Editing 2024-02-16 08:45:10