Viewing page 7 of 56

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

CHALLENGE OF THE 1980 ELECTIONS

SO FAR, in these first months of a new decade, the word that best describes prevailing conditions in our nation and in the world is TROUBLE. The evidence of deep trouble is all around us: In the nation, the chronic joblessness of millions of people, doubt digit inflation, an ever-escalating military budget which is a primary cause of the inflation, vigorous right-wing efforts to unseat those congressmen who are most responsive to people's needs-these are just some of the ills that beset us. 
Only passing mention is made in the press of another source of trouble-that is, police brutality against Black and Latin peoples, which has become epidemic throughout the country. New names have joined the list of battlefields on which the struggle for human rights is being waged against police systems that are unfettered by civilian control-Miami, San Diego, San Antonio, Wrightsville, Georgia, Chattanooga, Greensboro. (In the last two cities, the local police apparently colluded with members of the newly resurgent Ku Klux Klan in committing murder.) As the nation slides into a new, deliberately induced economic depression with its attendant social dislocations and conflict, civilian control over the police apparatus will continue to surface as an issue of critical importance. Outlawing of the Ku Klux Klan should also command a prominent place on our agenda of demands. Just as the "New Nixon" turned out to be an old enemy, so has the Klan, with its newly cosmeticized rhetoric, been exposed as the same anti-democratic, murderously racist organization that it was of old. 
In the wake of the outrageous acquittal of four police officers in the death of a black insurance executive, which sparked the Miami race riot, National Urban League President Vernon Jordan was felled by a would-be assassin's bullet. This vicious assault recalls another election year, 1968, when political assassination emerged as a tool for polarizing the country and creating a climate conducive to victory by the right wing in that year's presidential election. 
True to form, the repression and intimidation of Black and Latin peoples at home are mirroring the growing belligerence and provocation which characterize the U.S. government's responses to events abroad. After insulting the dignity and aspirations of the Iranian people by admitting the former Shah to the U.S.-the insult which brought on the hostage crisis-the Carter Administration has steadfastly refused to acknowledge and renounce this country's well documented historic abuse of Iran. Preferring to continue the abuse
69

Transcription Notes:
---------- Reopened for Editing 2024-02-26 01:46:27