A Word to Black Students

...But Mr...

...This should indicate a political principle that we must never forget...

...I am not suggesting that this process is inevitable, though to a certain extent it does seem to contain an internal dynamic that operates independently of human will...

...it is won...

...As long as blacks constitute only 11 percent of the population, any go-it-alone strategy is bound to fail...

...This problem does not spring from blackness but from a technological revolution that has affected all poor people regardless of their race...

...I would like, if I may, to apply Ellison's idea to the economic situation of black Americans today...

...And if he fails, then we will be provided with an opportunity to resolve once and for all a central dilemma of American life—the relationship of blacks to American society and, in an even more profound sense, their relationship with themselves...

...In The Souls of Black Folks, W. E. B. DuBois wrote that the function of the university is above all "to be the organ of that fine adjustment between real life and the growing knowledge of life, an adjustment which forms the secret of civilization...

...If we are to have any hope of accomplishing this task, it is essential that we make an important distinction between issues of politics and problems in psychology...

...The first is that in some instances the cultural revolt includes a demand for racial separatism, which is entirely self-defeating from a political standpoint...

...I think it can be demonstrated that for a racial minority the use of violence is not only politically ineffective but counterproductive and even suicidal...

...I ask this question rhetorically, since it should be clear that violence can do nothing more than produce a reaction against blacks that will strengthen our enemies and thereby make it impossible to achieve the things we so badly need...

...The question here is whether violence is an effective form of political struggle...

...In order to do this you must guard against the possibility of becoming concerned only with intellectual, cultural, and racial issues while the problems of lower- and working-class blacks remain economic...

...There is a tendency today to anticipate the apocalypse...

...Randolph did not mean that blacks should isolate themselves from broader political movements in the society...

...Many liberals have lost a sense of purpose and direction...

...We should see this as a distinction between what we do in order to influence the political and economic relations in the society and what, in a more personal way, we do to achieve self-knowledge and identity...

...I do not regard as radical those who advocate violence only to bring about repression...

...You are part of an intellectual elite among blacks...

...A just society certainly encourages a healthy psychology, and individuals can find personal fulfillment through political involvement...

...As You WELL KNOW, a great cultural revolt is taking place among many young black Americans...

...it also obscures the very meaning of social change by offering the desperate adventures of a few "revolutionaries" as an alternative to the mobilization of political majorities, and by making it appear that killing a cop is a serious alternative to full employment...

...Let us be very clear that the civil-rights forces alone could not have defeated Haynsworth and Carswell...

...We might psychoanalyze racism out of all the prejudiced white people in the country, but until we are willing to accept the principle that every able-bodied man or woman has the right to a decent and well-paying job, we shall not have begun to attack the economic roots of racial injustice...

...Thus, there are factors working both for and against the achievement of full racial equality...

...The study of the black experience in America is so vital to an understanding of our country and our people that it must attract scholars of the very highest intellectual eminence...

...Justice is never given, it is exacted...

...I therefore do not regard as radical those who talk of separatism, however loud may be their words and however militant and controversial their actions...

...Most of you were only five years old when the Supreme Court declared school segregation unconstitutional...

...The problem is not only that violence obstructs the achievements of social change by strengthening the Right...

...A man may take to drink because he feels himself to be a failure, and then fail all the more completely because he drinks...

...He is encouraging that reaction, for he knows that he became President because of divisions in the society, and that it is in his interest that these divisions grow wider...

...I do not regard as radical or progressive any black person who does anything that strengthens the forces of conservatism...

...But they have found no goals to replace the ones they have cast aside, with the result that they have become politically immobile...

...But we must also judge the use of violence by the oppressed from a political standpoint...

...But in the 1960s they occurred with a driving momentum that made the race problem the central issue in our national politics...

...Nor is Nixon simply riding the wave of reaction...

...And by equality I do not mean "separate but equal," a phrase created by segregationists in order to prevent the attainment of equality...

...They are taking new pride in their cultural heritage and are demanding to be accepted as full and equal human beings...

...A number of theories have been created to give this mood a forward-looking image, but it is really little more than an accommodation to the new conservatism...

...In the words of the civil-rights song, I don't think that anybody is going to turn you 'round—not now, not after we have come so far...

...Consequently, the likelihood is that there will be an increase in racial tension which will further eat away at the unity of the progressive coalition...

...Our task is to see to it that he fails...

...The Civil War and its aftermath left the North with a moral burden it simply could not bear...

...I mean equality based upon an integrated social order in which black people, proud of their race and their heritage, shall have no door closed to them...

...There is, first of all, the militant desire for racial justice, which is shared by countless numbers of young blacks like yourselves...

...What I am suggesting is that we must understand this process if we are to be in a position to influence it...

...The Southern strategy of the Nixon administration is based upon the same principle as the Compromise of 1876: namely, that Northern Republicans and Southern conservatives share common interests and together can rule this nation...

...I do not think it is possible to condemn too harshly what the President has done in the South in order to form this alliance...

...In a very real sense, we are at a crossroads...

...But even a moderate form of it can be dangerous since it can lead to a politics so preoccupied with psychological issues that the goals of political action are obscured and even rendered unobtainable...

...BY NO MEANS do I want to give the impression that the situation is hopeless...

...Morally, the former is more BAYARD RUSTIN reprehensible than the latter...

...It goes without saying that Negroes are brutalized by racial prejudice and discrimination...

...The problem is that such a consciousness finds it hard to come to grips with the reality that history consists of alternating periods of movement and stagnation, of action and reaction, of tremendous hope and enthusiasm, which can be followed by cynicism and exhaustion...

...We must keep this in mind, if we are to prevent the black cultural revolt from playing into the hands of white conservatives and segregationists who are the very worst enemies we have...

...I do not mean to disparage the attack on racism, but if we do only that, we shall provide an out for those whites who are far more interested in "giving a damn" about impoverished blacks than in doing the economically more uncomfortable things that could eliminate hunger and deprivation...

...Our struggle is too important, there is still so much that remains unaccomplished, that it would be a grave error were we to indulge in this "end-of-the-world" chatter...

...If we are to think strategically about eliminating racial injustice, then we should not be satisfied with an approach that results in aggravating our problems...

...What worries me most about the present situation is that there has been a decline in the effectiveness of some of the forces that have traditionally held reaction at I AYARD RUSTIN bay...

...This is the prime motivation behind the President's opposition to the extension of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, his nominations of Haynsworth and Carswell to the Supreme Court, and his clear message to Southern segregationists that the federal government will not oppose any efforts to roll back whatever advances had been made in school integration...

...Such moods can be harmful, for, as George Orwell has pointed out, "an effect can become a cause, reinforcing the original cause and producing the same effect in an intensified form, and so on indefinitely...

...The situation is not hopeless...

...I am not here discussing the motives of young blacks who preach violence...

...You were seven when a young black preacher named Martin Luther King emerged as the leader of the Montgomery bus protest...

...WE ARE LIVING in a time of such rapid change that we must continuously redefine our terms and reassert those principles which seem to hold some truth...

...Such walls, whether constructed by whites or by blacks, are built to oppress and repress, but never to liberate...

...What we must first understand is that the pendulum of history has already begun to swing downward...

...At eleven you witnessed the beginning of the sit-in movement in Greensboro, North Carolina, and for the next ten years—your adolescent years that were to shape the perspective with which you now look out on the world—you lived through a period in black American history more eventful than any other decade, including the decade of the Civil War...

...I think this is an exciting and creative social phenomenon, but it raises three political problems, which we must analyze carefully...

...We need a social and economic program that will wipe out poverty, and we need that far more than we need pure white hearts...

...It was far more interested in pursuing its own commercial interests than in advancing the welfare of Negroes in the South and, of course, the North also suffered from the disease of racism...

...But I think we must make this distinction, because in periods of great social upheaval—and we are living through such a period—there is a tendency to politicize all things, including scholarship, art, friendship, and love...

...There are progressive forces at work in American society that did not exist in 1876...

...Who benefits when blacks engage in violence...

...Now this is a very complex issue, with which A. Philip Randolph tried to deal almost 30 years ago...

...He has profoundly and perhaps permanently alienated blacks, he has put the white moderates of the South on the defensive, and he has given a go-ahead signal to the reactionaries...

...Finally, the dramatic events of the Iast few years seem to have totally disoriented a sizable portion of the liberal community...

...I do not regard as radical those who moralize about the evils of white society, if at the same time they do not present a program that can solve the problems of black society...

...The traditional goals of integration and the expansion of the welfare state are no longer thought to be feasible or even desirable...

...Nationally, the progressive coalition of blacks, liberals, and the trade-union move ment, which has been responsible for the major social advances since the New Deal, is now weakened by internal divisions...

...WHAT IS HAPPENING today is not very different from what happened in the 1870s...

...For all practical purposes, they stand with the opponents of our struggle...

...It is impossible now to gauge the extent of this reaction...

...But I do call into question the effects of their actions...

...All hope for black equality collapsed when Northern Republicans worked out a compromise with Southern Democrats in the disputed election of 1876...

...By means of such acts he has helped foster a mood of confrontationism and racial hostility...

...Freedom is never granted...

...Indeed, I can think of no recent President who has more blatantly sacrificed the ideals of equality and racial justice for his own political ends...

...Such ideas are sheer indulgence, because even if there were any truth to them—and I do not believe there is—it would be our duty to act so as to prevent the worst from happening rather than to enable the fulfillment of our prophesies...

...A clear distinction must, of course, be drawn between the violence of the oppressor and the reactive violence of the oppressed...

...Real self-determination can only be achieved by a unified black movement joining with other progressive social forces to form a coalition that represents a majority of the population...

...As such, it is extraordinarily important that you not lose touch with the problems and aspirations of the great mass of blacks who are not part of this elite...

...They control the White House and, through the power of presidential appointment, have gained a majority on the Supreme Court...

...My own feeling is that the drift to the Right in American politics can be reversed if we do the correct thing...

...The Southern Whigs agreed to let the Republicans retain control of the White House, in return for which federal troops were withdrawn from the South and large subsidies were provided for the construction of the Southern railroad system...

...He followed that statement with these words of caution: "But Negroes must not fight for their liberation alone...

...Finally, the third problem raised by the cultural revolt is that it has been exclusively preoccupied with racial issues and has thus tended to ignore other issues that are also vitally important...

...In this sense separatism is the opposite of self-determination, because it can lead only to the continued subjection of blacks...

...Things have not yet reached that stage today, but the parallels are frightening...

...At that time, he acknowledged that "the Negro and the other darker races must look to themselves for freedom...

...You must help it perform that function, particularly in the controversial field of black studies...

...The problems George Wallace had in the Alabama primaries should make this point eminently clear...

...In such a social order there will no longer be walls, representing fear and insecurity, to separate people from one another...

...This conflict has probably been exaggerated in the press, but a disturbing amount of it does exist, primarily because of economic competition between the two groups...

...They succeeded only because they were allied with the trade-union movement, and it is this alliance, based upon mutual interest between blacks and labor, which offers hope for future progress...

...Do blacks benefit, or do George Wallace, Spiro Agnew, John Mitchell, and Richard Nixon...

...I emphasize these economic problems for a special reason...

...He wrote this as an artist who has devoted his life to portraying human reality in all its complexity...

...it is the people who call for more police and less social spending...

...The system of Jim Crow was established and lynchings and terrorism became commonplace as poor Southern whites, embittered by poverty, were encouraged to unleash their wrath upon Negroes...

...Now I do not think that these are hard and fast categories that totally exclude one another...

...It is difficult to judge precisely what the effect of this experience with uninterrupted social protest has been on your generation (I am referring here to young whites as well as to young blacks...

...The most extreme form of this total politicization is totalitarianism, a stage we have not yet reached...

...Then there is the black vote, which in both the North and the South has become a major new factor in American politics...

...These millions of black people do not have the choice of withdrawing into the kind of concerns, sometimes mere fantasies, which are now prevalent among certain elements of the black intel A WORD TO BLACK STUDENTS ligentsia, and until they do have that choice, it is your responsibility to fight for programs that will enable them to achieve full economic justice...

...More specifically, he wants to see another antiblack Wallace vote in 1972, only this time he wants it cast for himself...

...What is not often remembered, however, is that were we to eliminate racism today we would have solved only part of the problem, and perhaps not even the major part...

...Automation is eliminating thousands of jobs that were held by both whites and blacks...

...But today, partly as a result of the Nixon administration's disastrous economic policies, we are in a recession...

...They must join sound, broad, liberal, social movements that seek to preserve American democracy and advance the cause of social and religious freedom...

...At that time, the country had been through a period as turbulent as the one we have just experienced...

...This vote has increased not only in numbers but also in sophistication, and in addition to the gains it has already won for blacks, it exercises a restraining influence on the scope and effectiveness of anti-Negro forces...

...I think it is also your responsibility, especially those of you who will go on to graduate work and university teaching, to protect the intellectual integrity of the university...

...In part this is due to conflict between blacks and lower-middle-class whites...

...Such competition can be reduced to a minimum if an expanding economy provides enough opportunities for everybody...

...A second problem is that the cultural revolt has been accompanied by a growing tendency to justify, and sometimes engage in, violence as a form of political struggle...

...Rustin's adaptation of a commencement address he gave at the Tuskegee Institute on May 31, 1970...

...In the case of the South, we have already seen how the federal government, formerly an ally in our struggle, has contributed to the resurgence of conservatism...

...Salvation for a race, nation, or a class must come from within...

...Nor are they radical who assume a revolutionary posture, but who then propose nothing more than an escape from American political reality and from the grinding social struggles that we must participate in...

...Young blacks are striking down the traditional symbols of racism...

...YOUR GENERATION has lived through a period of unprecedented upheaval...

...But we cannot escape the conclusion that, for the present at least, the conservatives have made important and ominous gains...

...We must not permit this promising area of study to become a refuge for charlatans more skilled at intellectual intimidation than investigation...

...But I would not doubt that it has made the political consciousness of this generation sensitive primarily to what we may call the upward arc of historical movement...

...Separatism can only aid Nixon's Southern strategy which is designed to build a conservative majority on the basis of hostility to blacks...

...Nixon succeeds in carrying out his Southern strategy, then the commitment to equality, on which America defaulted almost 100 years ago, will again be deferred to some future A WORD TO BLACK STUDENTS time...

...In the end it is not the black community that stands to gain from some of the more extreme activities of the Black Panthers and similar groups...

...The fact is that we live in a society that not only tolerates a relatively high level of unemployment, but is willing to increase that rate in order to combat inflation...

...For this reason it is essential that those students and faculty members who are committed to upholding the scholarly standards of black studies firmly refuse to accommodate anyone who would debase them...

...If Mr...

...Last, there is the trade-union movement which, though much maligned from both Right and Left, remains the strongest bulwark against reaction...

...The March on Washington, the outbreak of large-scale violence in hundreds of Negro communities, and the rise of the Black Power movement—these events no doubt had their precedents in the March on Washington movement of 1941, the race riots of 1919 and 1943, and the black nationalist Garvey movement in the 1920s...

...But it is a goal that we must hold ever before us, even in the darkest of times, for it not only confers dignity upon our struggle, but it should indicate to us how we must act toward one another today if we are to preserve for tomorrow the possibility of a just society...

...I admit that most likely we will not achieve such equality next month, or next year, or even in this decade...

...Ralph Ellison has written of his "struggle to stare down the deadly and hypnotic temptation to interpret the world and all its devices in terms of race...

...The Compromise of 1876 initiated the darkest period in the history of American Negroes...

...The real radical is that person who has a vision of equality and is willing to do those things that will bring reality closer to that vision...

...He is the executive director of the A. Philip Randolph Institute...

...Translated into political terms, the cultural revolt too often expresses itself as a desire for selfdetermination...