Antonio D. French Quotes

This is an incredibly important political and historical quotation. One of the leading white ministers of Boston, advises all Blacks (and implicitly whites as well) not to cooperate with the Boston Police. Under the Dred Scott and other legal doctrines, the law enforcement mechanism of even Northern, anti Slavery states, would arrest and hold those suspected of being runaway slaves. This included many ex slaves but also many freemen who were then enslaved by the system. Law enforcement was no better than the slave owners and the slave catchers as far as the welfare of Blacks was concerned. The result has been a hostility to and an antipathy to law enforcement in the North who – even in the view of many whites like Parker were not worthy of trust and cooperation. After slavery, law enforcement supported and enforced the Jim Crow discriminatory laws. The resentment and distrust remains.

Earlier, a virtually all white police force in nearby 67% Black Ferguson, had shot an unarmed black young man who was 20 feet away with his hands up, 7 times killing him and then leaving the body uncovered on the street for over 4 hours. Many people of all races began to peacefully demonstrate in Ferguson and were met with military assault weapons pointed at them and military armored vehicles, with the police illegally (as later determined by the courts) were interfering with the right to protest. The demonstrations turned to riots and there was looting and arson of business establishments. The demonstrations started to spread to nearby St. Louis and other cities as the news spread. While the Ferguson officials had behaved so badly and stupidly, the St. Louis mayor exhibited democratic leadership that was an example for others. Slay was then a 4 term mayor, being reelected more than any other mayor in St. Louis history, and was one of the outstanding politicians in America.

He was trying to calm many Americans who were upset that a young Black man who was accused of a minor misdemeanor of selling loose cigarettes (not whole packs) was being arrested by 5 white New York City police officers who thought that he was not cooperating forced him to the ground with one using a “choke hold” that was against Police Department regulations. The video, taken by a citizen, showed the arrested man crying to the police several times that he could not breathe when the pressure was placed by the officer with the choke hold. He man was choked to death. The coroner declared the death a homicide. However, the Staten Island district attorney presented the case to the Grand Jury in such a way that the jury found no reason to indict any of the police officers for any crime. Staten Island is a borough of New York far smaller and more suburban than the rest of New York System and more than half of all the white New York City police officers lived in the only conservative borough of New York where they were a major political force in the election of the borough district attorney. The President told the public that the Justice Department would investigate the case to determine if the victim’s civil rights had been violated.

Given that the Black population is less than 15 percent of the total, the odds against this occurring by chance is less than 100 million to one. The problem was then very hard to solve in that in most cases the cause was not anti-Black hostility. Rather it was that most police—including some Black police officers—were more fearful for Black males relative to white males and perceived themselves or the public in mortal danger much more often with Blacks than with whites in similar situations. Much of this was a historical societal bias and fear of Black males and much was the result of the disproportionate media depiction of violent Black males.

Lame was not opposed to civil rights as some who read this quotation sometimes conclude. He did think that much of the lack of success of minorities in America could be ameliorated by many self-improvement and individual efforts. His reference to destroying America, was an interesting rhetorical technique of assuming that what you advocate is not implemented and showing that it leads to disaster. Phrased this way, it gets and focuses the attention of an audience.

Battle was the grandson of a Revolutionary war soldier and the son of a former slave. He was the first person inducted into the New York City Police Force when it was first organized after the consolidation of the boroughs in 1898. He became the first Black Police Sargent and the first Black Lieutenant of the city and was probably the only Black senior police officer in the country at that time.

Two decades earlier leading Black politicians, observing the differential deleterious effects of drug use on Blacks called for a massive Federal effort to diminish substance abuse. The War on Drugs responded and reduced the drug use in America somewhat. However, the unintended consequences—especially for Blacks—caused many Black politicians to call for an end or serious curtailing to the War on Drugs. The differential effect on Black males was dramatic. White drug dealing tended to occur in private offices and homes where black dealing takes place to a greater extent on the streets where the lower level dealers are much more likely to be caught. The differential penal;ties for possession or selling of powdered cocaine (preferred by whites) and crack cocaine (preferred by Blacks) caused many more Blacks to be jailed. With less access to the better attornies, the Bplacks tend to get longer sentences, even for the same crime. In addition, the drug of choice for most whites is alcohol which was made legal while the drugs of choice for Blacks are illegal. In many Black urban neighborhoods like Newark, the majority of young Black men arwere in jail for ddrug law violations. See {624056} for a concurring opinion.

The vast majority of the million Blacks in prison have been sentenced for using or selling drugs.

There is a significant argument as to whether of not race should be used to try and predict the variables that will likely produce crimes. Some social scientists argue that virtually everything correlates with race {633357} and therefore the predictions are meaningless. Here, Kurtz argues that if you do not use race, since it does correlate with so much, then you might as well not try and determine the predictive factors of crime. Reality lies in the center, use race as one of the statistical variables but do not use it for profiling potential criminals and potential suspects unless there is observable and not deduced or inferred evidence of race in the crime.

She was commenting on the incident when in 2013, Congress awarded its highest honor to the 4 young Black girls who were murdered in Birmingham, Alabama at the height of the Civil Rights Movement by the KKK who set off a bomb in the 16th Street Baptist Church. The sister of Addie Mae Collins, one of the murdered girls, who herself was wounded in the bombing, refused the medal on behalf of her dead sister. She resented the fact that it had taken all these years for Congress to make this gesture and then would not do anything that might cost money such as monetary restitution. When the Muslim terrorists murdered people in the 9-11 World Trade Center attacks, Congress swiftly arranged for restitution payments to go to the relatives of the murdered victims and to those wounded. However to many people, when white terrorists murder black victims no restitution many comes forth—only a medal. See {634035} for the sister’s statement.

The murderers were found and tried by Federal authorities. They were actually convicted of civil rights violations although two had committed 1st degree murder and the others of 2nd degree murder. However, the racist judge gave the murderers incredibly light sentences. See {637613}.

The law enforcement officers were the ones who broke the law when they beat and brutalized the peaceful civil rights marchers. The “white niggers” refer to the white marchers including clergy.

One problem the Attorney General and the President faced was with the FBI. Director J. Edgar Hoover. He was a racist himself and he detested Martin Luther King and the Civil Rights demonstrators. He didn’t want his agents protecting the demonstrators who he regarded as Communists and rabble rousers . Further, his agents in the South were in tight with the local law enforcement officers who were allowing the white crowds to beat the demonstrators, and they didn’t want to upset their “colleagues” by arresting people who the local authorities didn’t want arrested. Only when one of them attacked an FBI agent observing the demonstration did the FBI make an arrest. That produced the dilemma the Attorney General described.