| The Voluntary Transfer Program: An Open Letter to Charlie Brennan | for everyone |
Charles Brennan is a radio talk host on KMOX, among other things. Unlike those who follow him on that station, he's not a conservative ideologue. This morning (Friday, 2/25/11) he had been talking about the decline in the city's population and a caller suggested that the schools had been harmed by the voluntary desegregation program. I never call in to radio shows, but I do sometimes send an e-mail to commentators. This entry (and the one to follow) is my response about the St. Louis Voluntary Interdistrict Desegregation Program. Both have been slightly edited for publication.
Dear Charlie,
I caught the tail-end of a call Friday morning in which I heard (seemingly grudging) agreement with the high cost of the voluntary desegregation program and its value. I was teaching in an inner ring suburban school (Hancock Place) when the program began. It was still in place when I retired (subject of e-mail #2 below-- sorry, you were truly inspirational this morning). There is no denying that the program was frightfully expensive. But....
When I began teaching at Hancock High School in 1971, it was 100% white; at the time, it seemed to me that the percentage of the population that was not racially biased was only slightly smaller. According to the veterans when I began, there was an active KKK cell in the community. As a child of the '60s I was appalled at the frequent, open expressions of bigotry I heard from my students (and occasionally some colleagues). Use of the N-word was frequent and unapologetic.
In 1992, about 10 years after the advent of the voluntary desegregation program, Hancock High School had a black valedictorian who gave the best valedictory speech I heard in my 37 years of graduations. (I have a copy if you're interested.) As Marcus stood in front of his classmates and their parents that evening in Jefferson Barracks Park, he asked his classmates to join hands. And they did. Black hands took white hands, boy hands took boy hands. They took that (unthinkable, 20 years earlier) step simply because a young man they respected asked them to.
I don't pretend that bigotry and racism had magically disappeared from Lemay by 1992. But I contend that a generation of men and women from that area (and from the inner city, as well) would never again be able to generalize and stereotype without the face of people they knew and respected, respected and knew as individual people, rising in their memories. There are subsequent stories, of course, that reinforce that opinion, of young men and women working and playing together, learning about each other, sharing their problems and successes. Marcus was just one example, but (the vast majority of) his classmates would never be able call someone a "N@⁄##¶®" without dissonance.
No question, the voluntary desegregation program was expensive. But what price can we put on that change in attitude by not just a generation but a community toward a group of their fellow citizens? Some might argue that bigotry and prejudice would have faded away naturally and gradually. As a history teacher I'm skeptical. Those same (kind of) people probably argued that slavery would eventually die out, too. The cost-value question is not (sorry) black and white. It's far more complicated than that. Most everything is.
Dear Charlie,
I caught the tail-end of a call Friday morning in which I heard (seemingly grudging) agreement with the high cost of the voluntary desegregation program and its value. I was teaching in an inner ring suburban school (Hancock Place) when the program began. It was still in place when I retired (subject of e-mail #2 below-- sorry, you were truly inspirational this morning). There is no denying that the program was frightfully expensive. But....
When I began teaching at Hancock High School in 1971, it was 100% white; at the time, it seemed to me that the percentage of the population that was not racially biased was only slightly smaller. According to the veterans when I began, there was an active KKK cell in the community. As a child of the '60s I was appalled at the frequent, open expressions of bigotry I heard from my students (and occasionally some colleagues). Use of the N-word was frequent and unapologetic.
In 1992, about 10 years after the advent of the voluntary desegregation program, Hancock High School had a black valedictorian who gave the best valedictory speech I heard in my 37 years of graduations. (I have a copy if you're interested.) As Marcus stood in front of his classmates and their parents that evening in Jefferson Barracks Park, he asked his classmates to join hands. And they did. Black hands took white hands, boy hands took boy hands. They took that (unthinkable, 20 years earlier) step simply because a young man they respected asked them to.
I don't pretend that bigotry and racism had magically disappeared from Lemay by 1992. But I contend that a generation of men and women from that area (and from the inner city, as well) would never again be able to generalize and stereotype without the face of people they knew and respected, respected and knew as individual people, rising in their memories. There are subsequent stories, of course, that reinforce that opinion, of young men and women working and playing together, learning about each other, sharing their problems and successes. Marcus was just one example, but (the vast majority of) his classmates would never be able call someone a "N@⁄##¶®" without dissonance.
No question, the voluntary desegregation program was expensive. But what price can we put on that change in attitude by not just a generation but a community toward a group of their fellow citizens? Some might argue that bigotry and prejudice would have faded away naturally and gradually. As a history teacher I'm skeptical. Those same (kind of) people probably argued that slavery would eventually die out, too. The cost-value question is not (sorry) black and white. It's far more complicated than that. Most everything is.
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