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MR. LEHRER: Good evening. I'm Jim Lehrer in Washington.
MR. MAC NEIL: And I'm Robert MacNeil in New York. After the News Summary tonight, our major focus is racism in America. We have a report by Betty Ann Bowser and a discussion led by Charlayne Hunter-Gault on the pessimism of young African-Americans and the appeal of extremists like Louis Farrakhan. Then Elizabeth Farnsworth reports on how the Japanese see the nuclear threat from North Korea. NEWS SUMMARY
MR. LEHRER: Stephen Breyer made his formal debut as a Supreme Court nominee today. He appeared with President Clinton at a ceremony in the White House Rose Garden. He had not been present Friday when Mr. Clinton announced his intention at nominating the Boston federal appeals court judge to the highest court in the land. Breyer spoke today about his judicial philosophy.
JUDGE STEPHEN BREYER, Supreme Court Nominee: President Woodrow Wilson said the Constitution of the United States is not a mere lawyer's document. It is a vehicle of light. And what that means to me is that the Constitution and the law must be more than mere words. They must work as a practical reality. And I will certainly try to make law work for people, because that is its defining purpose in a government of the people. And so if I am confirmed to the Supreme Court of the United States, I will devote myself to the best of my ability to ensuring that both the letter and the spirit of our laws continue to serve the people of this country.
MR. LEHRER: The Breyer nomination received generally favorable reaction from both Democrats and Republicans in the Senate. A confirmation vote is expected this summer. Robin.
MR. MAC NEIL: U.S. testing of the controversial abortion drug RU- 486 will begin this fall. The pill has been used in Europe for some time as a substitute for surgical abortions. Abortion opponents question its safety and say it will encourage more women to have abortions. The French manufacturer has agreed to give U.S. patent rights to a non-profit organization, Population Council. The Food & Drug Administration announced today it will expedite testing of the drug. At a congressional hearing, FDA Commissioner David Kessler talked about use of RU-486 in the United States.
DR. DAVID KESSLER, FDA Commissioner: Women should not think that pregnancy termination using a medical regimen will be simple. It will not be. In Europe, where RU-486 has been used in over 150,000 women, the procedure requires several visits to a medical facility, a precise dosing scheme using two different drugs, and close monitoring to care for women who may experience excessive bleeding and other complications. We anticipate that any use of RU-486 in the United States would have to follow strict distribution and use control.
MR. MAC NEIL: In economic news, the government reported another increase in the nation's industrial output. The Federal Reserve said the .3 percent gain in April was the 11th straight monthly rise. The report covers the output of all mines, factories, and utilities.
MR. LEHRER: An Amtrak passenger train derailed before dawn today near Smithfield, North Carolina. The engineer was killed, at least seven others were seriously injured. There were 438 people on board. The train was the Silver Meteor from New York to Florida. Twelve of its thirteen cars jumped the track after the engine hit a flatbed truck trailer which had fallen from a freight train on the adjacent track.
MR. MAC NEIL: A 19-year-old woman's lawsuit against one of the country's oldest military schools went to federal court today. Shannon Faulkner has been trying to become the first woman cadet at the Citadel. She's charged the Charleston, South Carolina, school with sexual discrimination in its attempt to block her admission. For the last five months, Faulkner has been attending day classes at the academy until the case could be heard. The Citadel is one of only two all-male state-sponsored military schools in the country. Both are defending their admission policies in court. A federal judge in New York today found Vassar College guilty of discrimination when it denied tenure to a married female professor. The former professor accused Vassar of denying her tenure because of her marital status and her age. She was 53 years old at the time. A lawyer for Vassar said it will probably appeal the ruling.
MR. LEHRER: The Red Cross delivered food to thousands of people trapped in Rwanda today. A truck carrying 12 tons of oatmeal successfully reached a town southwest of the capital of Kigali. Previous efforts to reach thousands of people stranded at the stadium there had failed. The Red Cross said another shipment is planned for tomorrow. And that's it for the News Summary tonight. Now it's on to racism in America and the North Korean nuclear problem as seen from Japan. FOCUS - YOUNG, FRUSTRATED, & BLACK
MR. MAC NEIL: Up first tonight, racism in America. This weekend, President Clinton made a plea for unity across the bounds of race and region and income and religion. He was speaking in Indianapolis at a ground-breaking ceremony for a memorial dedicated to the Rev. Martin Luther King and Robert F. Kennedy. In 1968, Kennedy had given a calming speech to black residents the day of King's assassination. While other American cities erupted in violence that day, Indianapolis remained calm. Twenty-six years later tensions between the races remain high. Last month, the first major poll exploring attitudes on race and culture in the African- American community was released. Correspondent Betty Anne Bowser has this report.
MS. BOWSER: Some of the strongest statements in the survey came from young people like these who we interviewed on the campus of Howard University in Washington, D.C.
MALE STUDENT: God made the black man and the black woman, but America made "niggers."
FEMALE STUDENT: You can't help but have a little piece of racism inside you because you were raised in this society, and this society is, indeed, racist.
SECOND MALE STUDENT: If I went into a restaurant and there was a white man standing beside me, and he came in behind me, I guarantee he'd be seated before I would. That's the way I see it.
MS. BOWSER: And that's the way increasing numbers of other African-Americans see it too. In the most comprehensive survey ever taken of black America, 42 percent said there would never be racial equality in their lifetime. 23 percent said it would never come. Only 4 percent said America is fair to blacks in its legal and economic system. And 81 percent of the respondents said they believe society owes African-Americans a better life. Authors of the report found blacks pessimistic and radical in their views of American life, and among the young, they found fertile ground for the growth of black nationalism, and messages like this one from Khallid Muhammad of the nation of Islam.
KHALLID MUHAMMAD, Nation of Islam: You hide behind these newspapers. I'm sorry, these Jews' papers. You hide behind these Jews' papers and these Jews' rules that you call news rooms.
MS. BOWSER: Muhammad made the speech on the campus of Howard University earlier this year. He stunned even his own supporters when he defended the actions of Colin Ferguson, an unemployed black man who went on a shooting rampage last year on the Long Island Railroad in New York. Before he stopped firing a nine-millimeter automatic weapon, four people were dead, sixteen others were wounded. All of the dead and injured were white.
KHALLID MUHAMMAD: I teach my baby about Colin Ferguson who caught the New York Railroad. God spoke to Colin Ferguson and said, "I want you to catch the Long Island train today." I love Colin Ferguson.
MS. BOWSER: Students, faculty members, and the Howard University administration denounced Khallid Muhammad's views.
FRANKLYN JENIFER, Former President, Howard University: [April 19] Each of has a responsibility to speak and to speak out loud and clear, to say that we disagree with them, and that we identify them for what they are, and identify their scholarship for what it is.
MS. BOWSER: Recently, we invited five young African-Americans to join us in a discussion of, among other things, the views of Khallid Muhammad. Frankie Jenkins is 22 years old. She is the mother of three children and lives in public housing in Washington, D.C. She recently finished her high school diploma and hopes to attend college. Jason Allen is a 20 year old junior from Los Angeles major in electronic studio computer graphics. Rodney Stotts is 23 years old. He's the father of four children and was recently accepted as a police cadet in the Washington, D.C. police department. Sharin Hairston is a 20 year old fine arts major from Winston-Salem, North Carolina. She chose Howard over Harvard and Princeton after all three offered her full scholarships. Malik Zulu Shabazz is a second year law student Howard and national chairman of Unity Nation, an organization that supports the nation of Islam. We sat down with all five young people in the student center on the campus of Howard. None of the five were previously acquainted. Martin Luther King said not too far from where we're sitting right now that he hoped the day would come in this country where people would be judged not by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. Do you think that day has come?
FRANKIE JENKINS: No.
MS. BOWSER: You don't.
FRANKIE JENKINS: No.
MS. BOWSER: Why not?
FRANKIE JENKINS: Because you still have prejudice, and you still cannot go without getting funny looks for walking in. And when you go to a department store, people -- [gesturing] --
MS. BOWSER: And what do they --
FRANKIE JENKINS: Make sure, you know, make sure she's not stealing anything, or make sure she's not putting anything in her purse or anything. It still hasn't -- you know --
MS. BOWSER: And that's behavior you feel is based on skin color.
FRANKIE JENKINS: That's behavior that I get when I walk into Hecht's, Macy's, Nordstrom's, they say, check her, she has a big bag, check her, she's, you know, you can feel a person following you through the store.
JASON ALLEN, Howard University Student: Sometimes I feel -- it's been to the point where sometimes I walk into the store and I feel compelled to buy something just so that they wouldn't -- just to say I'm not taking anything from you. I'll buy something, and then you can leave me alone. I don't know if it's just my self-conscious or maybe they're already watching me.
MS. BOWSER: Why do you think they're watching you?
SHARIN HAIRSTON, Howard University Student: They've been conditioned to believe that black people are thieves. I mean, it's in everything you watch on television. Of course, they would believe somewhere inside themselves that there's a possibility that this black person will steal.
RODNEY STOTTS: I don't think racism will ever end completely, regardless of how you get yourself to be. I don't think it will never end completely because they took 200 years and I can't give it that. So it'll never end, not to me.
SHARIN HARISTON: It's so ingrained in people, it's institutionalized. They don't even realize that they're racist. They don't even know that they're speaking racism. So it's something that you have to think about.
MS. BOWSER: Do you think your generation is angry as a group?
RODNEY STOTTS: You go outside now. 9 o'clock tonight on the news I guarantee you'll hear four more black men died, this, that, and the other. You see, the media hypes everything up about a black neighborhood, because when I went to Texas, and I was down there, the majority of people in Texas prisons are white.
JASON ALLEN: Most the people I know are not on the corner selling drugs, shooting someone, totin' a gun around. They're adults. They're -- I mean, they're productive people in society. They're trying to be right now as young adults. They're trying to grow up and change things. They're not trying to be a statistic or be one of those three -- one out of four people in prison, exactly, and like he was saying about Texas and the whites in prison, it's just like the gentleman in New York that goes on the train and he shot the people on the train, a black man in New York. I'm not saying --
MS. BOWSER: Colin Ferguson.
JASON ALLEN: Yes. I'm not saying that's correct. When he did that, they called him an animal, they called him some type of gentleman that was crazy, but when Jeffrey Dahmer was sitting there cutting up people, they thought he was something, you know, he's mentally disturbed. He's -- we'll make a movie.
FRANKIE JENKINS: They didn't know what kind of problems that man just went through or what was going on in that man's head to make him do that. He didn't just, oh, well, I'm going to go shoot me some people on the subway today. I'm sure he didn't just go, just wake up and say, I'm going to do this. On the other hand, Jeffrey Dahmer, he had to go out and look for his victims. He sat there and planned his out, and they called the black man a beast and Jeffrey Dahmer, he's just mentally disturbed.
MALIK ZULU SHABAZZ, Unity Nation: It's sad to say, but America and American racism and America's denial of justice for black people actually produced Colin Ferguson. America is now one of the most violent, morally degradated societies that can be found. And out of the lack of justice, Colin Ferguson took out his frustration in that manner. And I think if America wants to cease people like that, then they should do justice.
JASON ALLEN: One of the leaders of the nation of Islam said on this campus recently, talking about Colin Ferguson, he said, "I love Colin Ferguson." He said -- Khallid Muhammed said that God told him on that day to get on that train. Do you feel that way? Do you feel that you love Colin Ferguson?
MALIK ZULU SHABAZZ: I don't think it's a question really of whether we love Colin Ferguson, but it is what produced Colin Ferguson. It's American racism and the deprivation of justice of black people produced a man who was driven insane by America's wicked racist policies, then reacted out of frustration, like m any others, who go into McDonald's and the post office and shoot up people. If American racism produced Colin Ferguson, then we have to respect Colin Ferguson as one who's calling on America to do justice by these people. Give them reparation and give them justice for the 310 years of slavery, suffering, and death that they've been through, then you won't have to ever worry about Colin Ferguson appearing on the scene again.
MS. BOWSER: Sharin, do you agree with that?
SHARIN HARISTON: I couldn't say that I love someone who would willingly kill other people. However, I can say that I -- I could say that I hate the system which created Colin Ferguson. I hate the racism that continues to plague us. I can say that America definitely needs to rectify what created, what sent this man to, you know, kill people. Why is it that this man felt he had to kill people? Let's not address what he did. Let's address the problem. Let's talk about why this man had to do this. Let's talk about why there are so many negative images of black people, why we continue to see that black people are pimps and pushers and thieves and gang bangers and gunmen.
MS. BOWSER: Do you condone what Colin Ferguson did?
FRANKIE JENKINS: No.
RODNEY STOTTS: I do. I do. It's the same way like on the streets today. It's not even saying our society, our system, is screwed up, is all screwed up, and like you say, if that man felt as though that the good Lord spoke to him, told him that was his calling, that's what it was for him to do, any one of us sitting here today can go home and get hit with the same calling he got, and walk out the door and do the exact same thing.
MS. BOWSER: Murder people?
RODNEY STOTTS: Murder people.
MS. BOWSER: Are there any people in America today leaders, for lack of a better word on my part, whom you admire?
JASON ALLEN: I guess the only person I can say I truly admire would be my parents.
MS. BOWSER: Anybody in politics?
JASON ALLEN: Offhand, I would have to think about it.
MALIK ZULU SHABAZZ: I would have to say that I would have to agree with the man whom Time Magazine said that 67 percent of black people respect as a positive leader in our community and that's the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan. He definitely is a role model for me, and he turns my life personally from a life of immorality to a life of progressiveness on the road to helping myself an my people.
MS. BOWSER: What is it about Farrakhan's message that appeals to you? Or are there things about him that do not appeal to you?
JASON ALLEN: There are elements of Minister Farrakhan's that I do agree with, but, of course, there are some things I don't agree with, and --
MS. BOWSER: Where do you part company with him?
JASON ALLEN: I guess It would really be with the situation with the Jews. I mean, I'm not saying I am a Jew supporter or anything of that sort, but I'm not sure -- I can't really say how far I would go.
MS. BOWSER: You all have grown up with images of the civil rights movement of the 60's, whether it's images that have been portrayed to you by your parents or what you've seen on television or what you've read. Does any of that seem relevant to you in your lives today?
JASON ALLEN: Back in the 60's, racism was easier, I guess, to spot, because we saw it. You know, you could go somewhere and it said, whites only, colored. And you know what -- you knew -- it was like on a bus, you knew you were supposed to sit in the back then. But now it's to the point where you can work right next to a gentleman thatdoes not like your color and you would never know it, because he knows how to hide it. He's, I guess, trained or, or he's taught himself to keep it to himself. So I guess it is relevant, you know. It's not -- it is relevant now as it was in the 60's. It's just now it's harder to spot.
MR. MAC NEIL: Sentiments like the ones those young people expressed are troubling to many black leaders. On Saturday, retired General Colin Powell, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, addressed the issue head on. He spoke at Howard University's commencement exercises.
GEN. COLIN POWELL, [Ret.], former Chairman, Joint Chiefs: [Saturday] As the world goes forward, we cannot start going backwards. African-Americans have come too far, and we have too far yet to go to take a detour into the swamp of hatred. We as a people who have suffered so much from the hatred of others must not now show tolerance for any movement or any philosophy that has as its core the hatred of Jews or the hatred of any other group. Our future -- [applause] -- our future lies in the philosophy of love and understanding and caring and building, not of hating and tearing down. We know that each and every one of us know that to the depth of our heart, and we must be prepared to stand up for it and speak up for it. We must not be silent if it would live up to the legacy of those who have gone before us from this campus.
MR. MAC NEIL: For more on this story, we turn now to Charlayne Hunter-Gault. Charlayne.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: We're going to get five reactions now to what we've been hearing. Milton Bins is chairman of the Council of 100, a national organization of African-American Republicans, and director of education for community vision, a satellite program for public and private schools. Juan Williams is a reporter for the Washington Post and author of Eyes on the Prize, a narrative account of the civil rights movement. Shelby Steele is a professor of English at San Jose State University in California and the author of the book The Content of Our Character. Niara Sudarkasa is president of Lincoln University, a predominantly black institution in Philadelphia, and Franklyn Jenifer is the outgoing president of Howard University. He's leaving to become president of the University of Texas in Dallas. And starting with you, Dr. Jenifer, is it your sense from what we heard and what we -- what you have been hearing on your campus and perhaps others, that young people you've been listening to are detouring into a swamp of hatred?
MR. JENIFER: No, I don't think that is the case. What we've been seeing, especially at Howard University, and I think on many other campuses across this country, is a group of hate mongers who've been moving around, espousing views that the very small minority of the population of African-Americans believe in, however, they are touching some small portion. And that small portion that they're touching are really exhibiting a level of hopelessness that's found in many, many parts of our country, especially certain parts of our urban center.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: All right. I want to get to some of the causes for that in a minute, but let me just ask Dr. Sudarkasa, what do you think -- I mean, from what you're hearing, are these young people that we've just heard and students on your campus detouring into a swamp of hatred?
DR. SUDARKASA: I wouldn't say that at all, Charlayne. I do feel, however, that the point that the students made has to be clearly understood. They said over and over again, look at the elements in the wider society that provoke some of the responses that have been pointed to on your program. I don't exactly agree with Dr. Jenifer that they're only responding to all the hate mongers, so to speak, who come from some of the low income communities that are suffering from -- that are mired with crime and drugs and so forth. And I think that they -- their sense of hopelessness, if there is that, comes from the wider society, not from people like Mr. Muhammed, who I think has extreme views but who, unfortunately, speaks for far more than just a few.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: Juan Williams, what's your sense of why these young people are reacting the way they do? Are they detouring into a swamp of hatred, and what is the cause?
MR. WILLIAMS: Well, I think that there is a swamp of hatred out there in our community. I don't think there's any doubt about it. The question of detouring into it is where I guess I get a little bit confused, especially when you're talking about really our elite young people who are in the best institutions at Lincoln, at Howard, and you're talking about people who have some degree of opportunity. You know, you look at the group that were just being interviewed on your show. These are people who are law students, who had the opportunity to go to Princeton or Harvard, and to some extent, I think they're going -- undergoing a sort of an identity crisis in the midst of all that's happening to black America at this moment. We have an amazingly large middle class in a society by historical standards, bigger than we ever had before. But at the same time we have many, many poor people. And if you're a college student, a black college student today, either at Howard or Harvard, I think there's a lot of pressure on you, pressure to say, "Am I black? How do I prove that I'm black? Am I related to people on the corner who are ill educated? Am I able to relate to Gen. Powell, who was chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, or is he a sell out, and what does all that mean for me?" And in the midst of that, you also have the sense of powerlessness that you're dealing with what Mr. Muhammed in his little statement that we saw there, called the Jew paper, and saying, oh, well, you know, what are you reading, you're reading a newspaper put out by whites or by Jews who are a powerful group, and there are conspiracies out there, and there are reasons why Colin Ferguson gets on the train and it's a system, it's the conspiracy that puts him there, rather than saying, he has some personal responsibility. Now, all of that I think leads to tremendous confusion for this generation. The whites have I think what they call generation X. I don't what you call this generation of black Americans. But they are people who are suffering a tremendous identity crisis. And I think that we, as black adults, have to understand and to some extent exert more leadership.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: Mr. Bins, how do you explain this pessimism?
MR. BINS: Well, I want to underscore what Juan Williams just said. The issue of identity has to be clearly dealt with. I remember the 60's. We went through periods like this when there were a lot of strange appeal -- appeals being made that captured the attention or captured the imagination of many young people who really constituted a minority of the large -- the large majority of African-American people, including young people. So we really do have to be very, very careful about how we generalize from the very articulate expressions of those that we hear as contrasted to the large majority out there. Charlayne, I want to underscore another point, and I thought it was brought out in the discussion. The question about leadership was asked of the students. And they could not really clearly point to that, except for one young man pointed to his parents as examples of leadership, adult leadership. I think that is, indeed, one of the critical issues we face, or the one that was articulated by Colin Powell in his commencement address. This is an issue where we cannot, as leaders in the African-American community, we cannot at all be silent on this agenda. We must, in fact, make sure that our young people know about the progress that has been made since 1954. Seldom do we hear the drum beat of being victims and the drum beat of blacks being defined as problems. Seldom do we hear about the fact that nearly 6 percent -- 60 percent of black Americans are now in the middle class, that one out of seven African-American households have income of more than $50,000, that the graduation rate, high school graduation rate is now nearly 90 percent for African-American students.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: But, Mr. Bins, let me just interrupt you on that. But surely, these young people whom Juan Williams just identified as the elite would be aware of that, would they not?
MR. BINS: No, I'm not so sure, Charlayne. I think when you -- if you went about the community asking people about the progress that we have made as a people in this country and the tremendous efforts that have been put forth since 1954, and even before 1954, the economic progress that we have made -- I won't get into all the statistics.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: Well, let me --
MR. BINS: The educational attainment --
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: All right. Let me just ask Dr. Jenifer. Dr. Jenifer, do you think that's part of the problem, that the young people don't appreciate the progress that's been made, and that's why they say things like racism will never end?
MR. JENIFER: Well, absolutely not. I think certainly the young people at Howard University are more than familiar with the progress that's been made. They've been beneficiaries of that progress. That's why they're at Howard University. But they also have another responsibility, and that is as future leaders of this country to recognize that there still exists in this country a form of racism different from the form that we faced when we were young but is just as debilitating as a form that we faced, and they are committed to doing something about it.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: But what about Juan Williams' point that there are young people like the ones we've heard, including those who attend Howard University, are undergoing an identity crisis and that they feel a real sense of powerlessness and confusion?
MR. JENIFER: Almost every 18 year old that I know is undergoing some form of identity crisis. I think that's part of growing up. But the most important feature of what I think they're undergoing is to weigh this process that's molding them. These young people, I believe, have accurately defined that they have had progress in this country but there's still a lot more progress to be made. They're actively trying to change that. Actually what they're saying is that they deplore the statements of the anti-semitic statements, the hate statements that are being made. They want to see those hate mongers put back under the rock from which they crawled, but at the same time they want this country, they want us as their leaders to recognize that they still feel for those populations of people who they believe are caught in circumstances beyond their control, and these circumstances have been createdby the broader society at large.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: But how do you -- how do you explain the sentiment that they expressed about Colin Ferguson, the fact that they're saying that it's racism that led to this murder -- the murder that he did -- committed on the subways, that this is injustice, and in some of the expressions of the young people actually justifying the actions of Colin Ferguson as the by-product of the racist system under which he lived?
MR. JENIFER: Well, most of us who know individuals who have performed some form of social pathology in terms of criminal activity clearly it's not something that they were inherently born with. They are the victims of their society, their community. But most of them, and all of us, are expected to adhere to some controlling influence in the way we behave. You don't act out every matter that you become mad about. If that was the case, we would have Colin Fergusons blowing people away on every train in the city. What most normal people do in those circumstances is try to do something about it in a much more socially constructive way.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: But Doctor --
MR. JENIFER: Colin Powell [Ferguson] is to be criticized.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: Right. Let me just ask Dr. Sudarkasa, I mean, how do you react to what the young people said about Colin Ferguson, that this was the result of -- of the racism in the society, and as one man, young man said, any one of us can do what Colin Ferguson did, can go home because of the circumstances of our situation as black Americans, can hear God saying, go out and do something like this?
DR. SUDARKASA: Well, I think it's disturbing because one has to feel, as Dr. Jenifer said, that there should be some controlling mechanisms built in that would preclude even the thought of creating such -- I mean, of creating such a heinous crime. On the other hand, I'm struck by the fact that these people are young people who are very thoughtful. They're young people who clearly have views that have been formed as a result of contemplation and discussion. I don't think we can dismiss the depth of their concern, nor can we simply say that, that they represent a fringe. I'm afraid that they represent far more use of their generation than we would like to believe.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: What do you think about that, Juan Williams? Do you think that they're typical of this generation?
MR. WILLIAMS: Well, I think they are typical of black college students these days, maybe a little bit more extremely, and certainly that business about Colin Ferguson I thought was really offensive, but they are typical in the sense that what you're seeing there is I thought in a very good interview -- people are expressing their vulnerabilities. They didn't get into the idea that, of course, they are very concerned, as very college graduate this time of year is concerned about what will happen to them in the job market, will they get jobs, will they be able to do as well as their parents. These are things that are very compelling for young black people on a college campus getting an education, and when they have these kinds of concerns, then they're worried about, well, what opportunities will I get and what won't I get, what opportunities are out there for me, and it compounds the idea that they are being victimized by race in American society. Just to add on to this point, if you give me a second here, it's not so much that they would, I think, say I have it worse than my father or my grandfather did, let's say going back to the 50's or '30s, so much as they say, but there still is racism in American society, and they want to talk about that. The problem is, of course, the lack of perspective. Dr. Jenifer said he believes they know how much progress has been made, but you wouldn't know it from the conversation we just saw, from conversation with them.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: Yes, but the study that Betty Ann Bowser referred to as we were going into the documentary she produced - - while it narrowed in on young people -- it also documented a growing pessimism among all black Americans, say, for example, in the support of the rise of black nationalism, and it also said that the -- that the number of those who -- that the kind of people are not just the elite college students or the upper socioeconomic groups of blacks but lower class blacks particularly.
MR. WILLIAMS: That's right. In fact, if you look -- if you broke down the numbers, what the numbers indicate is that poor people who have less education are the most strong nationalists in the black community. But what you see among that group, I think, on a college campus is people who are trying to say, well, I don't want to have anyone make the allegation that I forgot where I came from, that I don't know how to relate to people out on the street, or that I'm acting uppity or something like that. I think there's a real stress. And they want -- they very much are the people who will invite Farrakhan or Muhammed to campus almost as a way to say, look, I am black, I understand this pain and this frustration and this anger, and I'm very much down with it. And I think that's part of what you're seeing.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: Is that what we're seeing, Mr. Jenifer?
MR. JENIFER: Yes, I think to a large degree we are. When we were talking about that issue of violence with Colin Ferguson, clearly that was an individual, but most people who read on the papers, who hear the statistics recognized that the issue of violence is a national problem. It is a national problem that each American must begin to think about addressing. It is particularly damaging within the black community. These students know that. They read the newspapers. They see the evening news every day where they're saying millions and literally millions of African-Americans have been killed over the years by violence committed by blacks on blacks. Of course, this is a concern in a nation where every 20 minutes someone is murdered, and when the majority of those murders are committed by African-Americans on African-Americans. What they are doing, in other words, is just saying, yes, we've had progress, yes, there have been tremendous successes, but there must be something fundamentally wrong in a society in which violence has gotten to the level that it is now. And there must be something fundamentally wrong with a society where this kind of violence is focused on our community.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: But he --
MR. JENIFER: It's difficult to figure out the answer to that.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: But they also made the point that the media looked at it -- as they look at them in very different ways, that they would characterize a Colin Ferguson as, you know, as a -- I forgot the term that the young man used -- but in a way -- beast - - in a way different from Jeffrey Dahmer, whom they characterized as being mentally disturbed.
MR. JENIFER: In some respects, that is true, but I think it would be unwise for us to even talk about Dahmer and Ferguson. These are two individuals who are so abstract and away from the cause. What I would --
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: Except that it's resonating in their minds --
MR. JENIFER: It is.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: -- in that way which may help to sort of explain some of these attitudes.
MR. JENIFER: Yes. But what I'd like to say is that they, yes, have identified the media focus on our institutions and on African- Americans more so than they focus on white Americans. Let me take you back a little bit.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: Let me -- I just want to briefly get Mr. Bins in on this because --
MR. JENIFER: Could I just finish --
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: All right, one point.
MR. JENIFER: I do think it's important. When you look back on the Howard University event that got so much focus, two of the speakers at the event, professors there, one was from Kuni System and one was from another institution, a white institution in the North. No one talked about them being there, and our scholars not being present at that particular occasion. No one talked in that audience of over a thousand individuals that there are only about 30 Howard students present. No one talked about the unity nation of a student population of almost 13,000 only having about -- membership of about 10. Why don't they focus on those other white institutions where the same hate mongers had visited? It's a real question for our students. They wonder about that and in their wondering try to find a solution and in trying to find that solution, they speak out, and the news media focuses on their unique expression.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: Mr. Bins, is it your sense that this is too much media hype, that this is just a small group of hate mongers affecting a small minority of students and maybe we're blowing all of this out of proportion?
MR. BINS: Charlayne, I really think definitely, definitely we're blowing it out of proportion. So I think we really need to get back to some more fundamental concerns that relate to who our young people are today. Some of it is related to the, the guilt feeling. I think Dr. Jenifer talked about young people of advantage, who have been advantaged from birth to now, when they're in the university. These young people do not want to be disconnected from those neighborhoods where black people suffering from lack of income, lack of jobs, are now isolated from the majority advantaged African-American community. There is a real disconnect presently between advantaged African-Americans and disadvantaged African-Americans, whether you want to call it economic class or what. Well, I tell you this. There's an important issue we need to address because we have been the principal disseminators of a message and a drum beat of messages throughout the last 12 years or 15 years. And the message has been that all the particular problems we are facing and dealing with are tied to racism. We have not turned the lens internally to look at what has been happening to African-Americans as a community of people in this nation. There are some serious problems that we have to address that are internal to our community.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: All right. We're just going to have a couple of minutes left, so if I could just briefly get each of you to say how do we bridge these gaps and what do we do about it. I know that there's a limited amount of time. Dr. Jenifer -- Dr. Sudarkasa, let me just ask you briefly, what do you think we should do about this as a society?
DR. SUDARKASA: I agree that we need to address some internal issues and problems that face our communities, clearly issues that have affected the African-American family are very important, with the breakdown of the extended family. We have far too many young women living alone trying to rear children when they, themselves, are just teenagers or very near their teens. But I think that fundamentally our society is not defined by the best of us but by the worst of us. And it happens that even though statistics such as those cited by Milton Bins prevail, there is a larger gap today between the average income of African-Americans and the average white Americans as attested to by the study of common destiny edited by Mr. James. We've got to do something about unemployment, about the overwhelming poverty before we can expect to see any real changes, I think.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: Juan Williams, how do we bridge these gaps?
MR. WILLIAMS: Well, that's an interesting question to ask me, someone in the media. Spike Lee has a new movie out, "Crooklyn," you know, and he talked about how he's trying to get away from the gangster thing, and it's very interesting if you look at a lot of the rap music, a lot of the MTV stuff with images of young black people, they tend to be not educated young black people, not people talking about progress that's been made, but people who are talking about the most intransigent drug-related violence, you know, illegitimate birth, treating women in a disrespectful way, those kinds of issues. And I think for too much of America, black America included, that has come to define our young people, rather than the strength of the young people we just saw from Howard University.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: All right, briefly, Dr. Jenifer, how do you think we should bridge that gap?
MR. JENIFER: I think we're going to have to bridge that gap by creating in our community a real sense of hope and overcoming this hopelessness. And I believe the only way to do that is in creating the kinds of things in our community that other communities have, good schools, jobs, work, more importantly self- empowerment. If you empower populations, if you give them the jobs, I believe that they behave the same way other populations do. If you create an environment of pathology, I think you create a pathology. I think that African-Americans are not sick. I think we are very interesting people in the sense that we have stayed in this society when we've been victims of a very virulent form of racism. Now we have a form of institutional racism that exists. The whole society must work to rid our communities of that because it is in the health of a total America that we're talking about and it's the health of this America that we all must work.
MS. HUNTER-GAULT: Well, Drs. Jenifer, Sudarkasa, Juan Williams, and Mr. Bins, thank you for joining us. We regret that we lost Shelby Steele due to some technical difficulties. FOCUS - PAINFUL LEGACY
MR. LEHRER: Now, Japan faces the prospect of a North Korea with nuclear weapons. Elizabeth Farnsworth reports from Tokyo.
MS. FARNSWORTH: Until last month, the Japanese public pretty much ignored the dispute over North Korea. The North's refusal to permit full UN inspections of its nuclear facilities was viewed as a problem for South Korea and the United States, not Japan. But then politicians involved in the seemingly endless negotiations over a new prime minister revealed that North Korea had become one of the bones of contention.
MICHIO WATANABE, Liberal Democratic Party: [speaking through interpreter] The problem is that in the coalition people from the left and right are fighting fiercely. There is a lot of confusion. They have worked together well on political reform, but now they are fighting about North Korea and tax policy.
MS. FARNSWORTH: The debate over cutting taxes was familiar. Politicians differ over how best to stimulate Japan's economy something the Clinton administration has been pushing. But this was the first public discussion of high-level disagreements over North Korea, which lies just a few hundred miles across the Sea of Japan. Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Kunihiko Saito.
KUNIHIKO SAITO, Vice Minister, Foreign Affairs: If North Korea succeeds in manufacturing nuclear weapons, the threat will be really, really serious to us. The government has tried to avoid provoking the North Koreans on this issue, so probably we haven't told the Japanese public enough about the possible seriousness of this problem.
MS. FARNSWORTH: At the National Defense Institute, analyst Hideshi Takesada warns that in any conflict with North Korea, Japan would be the most logical target.
HIDESHI TAKESADA, National Defense Institute: [speaking through interpreter] The North Korean missiles wouldn't reach the Golden Gate Bridge or the White House, and the North Koreans would not want to destroy South Korea, because they want its wealth. So with their one thousand to twenty-five hundred kilometer range missiles, Japan would be the prime target.
MS. FARNSWORTH: Takesada advocates stiff sanctions against North Korea. But members of parliament who have traveled there downplay the current dangers and caution against isolating the Kim Il-Sung regime. Representative Makoto Tanabe of the Social Democratic Party.
MAKOTO TANABE, Social Democratic Party: [speaking through interpreter] The basic policy for a party is not to allow North Korea to become isolated, and that has also been agreed upon by all the members of the ruling coalition. Japan conquered Korea during the colonial era and brought many hardships on its people. So we feel a special responsibility for peace on the Korean Peninsula.
MS. FARNSWORTH: The stakes for Japan in this debate are enormous. If North Korea continues to resist complete UN inspections and the standoff escalates into an economic embargo, the Japanese military would be expected to help enforce it. After nearly 50 years of constitutionally imposed pacificism, this would be an historic development. Adopted just after the war during the U.S. occupation, the Constitution bans the threat or use of force as a means of settling international disputes and prohibits the maintaining of armed forces. By loosely interpreting this crucial article as permitting a defensive military, Japan has built small but powerful maritime ground and air self-defense forces which have plenty of sophisticated weaponry, as this footage form the Japan Defense Agency reveals. The Japanese work closely with the 46,000 U.S. military personnel in Japan. But the self-defense forces are tightly restricted in what they can do.
HIDESHI TAKESADA: [speaking through interpreter] In case of a blockade, for example, let's say U.S. ships are inspecting other ships going to North Korea, those U.S. ships would need to refuel with Japan's help. But for Japan to provide that service would require new laws. Under existing legislation, Japan couldn't provide refueling or even send ships to bring back Japanese nationals in the event of war. So now, we are discussing what legislation would be necessary to make this possible.
MS. FARNSWORTH: In parliament, discussions about changing the role of the military are extremely divisive. Politicians still must respond to constituents' strong pacifist leanings. Buddhist monks circle the building almost continually, reminding legislators that the public is watching what they do on this issue. Takemasa Moriya is chief spokesman for the Defense Agency, Japan's pentagon.
TAKEMASA MORIYA, Spokesman, Japan Defense Agency: [speaking through interpreter] The Japanese people still think the self- defense force is only there to protect the country, and they feel that sending forces overseas violates that purpose. But the Japanese government also learned in the Gulf War that the world is expecting Japan to give not only money towards the cause of peace but also its military manpower.
MS. FARNSWORTH: U.S. Amb. Walter Mondale.
WALTER MONDALE, U.S. Ambassador, Japan: This is a very difficult question for Japan. After all, the Constitution, Article 9, that prohibits their becoming a military country again was put there at our insistence. And under it, they forego war as an instrument of policy forever. They have perhaps more than any other nation felt the pain of war. They're the only nation that have received the wrong end of nuclear weapons. This is a very deep issue here.
MS. FARNSWORTH: If sanctions are voted in the UN, will Japan be able to help enforce those sanctions on the high seas, for example, or would the Constitution and would Japanese laws prevent helping enforce the sanctions?
WALTER MONDALE: The Japanese say that if the United Nations adopts sanctions that they would have to be a part of the enforcement policies. And they have been working very closely with us to discuss what that might involve. I'm personally convinced that they see the seriousness of this issue, that they will do what's necessary.
MS. FARNSWORTH: If they do, it won't be easy. Member of parliament Hajime Ishii.
HAJIME ISHII, Japan Renewal Party: Seven hundred thousand Korean people are living here in Japan. It's very difficult to distinguish from South and North. It is very difficult to, to implement effective sanction when the emergency comes, you know.
MS. FARNSWORTH: Koreans living in Japan have already launched a noisy but so far well behaved campaign against economic sanctions. This is a demonstration by the Korean Youth League, which supports the government of Kim Il-Sung. That's his portrait on the left next to his son, Kim Xiao-Mil, who is know as "Dear Leader." Of 700,000 Korean residents in Japan, about one third are sympathetic to the North partly because Kim Il-Sung has helped pay for more than 100 Korean schools here. These young people say they fear that economic sanctions or a military confrontation will enflame anti-Korean sentiment in Japan. Japanese intelligence officials claim Koreans here are sending millions of dollars a year back home, some of which lands in the coffers of Kim Il-Sung. Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Kunihiko Saito. Would you give us an idea of how much money is involved and how it could be stopped?
KUNIHIKO SAITO, Vice Minister, Foreign Affairs: The frank answer is we don't know. There are different estimates ranging from twenty to thirty billion yen a year to a hundred million yen -- I'm sorry -- a hundred billion yen a year, but we don't know.
MS. FARNSWORTH: So somewhere between $300 million and a billion dollars?
KUNIHIKO SAITO: That's right. That's right.
MS. FARNSWORTH: The government says most of the money comes from pachinko parlors. These gaudy pinball gambling joints are one of Japan's most lucrative businesses, some say the most lucrative. Atsuyuki Sassa was for many years a police counterintelligence officer.
ATSUYUKI SASSA, Counterintelligence Officer [Ret.]: Pachinko business people are divided into three groups: One, North Korean element, the one third; one third South Korea; another one third Chinese and Japanese. If some North Korean businessman who wants to return to North Korea with luggages, you can put them -- you can put paper notes in that luggage. So this is obviously one way to send money. There are so many ways. Perhaps you can send money to Hong Kong, Macao, maybe Switzerland, Bank of Switzerland. So there's no way to control.
MS. FARNSWORTH: The young Koreans whose demonstration continued into the evening denied that their community is helping support the Kim Il-Sung regime. And Pak Ku Ho, chairman of the Youth League, condemned stepped up searches of travelers to the North.
PAK KU HO, Chairman, Korean Youth League: [speaking through interpreter] When we travel to our country, whether by air or by sea, but usually by ship, they inspect what we carry. There are especially severe restrictions on exporting electronics, and those kinds of controls and restrictions are getting tighter and tighter.
MS. FARNSWORTH: Pak Ku Ho says he fears a further crackdown on pro-North Koreans if the Japanese government participates in UN sanctions. Already Koreans living in Japan, whether from North or South, face discrimination in education and jobs. They are Japan's civil rights problem, a daily reminder of the bitter legacy from Japan's occupation of Korea in the first half of this century. The most dramatic reminder of that legacy are the protests of the so- called "comfort women," Koreans who were forced to be sex slaves for Japanese soldiers during World War II. Japan's past weighs heavily as the new government of Prime Minister Sutomo Hata begins to craft policy towards North Korea. In this crisis, which touches so many sensitive issues, political leaders are seeking consensus. Given the painful legacy of the past, that consensus may be difficult to achieve. RECAP
MR. LEHRER: Again, the major stories of this Monday, President Clinton formally introduced Supreme Court nominee Stephen Breyer at a White House ceremony. Senate Democrats and Republicans generally praised the nomination. And an Amtrak passenger train derailed in North Carolina. The engineer was killed. At least seven other people were seriously injured. Good night, Robin.
MR. MAC NEIL: Good night, Jim. That's the NewsHour for tonight, and we'll see you again tomorrow night. I'm Robert MacNeil. Good night.
Series
The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour
Producing Organization
NewsHour Productions
Contributing Organization
NewsHour Productions (Washington, District of Columbia)
AAPB ID
cpb-aacip/507-kp7tm72t0n
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Description
Episode Description
This episode's headline: Young, Frustrated & Black; Painful Legacy. The guests include FRANKLYN JENIFER, Former President, Howard University; NIARA SUDARKASA, President, Lincoln University; JUAN WILLIAMS, Journalist; MILTON BINS, Businessman; CORRESPONDENTS: BETTY ANN BOWSER; CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT; ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH. Byline: In New York: ROBERT MAC NEIL; In Washington: JAMES LEHRER
Date
1994-05-16
Asset type
Episode
Topics
Economics
Social Issues
Women
Race and Ethnicity
Health
Politics and Government
Rights
Copyright NewsHour Productions, LLC. Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International Public License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/legalcode)
Media type
Moving Image
Duration
00:58:45
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Credits
Producing Organization: NewsHour Productions
AAPB Contributor Holdings
NewsHour Productions
Identifier: 4928 (Show Code)
Format: Betacam
Generation: Master
Duration: 1:00:00;00
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Citations
Chicago: “The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour,” 1994-05-16, NewsHour Productions, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC, accessed March 28, 2024, http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-507-kp7tm72t0n.
MLA: “The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour.” 1994-05-16. NewsHour Productions, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Web. March 28, 2024. <http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-507-kp7tm72t0n>.
APA: The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour. Boston, MA: NewsHour Productions, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Retrieved from http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-507-kp7tm72t0n