The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour

Intro ROBERT MacNEIL: Good evening. Leading the news today, the Supreme Court upheld an affirmative action plan to promote women. Areas of the plains states remain snowbound by a heavy spring blizzard. Former CIA Director William Casey reportedly masterminded secret aid to the Nicaraguan contras. We'll have details in our news summary in a moment. Jim? JIM LEHRER: After the news summary, two attorneys disagree about the Supreme Court's decision on affirmative action. We have a documentary report on disinvestment in South Africa with a follow up debate between former Ambassador Nickel and Congressman Fauntroy. And we close with Charlayne Hunter Gault's conversation with Alice Walker, author of The Color Purple. News Summary MacNEIL: The Supreme Court ruled today that it was all right for an employer to promote a woman over a man with better qualifications to get women in higher ranking jobs. The six to three decision was the first time the court had upheld an affirmative action plan aimed at promoting women. The National Organization for Women called the decision an important victory for women. The case involved the Santa Clara, California, County Department of Transportation, which in 1980 promoted a woman named Diane Joyce over a man, Paul Johnson, to the post of road dispatcher. Johnson claimed he had scored higher on an oral test and called today's verdict a gross miscarriage of justice. Ms. Joyce was asked about Johnson's claim.

DIANE JOYCE: Was he more qualified than me? Not in my opinion. The job qualifications for this job is four years on the roads. He had two, I had five. He had sat at a desk, just like I did as a clerk, the remaining time with the county. In my opinion, I was better qualified. MacNEIL: Today's decision marked the second defeat by the court this year for the Reagan administration policy on affirmative action. In this case and others, the administration has argued that affirmative action plans to help women and minorities should be struck down as a form of reverse discrimination that violates the constitutional rights of other employees. Jim? LEHRER: President Reagan made a trip to Capitol Hill today for a meeting with Republican House leaders. The purpose was to talk about his planned veto of the $88 billion highway bill and other fiscal matters. He sees the occasion to bash Democrats for failing to produce an acceptable 1988 federal budget.

Pres. RONALD REAGAN: The Republicans, for all the six years that I've been here, every year have offered a sound, solid budget. And the Democrats come back with continuing resolutions. They haven't given us a budget yet. LEHRER: The Democratic chairman of the House Budget Committee turned the blame on the President and House Republicans. GOP congressmen have refused to participate in budget writing sessions to dramatize their claim they have been left out of the budget process.

Rep. WILLIAM GRAY (D) Pennsylvania: The President has dropped his budget on the field of play and retired to the sky box. What we see is the members of his party essentially doing the same thing here on Capitol Hill, saying, ''We're going up in the sky box and watch the fun and games from up above. '' Apparently, the Republicans don't want to participate in the legislative process. And we'll just have to muddle our way through without their support. MacNEIL: The Senate Democrats failed again today in their attempt to freeze $40 million in aid to the Nicaraguan contras. Congress approved the aid last year. But freeze advocates want to hold up the funds until the administration gives a complete accounting of all money sent to the rebels. Republicans led a successful filibuster against the idea of a moratorium on the aid. The New York Times reported today that congressional investigators believe that former CIA Director William Casey masterminded the covert administration aid to the contras. The story quoted members of the select committees investigating the Iran contra affair as saying that Casey is now the focus of the probe. Casey is back in the hospital for further treatment, following surgery for a brain tumor. Daniel Inouye, chairman of the Senate select committee, was upset by the fact that two senators and a congressman were cited as sources in the story.

Sen. DANIEL INOUYE (D) Hawaii: If it should come to my attention, and I'm convinced that a member of the staff has been responsible for the unauthorized transmission of information to other parties, I will not hesitate in terminating his service immediately. If the same occurs with a member of the panel, I will not hesitate in discussing this matter with the leadership and request that he be replaced with another member. MacNEIL: In El Salvador, a man and a woman believed to be leftist guerrillas took 1,000 students and teachers hostage in a school and demanded safe passage to Nicaragua. The school is located in a suburb of the capital, San Salvador. No violence was reported. After a four hour standoff, the couple allowed most of the youngerstudents to leave, but continued to hold 47 older students and an unknown number of teachers. LEHRER: In Afghanistan, there was another major air raid today near the border with Iran and Pakistan. Afghan planes struck a refugee camp there, killing at least 80 persons, according to reports from Pakistan. A similar raid yesterday killed 85. Back in this country, a second U. S. Marine was ordered held as a suspected spy for the Soviet Union. The Marine Corps said Corporal Arnold Bracy of New York City was under investigation for having committed espionage while assigned as a guard at the U. S. embassy in Moscow. The case grew out of the investigation of Sergeant Clayton Lonetree, who was arrested in December on similar charges. MacNEIL: At least three people have died as a result of a vicious spring storm plaguing the plains states. The areas hardest hit were Kansas and Nebraska, where three days of snow and drifts of up to 12 feet high closed roads and left thousands without electricity or phone service. One of the storm fatalities was in Kansas, two others in Oklahoma. LEHRER: And finally in the news today, a federal grand jury indicted three New York men on charges of operating a massive tax cheating scheme. The indictment alleges the trio manufactured $500 million in phony tax losses for clients that included show business personalities Lorne Green, Norman Lear and Sidney Poitier, the late artist Andy Warhol, and businessmen such as CBS President Lawrence Tisch. None of the clients are accused of doing anything wrong. The three charged are Charles Atkins, William Hack and Ernest Grunebaum. MacNEIL: That's it for the news summary. Now it's on to affirmative action decision, disinvestment in South Africa, and a conversation with Alice Walker. Ladies First LEHRER: The big Supreme Court decision on affirmative action is first tonight. The court today approved preferential treatment for women in promotions. The case involved the selection of a woman to be a road crew dispatcher in Santa Clara County, California. She was chosen over a man with higher promotion scores, in keeping with the country governments' affirmative action program. The Supreme Court said such procedure is permissible under the 1964 Civil Rights Law. Today's vote was six to three. We have two attorneys with us now who see the case, the decision and the impact differently. They are Marsha Levick, executive director of the National Organization of Women's Legal Defense and Education Fund. She joins us from public station WHYY in Philadelphia. And Bruce Fein, a Supreme Court scholar who is a visiting fellow for constitutional studies at the Heritage Foundation. Mr. Fein, is this decision a wise and constructive one? BRUCE FEIN, Heritage Foundation: I think the decision is regrettable, Jim. For so long, the United States has been unique amongst the international community as at least aspiring to the goal of color blindness, gender blindness, when it comes to the world of politics and economics. When we've fallen short of that in the past, as we have, we've thought it quite proper to award preferences to those who have been victimized by past discrimination, so that they do not suffer because of that fact. This decision today holds that merely because of a statistical imbalance in the workplace -- a statistical imbalance which might be there simply because our cultural ethos did not incline women, for example, to apply for engineering jobs or police jobs or fire fighting jobs. The imbalance itself creates a justification for an affirmative action program that discriminates against a white male, even though he stands on a par, in light of justice and equity, with a preferred female. Because neither have been discriminated, neither have been aided by any wrongdoing. And I think that tarnishes our ideal of individual merit as the basis for political and economic ascendancy in this country. LEHRER: Ms. Levick in Philadelphia, you're overview of the decision? MARSH LEVICK, NOW Legal Defense Fund: Well, I think that what the court is really trying to do is to insure that individual merit of women, as well as minorities, is taken into account. The scenario that Mr. Fein has mentioned, in terms of what the ideal in this country should be, is really better achieved by the Supreme Court's decision today, which, by the way, is totally consistent with a series of Supreme Court decisions on affirmative action that have been decided in the last couple of years. LEHRER: All right, what -- starting with you, Ms. Levick -- how does this accomplish what you said it accomplished? How does it better the position of equality? Ms. LEVICK: I think what the Supreme Court has recognized is that really in the past, probably for about 150 or 200 years, the sex of women has been taken into account in a way that permitted them to be excluded from jobs. What this decision today recognizes is that, when you have qualified applicants for a job, both men and women, neither one of them can be excluded on the basis of their sex, nor can minorities be excluded on the basis of their race. The Supreme Court is simply trying to insure that every individual who is qualified for a particular job category has an absolutely equal opportunity to compete for that job. LEHRER: Mr. Fein? Mr. FEIN: I simply think that misstates the holding of the court here. It's clear that the woman was preferred because of her gender. She scored lower on the standardized tests here. There was no proof of past discrimination. Indeed, the court went out of its way to hold that the particular preferred female had not proven and the employer had not demonstrated any illegal discrimination. That's not equality under the law. I think the problem with the decision is that it descends from individual rights to group rights. And what has so distinguished this country is an avoidance of a caste like legal system and a treatment of individuals on the basis of what they themselves have accomplished and achieved by dint of their own efforts. If there had been proof in this case that the woman had been discriminated against in the past, then I would voice no objection to having her given a preference in order to put her in the place that she would have achieved otherwise. But that wasn't the facts of the case. And that's what makes this particular decision so significant in terms of its affirmative action effect. LEHRER: Ms. Levick? Ms. LEVICK: I think that the court has said that sex is only one factor that employers are now permitted to take into account, along with a host of other appropriate considerations, such as their experience, their qualifications as they're reflected on a particular employment test, and other kinds of strengths that each individual brings to the job. I don't really think that this is a decision that is promoting group rights over individual rights. I think that it is recognizing that exclusion of women and minorities from a host of job categories in the past -- in this particular case, we had absolutely no women ever in the history of the Santa Clara Department of Transportation in this particular job classification. I think for Mr. Fein to make the argument that that is the result simply of societal choice on the part of women and that discrimination played no role in that is really to ignore the reality of the kind of discrimination that women have historically faced in this country. LEHRER: But is he not -- excuse me, Mr. Fein -- but is he not correct, Ms. Levick, when he says that the court decision today okays preferential treatment for women in this case? Ms. LEVICK: Absolutely not. LEHRER: No? Ms. LEVICK: I think that that's a mistake in the sense that what the court is saying is that preferential treatment, only to the extent that it allows employers to take sex into account, where otherwise all things are equal, where you have minimally qualified candidates, all that the court is insuring really is that the pool of qualified candidates be expanded to include men and women and minorities, which is good for employers; not just for minorities and women. It is not setting up artificial preferences or artificial numbers quotas that set certain kinds of positions aside for women, regardless of whether or not they're qualified for those jobs. LEHRER: So you dispute the facts of this case -- that this woman was promoted, even though the man was more qualified or scored higher on the test? Ms. LEVICK: I think that that does a real disservice to the decision and to the facts of the case and to Diane Joyce. What this case -- what happened in Santa Clara was essentially that there was a civil service system that said that the top seven candidates were all considered equally qualified for the job. Diane Joyce and Paul Johnson were both in that top seven. And they were considered by the interviewers and the individuals making the decision here to both be well qualified for the position. I think to continue to talk about Paul Johnson as being more qualified because he scored two points higher is really missing the point of what this decision is all about. Mr. FEIN: But the facts are that the panel ultimately recommended that Mr. Johnson be hired. It was only after an EEO officer called -- the ultimate employing official -- and importuned for hiring of the woman that the woman was hired. And in this case, it's clear that the court held that even if the statistical imbalance is there simply because women, because of their propensities or cultural upbringing, chose not to apply, that still was sufficient to go ahead and grant preferences. It wasn't the case where the court said, ''We find as a matter of law that historically there has been discrimination. And therefore, the preference can be awarded. '' LEHRER: All right, what's the harm of this, Mr. Fein? Mr. FEIN: I think the harm is symbolic . . . to aspire to a regime of law whereby individuals know that they will get a fair shake on the basis of what they are able to accomplish, how well they can develop their faculties. I think it's exceedingly demoralizing to everyone to believe that, no matter how hard they work, they nevertheless may lose out -- not because of what they have done individually, but because of an accident of birth. LEHRER: Ms. Levick, how do you see the symbolic importance of this? Ms. LEVICK: Well, I think it's interesting, because I really agree with what Mr. Fein is saying in terms of the ends to be achieved here. I agree that an accident of birth should not affect someone's employment opportunities. And I agree that those kinds of factors shouldn't influence what kinds of employment decisions get made. The difference, of course, is how we achieve that particular end. The Supreme Court said more than a decade ago in race cases that, in order to get beyond race discrimination, we sometimes need to take race into account. I think the court is simply recognizing today that, in order to really eliminate sex discrimination from employment decisions in this country, to put women on an equal footing, to give them a fair shot alongside men, that we sometimes may need to take sex into account. LEHRER: All right, let's move from the symbolic to the practical, Ms. Levick. What do you think the practical impact of this decision is going to be on the workplace around the country? Ms. LEVICK: I think it has a couple of impacts. First of all, this was a decision involving nontraditional employment for women. I think that we can immediately hope to see employers -- LEHRER: Meaning a road crew supervisor, right. Ms. LEVICK: Yes, the road dispatcher position is certainly considered to be nontraditional employment for women. I would hope that employers who are looking at their work forces and seeing similar kinds of disparities -- gross disparities -- in the participation of women in these kinds of jobs, that they will think about undertaking some voluntary affirmative action. I think the other important aspect of the decision is that this was a case involving promotions. And while women have made a lot of inroads at the entry level into a number of jobs in the last 15 years, they continue to be discriminated against at the promotional level and in terms of career advancement. And I think that this decision sends a clear message to employers and to women -- a note of encouragement that women are in the workplace to stay, that it's not enough to invite them in on an equal basis, but also to make sure that they advance equally alongside men. LEHRER: Mr. Fein, how do you see the practical fallout? Mr. FEIN: I think the practical significance will be a greatly accelerated voluntary affirmative action program in the business sector. I know the Chamber of Commerce, to my understanding, has applauded the decision. The decision basically gives the private employer a safeguard against discrimination lawsuits that might otherwise be brought on threat if a voluntary affirmative action wasn't undertaken, even if the employer believes that he had committed no wrongdoing in the past. I think it's somewhat ironic that the decision comes down at the same time that so many in Congress and elsewhere are complaining about the lack of competitiveness of the United States internationally and seeking to bolster our ability to compete in the marketplace, based on pure merit. And this decision seems to me to run totally ahead at odds with that particular goal. LEHRER: So you think that business -- that we can expect over the next several months and years, businesses, to say, ''okay,'' to on their own come up with voluntary plans that would -- Mr. FEIN: I think that is likely in the areas where, by practice or otherwise, women have been under represented. I believe that is correct. LEHRER: And you hope that's true, right, Ms. Levick? Ms. LEVICK: I hope it's true, but I just want to respond to what Mr. Fein just said, which is that, again, this decision is not doing a disservice to employers and to business in this country. What it is doing is making sure that employers consider all qualified applicants for a job. This is a benefit to employment. And I think that's why manufacturers are applauding it, quite frankly. LEHRER: Both of you watch the Supreme Court very carefully as part of your normal course of work. Ms. Levick, did this surprise you that the court came up with this decision, particularly on a six to three vote? Ms. LEVICK: It wasn't surprising in the sense that I think this is a very straightforward application of a decision by the Supreme Court about ten years ago involving voluntary affirmative action plans in the private sector to benefit minorities. So there's nothing new, in a sense, about what the court is saying here today, except that they have applied it to women. LEHRER: Mr. Fein -- Mr. FEIN: I was quite surprised by the decision. Traditionally, the court has always been very fact bound in its affirmative action rulings -- very hesitant to go much beyond what they had said before. Here, the court cut loose from its past doctrine and said, ''Even though past discrimination hasn't been proven, even though there's no evidence that might lead an employer to believe a lawsuit proving past discrimination would be successful, nevertheless, affirmative action programs can be undertaken, and they can benefit those who themselves haven't been victimized by past discrimination. '' That's a watershed in the law of affirmative action. And it's the first time that the court has really reached out to decide issues broader than need be in rendering a decision. LEHRER: Well, this is a so called conservative court. How do you explain that? Mr. FEIN: I don't -- LEHRER: They're not listening to you, Mr. Fein. Is that it? Mr. FEIN: I think many, at the confirmation hearings last summer with regard to Chief Justice Rehnquist and Scalia were forecasting the demise of all civil rights. I think that this decision and others -- the Paradise case on promotions this year, which went in favor of affirmative action proponents -- discredits that idea. And I think what this does say as well, Jim, is that this court is going to be reluctant to move or make any retreat from affirmative action which might cause some kind of obloquy to be heaped upon them, justified or not, when they don't see the executive branch itself doing anything. After all, if President Reagan has had executive order out relating to employment for government contractors, that has provided, in a sense, the same kind of goals and timetables for women and blacks that oftentimes the Reagan administration has opposed in court. And I don't think the Supreme Court's going to take the heat where they don't see the Reagan administration taking a lead. LEHRER: In a word, you agree with that additional point, Ms. Levick? Ms. LEVICK: I would agree with it. What I would add is that I would hope now that the Reagan administration would take a lesson from the Supreme Court and start enforcing those laws, rather than trying to roll back civil rights in this country. LEHRER: Okay. Ms. Levick in Philadelphia, Mr. Fein here in Washington, thank you both very much. MacNEIL: Still to come on the News Hour, the reality of U. S. disinvestment in South Africa and a conversation with the writer Alice Walker. Pulling Up Stakes MacNEIL: Next tonight, a second look at what is actually being achieved by the exodus of U. S. companies in South Africa. A number of big American companies, like General Motors, Kodak and Xerox, have pulled out, at least partly in response to pressure from American opponents of apartheid. But in South Africa itself, the issue of disinvestment -- whether foreign companies should close or sell their South African operations -- has become increasingly controversial. We'll have a debate about that. But first, from South Africa, a special report for the News Hour by Michael Buerk of the BBC.

MICHAEL BUERK [voice over]: It was not the revolution, and in the black townships they know it now. The defiance has drained away. No insurrection here, no sanctions there will topple Pretoria tonight. In London and Washington, disinvestment may seem a moral crusade. It looks different in a church hall at Quentin. MISHACK MASHIANE, choirmaster: All around, people must talk together -- whites, blacks, internationally and in South Africa. That is the only way. BUERK [voice over]: The choir runs on corn flakes sponsored by Kellog's, a company that refuses to leave. Mr. MASHIANE: Kellog's is a great help to us. If they had to leave South Africa, then I am dead sure the choir will just definitely go to the dogs. If the American companies leave South Africa, then many people are definitely going to starve. BUERK [voice over]: In Johannesburg's black portrait parlors, they're working through the last rolls of Kodak film to be brought into the country legally. Foreign companies have been selling $10 million worth of assets a day here, but none have pulled the shutters down like Kodak. The break's total. Next month, Kodak will close down, pull out and ban the sale of its products here. No matter the Japanese will take over; the hassle at home's too much to hang onto market share or employees' jobs. EMPLOYEE: We'll have to look for other jobs. EMPLOYEE: Well, we are disappointed. EMPLOYEE: Well, [unintelligible]. But then, politics is also dirty, isn't it? Rev. ALLAN BOESAK, United Democratic Front: Disinvestment is actually part of the package that we have called for -- people like Bishop Desmond Tutu and myself -- together with so many organizations here. That is fairly low on the list. Because we have asked for sanctions that could hit hard at the South African government, things that could be felt immediately and that would really, really impact the South African economy to such an extent that the government here would have no choice but to think differently on certain matters. BUERK [voice over]: But not since the '76 Soweto riots that first made foreign investors nervous has the government clamped down so hard. And when foreign firms leave, it's white businessmen, not black workers, who benefit from deals that aren't all they seem. General Motors has pulled out of South Africa, but has just launched a new car here. It's a neat trick. They've lost a political problem and kept a potentially valuable market. They sold out to their local managers, who will still put together GM cars from important GM components. They've already sacked 500 black workers who went on strike, claiming the deal had cheated them. Chris Dlamini is vice president of the biggest, most radical union federation. They've called loudly for sanctions against South Africa, but disinvestment -- that's now different. CHRIS DLAMINI, trade union spokesman: Some companies or some people, you know, confusing divestment and disinvestment. We had never in our unions called for companies to pull out. But what we are saying is that the sanctions should be applied, and we support the question of sanctions. So if companies are under pressure from their own countries that they need to pull out, then we say to them that we will have to sit down and discuss that question. And maybe wecould arrive at a situation where both parties are happy about this. We haven't called upon any company to pull out, whether it's American or British or Germany. We've never called for them to pull out. But what we are saying, that if those companies have to pull out to comply with the requirements all stand up and stand together with the workers and demand that apartheid should be dismantled, then those companies do not I refuse. BUERK [voice over]: It's one of the endless paradoxes of South Africa that Kellog's should provide a safe base for a union man who believes capitalism and apartheid are partners. Chris Dlamini has been in hiding while other union men have been rounded up. Kellog's won't let the police past the gate if they come for him here. Like most American companies, but not many local ones, the strict racial equality -- whites alongside blacks on the productions lines and blacks in management working alongside the managing director John Johnson. The Sullivan Code stipulates American companies must provide equal pay and equal conditions. But as they've come under increasing pressure at home, many have gone further. Kellog's is upgrading the local black township. The company started a housing scheme and Quantema for its workers and spends hundreds of thousands of dollars on Quantema's children, sponsoring three schools and an orphanage. All together, the Kellog Foundation is committed to spending $8 million on black education in Southern Africa. There is little of the snap and crackle of PR about this commitment. The projects are low key and long term. Not easy to explain to her that Kellog's should go home. JOHN JOHNSON, Kellog's, South Africa: Our people want us to stay and help them in the struggle for peaceful, fundamental change. And we believe that we can do that. We can help. We can make a contribution, provided at the same time we're able to run a successful business. BUERK [voice over]: Kgomotso Masebe is studying medicine, sponsored by Kellog. Few blacks can afford university education without help. Ninety percent are sponsored by companies. KGOMOTSO MASEBE, medical student: Most students are being sponsored by certain companies. Some of them are American, some British. Most students really can't afford their fees. It's very expensive to get education. And we can't depend on our family funds. The extra hundred that you have, you really need it. BUERK [voice over]: It's undeniable foreign businessmen have profited from apartheid in the past. Chris Dlamini thinks Kellog's should be doing more now. Mr. DLAMINI: Kellog's has been doing something. Because it has been, you know, sending telexes to the minister and people its detained. And it has been, you know, trying to get, you know, students. But that is not enough. Because if they do that, they're still doing it within the respect of apartheid. The role that's been played by employers here is that of paying tax to the government. Because the government can not live without tax. So they have never mentioned at any stage that they may stop paying if the government isn't prepared to change. Mr. JOHNSON: We will go as far as we possibly can in trying to bring about peaceful, fundamental change in South Africa. I think the suggestion that we should not pay our taxes is a very shortsighted approach to the problem. Because when we've not paid our taxes, then very shortly after that we will be out of business. BUERK [voice over]: There are no official figures, but it's estimated 3 million blacks here are desperate for work. In all big cities, there are places where they gather, ready to run for the chance of casual labor for as little as $2 a day. South Africa will need 7 million jobs by the end of the century. Whites are unemployed too, and growing numbers are to be found on food for work schemes in the bigger cities, doing jobs normally reserved for blacks. WHITE WORKER: It's degrading. Everybody looks at us. Even the [unintelligible], you know, in the street on the back of the truck, they laugh at us. You know, things like that. So a man doesn't feel too happy about that. BUERK [voice over]: In theory, economic pressure should force South Africa's whites towards a more just society. In practice, it's doing the opposite, hardship and the perception of outside interference working against change, moving whites to the right. Mr. BOESAK: Look, you people -- we didn't want this. We were asking for other things, and this is a kind of a last resort until some peaceful measures. I'm very aware of that. That is why I keep on saying disinvestment is the strategy of the second level. The strategy of the first level -- what we wanted -- was the quick and effective sanctions that we have not seen yet. So what we want really is to see whether we can not get the international community to move on the sanctions issue far more effectively, far quicker than they have up to now in order to minimize the effect of a long, drawn out disinvestment thing that would go over five or six or seven years and in the end leave us with an economy that is indeed, as you say, a wasteland. BUERK [voice over]: The moral issue of South Africa seems so simple and is so complicated. If every American company goes, it will do some local economic damage, destroy a few small signs of hope, but not bring Mr. Botha to his knees -- a moral gesture, even the most radical blacks here are questioning now. MacNEIL: Now to two people who are the opposite sides of this question. Walter Fauntroy, District of Columbia delegate to the U. S. Congress, is strongly in favor of U. S. disinvestment. Herman Nickel, U. S. ambassador to South Africa from 1982 until last October, wants American corporations to stay involved there. Mr. Fauntroy, in view of that report, which said that even radical blacks now are questioning the disinvestment, do you personally think U. S. companies should continue pulling out, like Kodak, or stay, like Kellog's? Del. WALTER FAUNTROY (D) Washington, D. C. : Let me say first that you've treated the audience to a very interesting reaction on the part of the 1% of the work force of South Africa that's affected by U. S. firms. And I agree quite frankly with the Reverend Mr. Boesak, who's indicated that -- we recognize that this is a second level strategy. It's the only nonviolent tool remaining for those who want to see peaceful change in apartheid. I have talked personally with many of the union people there. And I do understand that they are prepared to accept the additional suffering occasioned by the moral impact of disinvestment, as over against divestment. And I hope we will have an opportunity to make the distinction. MacNEIL: Explain the different between those two things, as you understand it. Del. FAUNTROY: Well, as I understand it, divestment is the kind of thing that GM and IBM and Coca Cola have done. They have sold their assets to the local South African owners. And in the process, as someone indicated in the ten minute presentation there, actually, the South African managers have been enriched, but Coca Cola, IBM and GM, for that matter, continue to market their goods and make profits in South Africa. So that the people of South Africa feel -- the whites of South Africa feel no effect of the sanctions, because they're getting the same goods. Disinvestment, on the other hand, goes along with what Eastman Kodak is doing. They're moving out altogether, disengaging totally. And I would like to see, when divestment takes place, the divestment to the black entrepreneurs, so that the black community is enriched at least to deal with the -- MacNEIL: Okay. But come back to my original question. As a black leader in this country, what do you now advocate to American companies -- that they should get out, like to divest, like -- sorry -- disinvest like Kodak or stay like Kellog's, since you don't obviously favor divestment in the first case. Del. FAUNTROY: I favor divestment when it is divestment to black, political, economic empowerment. I support a disinvestment, certainly among American firms which, if all of them moved out, would not have that much effect, but would certainly give the kind of moral leadership that would ultimately cause the whites of South Africa to recognize that they pay a price. They're not now going to be able to get Kodak film. If they get Fuji, then I think we ought to talk to Japan about their cooperation with a worldwide effort to bring these people to their senses. MacNEIL: Ambassador Nickel, how do you see it? HERMAN NICKEL, former ambassador to South Africa: Well, I think what we are seeing here is the confirmation of the first rule of divestment or disinvestment -- namely, that the enthusiasm is the greater the less costs you have to carry. The less your job is threatened, the less your wages, your lifestyle is threatened, the more you are for sanctions, the more you are for disinvestment. When you discover that it simply results in economic suffering and that the change in ownership is basically, at best, irrelevant to the political problem of a transfer of power or a participation in the political process, I think there is a great disillusionment. MacNEIL: So does that mean you think -- come back to the examples we can all understand. What do you think American companies should do? I mean, they're under enormous pressure from boards of directors, from public pressure, to get out now. And from people who are campaigning against apartheid in this country generally, to get out. What should they do, do you think? Mr. NICKEL: Well, obviously, they are under very strong pressure. And many of them think that the pressure is so great that it is no longer worth the candle. I regret that very much. I applaud companies like Kellog who are responsible and certainly likely to be more responsible employees than those to whom the company is then transferred in other cases and who are hanging in there. I think that the American public will, after a while, be confronted with evidence like we saw here this evening and conclude that this is really not an effective way to go. It's all very well to say we are prepared to suffer. We now see that if there is no reward for the suffering -- nobody likes to suffer for the sake of suffering -- then I think you're going to have a turnaround of opinion and I think what Mr. Dlamini said, the trade union leader, and what Mr. Boesak said, or the Reverend Boesak said, reflect the fact there are a lot of people in their constituencies who are not as, you know, gung ho as Mr. Dlamini and Reverend Boesak once were. MacNEIL: Congressman Fauntroy, isn't the presence of Kellog's a positive force for black interests and advancement in South Africa -- staying there and doing what it's doing? Del. FAUNTROY: If Kellog were a perfect company and functioned more fairly than some companies in the United States, with respect to minorities, for another century, it would not change a system that enables South Africa to endanger the lives of 150 million people and cost the West additional money, because they refuse to allow them to develop the same natural resources in that region in competition with South Africa. It's for that reason that another thing which we did in the sanctions bill last year is important. Not only did we call for divestment in terms of U. S. companies, but more important, we banned the purchase by the United States businesspeople of uranium and other coal and other steel, all of which feed the South African government, because they are government owned enterprises by which they put half the Afrikaners to work policing the -- MacNEIL: Let's come back to sanctions in a moment. I just want to ask you, do you feel that Kellog's -- how do you balance the good that Kellog's would claim that it's doing against the moral gesture of pulling out? You obviously think Kellog's would be better advised to pull out. Do you? Del. FAUNTROY: I feel first, they're doing a fine thing, just as there were people in the South in the '60s who invited blacks to sit down at lunch counters with them, in their homes and in their private clubs. But that did nothing about the millions of blacks across the South who were by law humiliated. So that this is to say -- I think this is a parallel that says, ''Look, these people are doing fine. Let them stay. '' When we're saying that this is a second level strategy to raise the consciousness of the people of the world so that not just 1% of the companies say, ''We will not cooperate with you,'' but all of those who have invested in this system of social segregation and political domination for the purpose of the economic exploitation of millions of people. MacNEIL: Let's move on to the sanctions question. Ambassador Nickel, you heard what the Reverend Boesak said, and Mr. Fauntroy's just repeated it -- that the divestment was always intended as a second level strategy and that unless there are serious, biting sanctions by U. S. , Britain, Germany and others, this other thing won't have any impact at all. What do you say to that? Mr. NICKEL: Well, I think in the first place, I think the Reverend Boesak was talking about quick, effective action that would leave the government with no choice. I think that this is a misreading of the way in which South Africa has been preparing itself -- the government -- for that contingency. It is an extraordinarily self sufficient country. And the notion that you can force the government to its knees is, I think, highly unrealistic. I mean, there are two criteria that have to be met here: one, you have to have a government that is really economically subservient to those who impose the sanctions on it. And I question that. But the second criterion that has to be met is that the government must be able to meet the concessions that are demanded in a way that don't undermine its own domestic position. Because if a government is being told that it must commit political suicide, it's likely to want to endure almost any kind of pain rather than commit suicide. That's a matter of common human experience. So I don't think it would work. The other thing is, also, I'm glad that Congressman Fauntroy raised the role of regional context here. That kind of quick, effective action, of course, would spell disaster at this stage to those 150 million people who are at present still very much dependent on South Africa. MacNEIL: To boil this down, Ambassador, you're saying that neither sanctions as quick effective action or divestment are really going to work and have a really decisive impact on the Botha government. Are you saying that? Mr. NICKEL: Precisely. Del. FAUNTROY: And I beg leave to differ. The fact is that, in my view, there are two things that we can do. One is to stop purchasing, where possible, the vital natural resources which fuel the government there in South Africa. And secondly, to develop the nations and the regions surrounding South Africa which have the same gold, the same diamond, the same ferric manganese, the same platinum and titanium which we now get almost exclusively from South Africa. How do we do that? We pass the $700 million aid program that we have projected over a five year period to the front line states with a view to their being able to market in competition with South Africa their products to the world in a fashion that cost us less. You can't understand apartheid unless you understand South Africa's determination to be the only game in the world in terms of the world's access to these vital resources which they control in South Africa and which they destabilize the countries around South Africa to prevent them from being able to produce -- MacNEIL: Congressman Fauntroy, we have to leave it there. I'd like to thank you and Ambassador Nickel. Illuminating the Color Purple LEHRER: Finally tonight, some words about and from Alice Walker, author of The Color Purple. It is the work of Charlayne Hunter Gault. [clip from The Color Purple] ACTOR: Celie, get me some lemonade.

CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT [voice over]: The movie The Color Purple told the same basic story as the novel: the triumph of a poor, abused, Southern, black woman over Mister, her abusive husband. And the movie provoked the same basic criticism as the novel. The issue: the portrayal of the black man, which many thought was totally negative. The movie crystallized and intensified the debate. Dr. JAMES COMER, psychiatrist: The film is like putting a lighted match to dry grass. HUNTER-GAULT [voice over]: Until the movie, Alice Walker's name had not been a household word, even though she was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for the novel The Color Purple in 1983 -- the first black woman ever to win it. And even though she had a solid list of other works to her credit: three novels, two books of short stories and three volumes of poetry. Once is her first volume, written when she was still a student at Sarah Lawrence College. Letters are still pouring in from readers of The Color Purple, now translated into 17 languages. And here in the United States, it's been on the fiction paperback best seller list for the past three years, last year moving to number one. A self proclaimed recluse by nature, Walker never entered the public debate over her work. Instead, she retreated from public view. Profits from the novel enabled Walker, a native of rural Edenton, Georgia, to buy land in Northern California and to expand the publishing company she started with her mate, Robert Allen. Called Wild Trees, the press puts out works by authors with little chance of getting published by major houses. The latest is Ready from Within, an autobiography by Septima Clark, and 89 year old civil rights pioneer. Wild Trees recently held a part in her honor at the Oakland Museum. It included readings from Clark's book. ALICE WALKER: I have great belief in the fact that whenever there is chaos, it creates wonderful thinking. I consider chaos a gift. And this has come during my old age. I say out of that will come something good. It will, too. They can be afraid if they want to -- afraid of what is going to happen. Things will happen, and things will change. The only think that's really worthwhile is change. It's coming. HUNTER-GAULT [voice over]: Walker, 43, her 17 year old daughter Rebecca Levanthal and Robert Allen divide their time between San Francisco and what they call their real refuge in Mendocino County, California, where Walker wrote The Color Purple. [on camera] As you know, at the time, there was a lot of talk about how the novel presented a negative image of black men, negative image of black family. If you could have joined the debate at that time, how would you have responded to that? Ms. WALKER: Well, I would have said that I write out of what I know. And I write out of my experience and out of the experience of people that I have known. And I don't make up brutality. I don't make up violence because it's something that I like or it's something that I want to use to malign black people. But I write about it because it is a very strong reality in all of the communities on the planet. You know, violence is everywhere. It's not just black, it's not just white. And I think that I come -- I mean, I know that I come -- out of a tradition where you are supposed to say when you see something is wrong. You know, I came of age during the civil rights movement. And I think most of the black men who took part in that movement would definitely understand what I'm saying. I mean, I saw them confront white people who were abusive to us, you know? And so when they see that I am willing to confront black men who are abusive to us, they should be able to recognize it as the same violence and really to applaud it. HUNTER-GAULT: But do you think that black men were at all justified in their reaction to the book? Ms. WALKER: First of all, see, I don't agree that the people in The Color Purple -- the men -- are negative. I don't think they are bad images. Mainly because they grow and they change and they develop. I think what was the problem for a lot of black men is not so much what I do with black men -- you know, whether I treat them gently or roughly -- it is that black men are not central to my work. Women -- black women -- are central to my work. And that's logical, because I am a black woman. And so I write from my own perspective. And I write about what I know best. HUNTER-GAULT: Do you think that there's an inevitable conflict in writing about black women that you're going to have with black men? Ms. WALKER: Oh, absolutely. Because you have to write what you see and what you experience. And you know, unfortunately, the abuse of women is rampant. You know, it's rampant in our society, and it's rampant in most of the societies that I've ever heard of. So naturally, you know, if I write about having been abused, I have to then say who abused me. And if you are the person who did it, then you're not going to look very good, you know? But there's a wonderful song by Bob Marley called ''Who the Cap Fits,'' you know? And so I always feel that if the cap does not fit you, if you have not abused anyone, then you should not feel bad. You should not feel maligned. You should only be concerned if, in fact, you arean abuser. HUNTER-GAULT: I know you said you didn't read a lot about the criticism, but do you remember what bothered you the most about what you knew about it? Ms. WALKER: Well, you know, it always seemed to me as if the people were looking at a picture, and they were distracted by the frame, you know? I always felt that they didn't really see what I was doing. They didn't see the story. And one way for me of telling that is that there was very little debate about what I consider the main focus of the novel, which is theology, you know? I mean, I'm not so interested in who beats up whom. I mean, that's very important, but what is really important is our relationship to the universe, you know, and what -- that Celie's struggle is not so much with Mister in the end as it is with developing her own connection to the universe and to the cosmos. It's a spiritual book, you know. It's a religious book. All my books are religious books. HUNTER-GAULT: And how do you feel about the movie, which had a much wider popular appeal than the book? Ms. WALKER: I have come to feel that a lot of the criticism of my work and of the movie and of all of this has been by people who in some ways don't have enough to do, you know? I think that it is much easier to criticize me and to criticize my work and to criticize a movie than it is, for instance, to say that it is wrong to drop a bomb on a family in Philadelphia and to wipe out a whole block in Philadelphia, you know. That happened. That incident that I'm mentioning happened in Philadelphia the same year that we were making the movie of The Color Purple. It got almost none of the controversy. And that, I think, is shameful. HUNTER-GAULT: What was your overall impression of the achievement of the movie? Ms. WALKER: Well, the first time I saw it, it gave me a tremendous headache, because I could see all the things that were missing. If you only knew how hard we worked on the people to try to get them to speak the language. And believe me, I could not talk to much with actors, you know, out of using I's. In the novel, there is no such thing as I's -- ''I's gonna. '' So no matter how I'd tell them that, ''No, no, no, you know, the folk language is not I's; it's I'ma -- HUNTER-GAULT: ''I'ma go. '' Ms. WALKER: Right. ''I'ma go here, I'ma go there,'' you know. It's not ''I's gonna. '' So, you know, after the headache, you know, I went to see it. And I loved it. And I still love it. HUNTER-GAULT: Well, some people said that what the debate was really about was a lack of power -- the lack of power that black people have in any of their images, any of their -- Ms. WALKER: Well, no. See, we have power over our own image, you know. I mean, if I were a black man, I wouldn't bat an eye at almost anything anybody did, because I would have my own image. And you know, I think we sometimes give away our power by believing that we don't have any. HUNTER-GAULT: The other argument that was made was that in the absence of the full spectrum of the portrayal of black life, that the black artist has a responsibility to, in the words of the song, accentuate the positive and eliminate the negative. How do you feel about that? Ms. WALKER: I think it's terrible. I would never listen to that kind of advice. I feel very deeply that the stories that I tell are stories that have been missed by so many other writers who have been, maybe, accentuating the positive. But by accentuating the positive, so much has been left you, you know? I mean, I am trying in my work to tell the stories of people who have never had a voice. HUNTER-GAULT: I once read that you regarded storytelling as a means of survival. Is it still? Ms. WALKER: No, it's just a means of absolute celebration. I did have a difficult childhood, and I had to write in order to make a space for myself. We had ten people in my family, and we lived in shacks, very small rooms, sometimes three rooms. So my writing was my other room. It was my room of my own, you know? But now in writing the The Color Purple, whatever anyone says or, you know, feels about it, I did it in such joy. I mean, I had such a good time that I, you know, I will never repent. HUNTER-GAULT: Why? Was it -- I mean, why were you so joyful about it? Ms. WALKER: Well, because I think I reached the place where artists want to get, which is where you break the barrier between yourself and your art, you know. You really break the barrier between -- in writing terms, you break the barrier between yourself and your characters. I mean, you become really one. And so they seem, you know, almost more real to you than the people that you're living with. The joy of it was just that I really feel that I have captured these lives and that time whole and with its life -- with its life and with its spirit, you know? And that was another reason I had to have, as you call it, the hiatus. Because you see, in our culture, when you produce something that becomes a success, people kill it. They use it up. They beat it to death. They abuse it. I didn't want that to happen to my work. HUNTER-GAULT: Do you feel defined or maybe confined as a black and as a woman writer? Ms. WALKER: No. No. I wouldn't have it any other way. When I learned that, in addition to having African ancestors, I also have this Irish Scots person as a grandfather and this native American grandmother, I was really delighted. Because you know, everything, instead of confining you, actually expands you. And so the more, you know, sort of people you are, the more facets that you have to sort of reflect the light. LEHRER: Again, the major stories of this Wednesday. The U. S. Supreme Court upheld an affirmative action program that promoted a woman over men with higher promotion scores. The court, in a six to three vote, said such promotions are permissible under the 1964 Civil Rights Law. Women's rights advocates welcomed the decision as a major step toward correcting workplace discrimination against women. And in El Salvador, an armed man and women surrendered after holding 1,000 students and teachers hostage in a school for more than six hours. Good night, Robin. MacNEIL: Good night, Jim. That's the News Hour tonight, and we will be back tomorrow night. I'm Robert MacNeil. Good night.