Your Morning Franklin
For Thursday, October 31st, 2024
Week 84 of our regular morning feature here at Friedman of the Plains Worldwide in which we highlight the great words and works of great men and women, as well as those who are insufferable, delusional, and even fictional.
This Week John Hope Franklin
“The merit is not in going back or holding back and becoming and remaining segregated. The merit is in making desegregation work. Making desegregation work. That’s where the merit is. We didn’t work to do it. We haven’t worked to do it — not hard enough. We haven’t pressed our government. We haven’t pressed our communities. We haven’t pressed our educational systems to stand up and do what they’re supposed to do. We can’t say we’re going to run back to our segregated institutions and think that that’s going to get us anywhere. I don’t think so. I have not lived all these years to want to go back. I want to go forward. I want to improve what we’ve got. I want to make over what we’ve got, if necessary. But I don’t want to go back to the ghetto. I don’t want to go back to segregation. I don’t want to go back to Jim Crow.”
Desegregation has always had a NIMBY element in that some of the most furious objections to school desegregation occurred not in the South but in Boston, a place that regularly sends liberals to Congress. This furious rejection of a solution that most Boston voters knew was necessary shows that while addressing this country's racist heritage is vital, we should also be aware of the tragedy that ensues when local control of schools means that poor communities can only afford inferior education, so whether or not the races are mixed the education the children receive perpetuates their exile from the salons of power.
It's like chemistry; two ingredients that won't go into solution without a catalyst, or heat. Something that actually promotes a solution (desegregation).
Some new testament fool, "Oh Lord, give me chastity, but not yet..."