Op-Ed

Beyond the Rhetoric: How the Army Addressed Racial Tensions

Published

10 years ago

May 25, 2015

By Harry C. Alford
NNPA Columnist

I remember sitting through a lecture in a sociology class during my senior year at the University of Wisconsin. The professor was boring and I had a newspaper. I looked at the front page and noticed a list of dates. They were birth dates for the new Army draft lottery. Most exemptions from the draft were gone and President Richard M. Nixon implemented the draft lottery based on birth dates. There it was, my birth date – Feb. 14 – listed as the fourth number to go. Those with the first 100 birth dates were going to get drafted into the Army and I was near the top of the list. My first thoughts: “My future is toast. ”I am going to go to Vietnam and catch a bullet or grenade. If I survive, I am not going to live on a college salary but a drafted private in poverty.”

Procter & Gamble had already made me a job offer. My fear was that my draft status was going to kill the employment opportunity, if not me. However, my corporate recruiter told me not to worry. In fact, he said that what I presented to them was an opportunity. I could go into the Army and come out an officer. That would give me a “triple.” I would be college degreed plus a competitive athlete via football as well as a military officer. He showed me how to apply for Officer Candidate School and I was soon accepted. Thus, I worked a few months before it was time to get inducted and then off to Officer Candidate School in Ft. Benning, Ga.

The racial tension that soared immediately after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968 was starting to carry over into the Army. That would make sense as they were drafting young men at a rapid pace and Blacks would be over-represented in the demographics, especially among junior ranking soldiers. Blacks and Hispanics had no slick attorneys to help them avoid service like so many White young men. Fights, threats and even murder were starting to appear in the ranks, especially in Vietnam. You can’t have an efficient fighting military when the soldiers are fighting among themselves.

The Army was a snap for me. My football conditioning came in handy and compared to many of the draftees, my charisma was glowing. If it weren’t for wars, I would have stayed forever. A few months after I finished OCS and Finance School, I was assigned to Dugway Proving Grounds, Utah, 70 miles southwest of Salt Lake City. Three months into my new assignment, I was appointed the Race Relations Officer. The Pentagon decided to aggressively address the racial problems it was having in the field. Each brigade would have an active Race Relations Officer who would report to the Commanding Officer on a regular basis and would also directly report to the Pentagon any serious and negative activity. I spent three weeks at the new Race Relations Training School in Ft. Benning. More than 90 percent of the Race Relations Officers were Black.

We would get together three times a year and compare our experiences: –what worked well and what didn’t. A formal summary would be crafted for review by the Pentagon. I would now counsel personnel who had complaints or suspicions. I would write columns on Black history and self-esteem in the local newspaper. Many White soldiers would come to me and say things like, “I didn’t know coloreds did that.” Just the fact that it was well known that we had a Race Relations Officer who was accessible 24/7 made things a lot better.

Whites, especially southern Whites, started to enjoy a new comfort level. At my post, we had a majority of Mormons who were trying to change their image. The denomination they barred Blacks from joining their church until the mid-1970’s. The change was sincere and our military was better because of this program.

There was one personal “hiccup.” I received a call from our contact at the Pentagon. The colonel asked me to explain why a cross burning was considered a minor act on my watch. I replied that it wasn’t. He said, “I am sending this report to you and want an explanation.”

The Commanding Officer had executed his own report and sent it in as if it were from me. I asked him for an explanation since the eyes of the Pentagon were upon us. He broke clean. Someone put a 4’ cross in a Black sergeant’s yard. The military police caught the culprit. He was the child of the post’s Executive Officer, the second-highest ranking officer in command. The Commanding Officer was embarrassed, so they kept the identity of the perpetrator secret and asked the Black sergeant to be quiet about it for the sake of peace – and he did. The Pentagon accepted the final version.

This Army-wide program succeeded and the main reason is that we owned up to the problem and sat down with each other to just “get along” as Rodney King would later admonish the public.

Harry C. Alford is the co-founder, President/CEO of the National Black Chamber of Commerce®. Website:www.nationalbcc.org Email: halford@nationalbcc.org.

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Actor, Philanthropist Blair Underwood Visits Bay Area, Kicks Off Literacy Program in ‘New Oakland’ Initiative

These community activations were coordinated with the San Francisco-based non-profit program “Room to Read.” Ray said he is also donating his time to read and take pictures with students to encourage their engagement and to inspire them to read more. The inspirational book “Clifford Ray Saves the Day” highlights Clifford Ray’s true story of saving a dolphin.

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Blair Underwood (left) and Barbara Lee (right). Courtesy photo.

By Paul Cobb
New Oakland Series
Opinion Part 3

The Post mentioned three weeks ago that a number of our local luminaries were coming together to support the “New Oakland” movement. As this current national administration continues to eliminate our “legacy” institutional policies and programs left and right, most communities find themselves beyond “frozen” in fear.

Well, esteemed actor, long-time Bay Area supporter, and philanthropist Blair Underwood returned to Oakland this week to speak with city leaders, community trust agents, students, the Oakland Post, and local celebrities alike to continue his “New Oakland” initiative.

This week, he kicked off his “Guess Who’s Coming to Read” literacy program in some of Oakland’s middle schools. Clifford Ray, who played the center position of the 1975 World Champion Golden State Warriors, donated close to 1,000 books. Ray’s fellow teammate Charles “The Hopper” Dudley also gave Converse sneakers to students.

Underwood also spent quality time with the Oakland Ballers ownership group and visited the amazing Raimondi Park West Oakland community revitalization site. In the 1996 TV film Soul of the Game, Underwood played the role of the legendary first Black Major League Baseball player Jackie Robinson and commended the Ballers owners.

“This group of sports enthusiasts/ philanthropists needs to be applauded for their human capital investment and their financial capital investment,” Underwood said. “Truly putting their money and passion to work,” Underwood said.

Underwood was also inspired by mayoral candidate Barbara Lee’s open-minded invitation to bring public-private partnership opportunities to Oakland.

Underwood said he wants to “reinforce the importance of ‘collaborative activism’ among those most marginalized by non-empathic leadership. We must ‘act out’ our discomfort with passionate intentions to create healthy change.”

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Councilmembers Ramachandran, Kaplan, Unger Identify Funds to Save Oakland Fire Stations

Our budget crisis – one of the worst in Oakland’s history – is compounded by the fact that people do not feel safe coming to Oakland due to our public safety crisis. By investing in our fundamental public safety resources today, we can send a signal to the world that Oakland is open for business. We have such a rich and vibrant culture, arts, and food scene that is worth celebrating – but we can only showcase this if we are able to keep our neighborhoods safe. Having fully functioning fire stations are absolutely essential to these efforts.

Published

3 weeks ago

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Oakland Post

Councilmember Janani Ramachandran. Courtesy photo.

By Janani Ramachandran

There is no greater concern to the people of Oakland today than public safety. Fire stations are the bread and butter of essential city services – and every day that we have stations shuttered, we imperil the lives of our community members. In response to widespread outcry over the current and planned closure of stations, myself, along with Councilmembers Kaplan and Unger, have painstakingly worked to identify millions of dollars of new funding to save our stations. The legislation we introduced on Thursday, February 13th, will amend our budget to prevent the closure of four fire stations that are currently on the chopping block due to our budget crisis and will re-open two closed stations that have already been closed – Station 25 and 28 – in the near future. The resolution that will provide the funding to keep our stations open will go before the full City Council for a vote at our meeting on Tuesday, March 4^th at 3:30 PM – and we invite you to join us at City Hall to share your perspective on the topic.

With the devastating Los Angeles fire at the top of people’s minds, terrible memories of Oakland’s own wildfires are re-surfacing from the 1991 Oakland Hills Firestorm to the Keller fire just a few months ago – and how essential fire stations are to mitigating these catastrophes. But in Oakland, our fire stations don’t just fight wildfires – they also provide emergency medical services to our most vulnerable constituents, put out structural fires and encampment fires, and much more.

We recognize that there are a number of competing interests and important initiatives fighting for sparse City resources. But from my perspective, core safety services are the most pivotal functions that a City must spend its resources on – especially given the outcry we have heard around fire stations.

The fight to save our stations is not over. The resolution we introduced is a critical first step, and there are hurdles to overcome. If you support keeping our fire stations open, we invite you to be a part of the solution by making your voice heard at the March 4^th City Council meeting at 3:30 pm.

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NNPA Launches National Public Education and Selective Buying Campaign

“We are the trusted voice of Black America, and we will not be silent or nonresponsive to the rapid rise of renewed Jim Crow racist policies in corporate America,” stated NNPA Chairman Bobby R. Henry Sr. “The Black Press of America continues to remain on the frontline keeping our families and communities informed and engaged on all the issues that impact our quality of life.”

Published

3 weeks ago

February 18, 2025

Oakland Post

iStock.

Washington, DC: The National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA), representing the Black Press of America, has announced the planning and implementation of a national public education and selective buying campaign across the nation in direct response to those corporate entities that have dismantled their respective Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) commitments, programs and staffing. NNPA Chairman Emeritus Danny Bakewell Sr. explained, “Now is the time for the Black Press of America once again to emphatically speak and publish truth to power.”

At a recent convening of NNPA member publishers and editors, a united resolve was reached that each member publication of the NNPA will begin a national public education campaign coupled with the release of research data on those American companies that are engaging in efforts to sanction racial injustice, inequitable polices, divisive leadership, and economic apartheid in America.

“We note forthrightly that Black Americans spend $2 trillion dollars annually as consumers of products and services throughout the United States,” NNPA President and CEO Dr. Benjamin F. Chavis Jr. emphasized. “We now must evaluate and realign to question why we continue to spend our money with companies that do not respect us,” Chavis continued. “This now must come to an end. These contradictions will not go unchallenged by 50 million Black Americans who have struggled for centuries to ensure equality, fairness and inclusion in our nation’s democracy.”

A selective buying campaign involves exercising the right to select what we spend our money on and who we spend our money with. We are starting with targeting TARGET.

The following are some of the major American companies that have publicly retreated from Diversity, Equity and Inclusion: