Chapter 7 THE MAJORITY MINORITY:
Switching the Issue
The day before the Delta High School students armed themselves and prepared for war, I talked with the principal.
"Everything is great, Marc," he informed me over the telephone. "Nothing is wrong."
Here was one man, about to be shaken by a violent crisis, yet completely unaware of his own contribulion to the events that led up to that crisis.
The black students at Delta, a minority of 200 out of 2,000 students, had spent over six months negotiating with the administration. Their demand for the integration of black history into the curriculum was in line with a recent mandate of the State Department of Education.
The students had gone through proper channels. The administration had agreed to take action. But after months of fruitless waiting, the black students concluded that the principal and the faculty would not take action unless compelled to do so.
The Black Student Union, therefore, organized a boycott of social studies classes in order to dramatize their grievances and thus speed up the process of implementing the curriculum changes. They were joined by a group of radical white students, the United Students for Action (USA).
These developments were closely watched in the community that surrounded the school. Comprised mainly of working-class whites whose families had resided in the area for many generations, the community was as suspicious of the antiwar white radicals as it was of the blacks. Both troublemaking groups, it was assumed, were incited to violence by outside agitators. And who, wondered some parents, gave students of any color the right to demand anything or to say what or how they should be taught?
On the Thursday before the start of the Christmas vacation, the black students were in the auditorium conducting their boycott. Amid shouts of "It's our auditorium" and "We don't want black history," many white students entered the auditorium and scuffled briefly with the boycotters, who soon left and regrouped in the cafeteria.
At this point, I received an emergency call to meet with the black students. They had lost all faith in the school administration's ability to deal with inhouse problems.
The administration itself was prepared to let outsiders intervene. The principal had asked police to stand by at the school's front door.
Meanwhile, the white students were meeting in the auditorium. Rumors of fights and of white students' being attacked swept the school, adding to the hysteria. When a rumor that a white student had been seriously hurt reached the auditorium, a white student leader shouted, "Let's go down there and get them."
By the time I reached the school, the white students were coming down the hail heading for the lunchroom. The district superintendent was there, blocking the door. I asked him to lead the students back to the auditorium and talk with them. I would talk with the black students.
The boycotters expected I would be carrying in the principal's line: "You all be nice boys and girls and go back to class." Instead, I asked them to give me their list of demands. I read the list and said: "You know what, brothers and sisters? There's nothing wrong with any of these demands. They are legitimate. You don't have one thing on this list that wasn't operating at Gratz High School two years ago. The question is, How do we get them done?"
The students almost fell off their chairs. They never expected that anyone would agree with them or show any intention of helping them. If they had learned anything from dealing with administrators, it was to expect little in the way of understanding or help. I explained to them that until this point, they
had conducted themselves in a way that properly dramatized their legitimate concerns. But their program was in imminent danger. They could be their own enemy.
If they now picked up sticks and charged out to meet the white students, no one would ever again talk about the need for black history and why it would be useful for both black and white students and faculty members at Delta. No. What would be discussed would be the Delta High School race riot and police brutality. Still, some of the young men in the room were unconvinced. Nonviolence didn't interest them at this point. They were ready to go out and accept the challenge to fight.
I reminded the students of November 17, the famous (or infamous) day when black students massed at the Board of Education building and publicly demanded black studies in the curriculum. On that day, provoked or not, the police had moved in. Most people recall the incident as a riot either a police riot or a student riot. Few remember the issues of black studies.
"Don't let the game get switched," I said. "It's getting ready to be switched right now and you people will be largely responsible. This isn't a black and white issue, you know. I'm looking around this room and I see white folks standing here with you, making demands with you for black history, making demands with you for quality education.
"Some of you think you can justify a fight because you think it wasn't you who provoked it. But later on, no one will care who really started it. If you get some sticks and go out there to meet with those outside, the whole thing will become a black-white issue. These legitimate demands will be forgotten."
The students listened.
"Your principal has worked it out with the police to send the white students out of the building. Let's get our strategy together and move ourselves out of here. Now you know we are in hostile territory. What is the best way to get out of here?"
"Mr. Foster," said one young man, "if we go out this door, we can get right to the bus stop."
"Okay," I said, "are we agreed? If anybody calls you a name, what are you going to do?"
"Nothing!"
"If anybody throws something at you, what are you going to do?"
"Nothing!"
Fine. We were set to go, determined that the game would not be switched. We gathered together and walked out of the school and down the street to the buses. I got into a police car to ride along to make sure no one got jumped and no one did anything stupid. Would the students really remain nonviolent?
To reach one of the buses, a number of the black students had to walk several blocks through the town. It was obvious that many merchants felt threatened by the large group of blacks walking by. But the students moved along peacefully. As they neared the bus stop, a host of white students appeared, armed with sticks, tire irons, chains, and bricks. Because someone had put in an "assist officer call," which meant that an officer was under attack, red police cars were zooming in from all directions. They encircled the black students who now were standing on the corner, waiting for the bus.
The black students were getting upset and excited. The police had put one student into the paddy wagon. It was important to calm the youngsters so that there would be no excuse for the policemen to get any "head time" in with nightsticks.
"The policemen are here for your protection," I explained to the students. "No need to panic. Nobody is going to get hit. I'm here to see that nobody gets hit. What you have to do is what the man asks you to do stay together in this section and don't move.
Some of the young men were skeptical. "Why are they here with us? We don't have any sticks. Why aren't they up there with them?" They pointed up the street to the assembled white youths, about fifty strong, armed with sticks and chains. I went over to some policemen and suggested they scatter the students who were massed on top of the hill. "You know, that looks threatening to me with those boys up there with chains and bricks.".
This helped calm the youngsters down. But they were still upset about the boy in the paddy wagon. "What about our brother in there?" they asked. Fortunately, the policemen understood the situation and agreed to release him into my custody. By now, some of the police were up the street dealing with the white youths. A bus finally came, and the black youths boarded it.
I still had the faculty to talk with. The officer I was riding with headed back toward the high school. On the way he said, "Look back there on the floor." I turned to see a whole arsenal of stuff he had managed to take from the youths up on the hill.
Back inside Delta, many members of the faculty didn't see the legitimacy of the demand for black history. They weren't sure that the black students' demands made any sense. In fact, some of them were convinced that the black students were simply troublemakers.
"We didn't always have this kind of trouble," said someone, meaning that things were calmer and simpler when the black students were "satisfied." Then, too, some of the teachers were fondly reflecting on the days when there were only a couple of black students at Delta.
We discussed the whole rationale for teaching about minorities: it was as important for whites as for blacks to know about black history. Take a white fellow who comes up in a white community hardly ever coming into contact with black people. On his job, he may be thrown in with blacks whom he has to view as "being different" but about whom he knows precious little. He doesn't even know enough to begin to build a relationship.
"One can make the same point," I said, "for white teachers who are assigned to teach black children. Don't you think it's difficult to teach children whose backgrounds and styles of life you are ignorant of? Isn't it better to have a sense of their past, and to understand reasons for basic behavior patterns which may differ from your own?" Most of the teachers responded to what had been said. They agreed to have a follow-up meeting during the Christmas vacation. They were willing to deal with substantive issues, not just with how to keep things cool.
Fortunately this conflict had broken out the day before the Christmas holidays were to begin. There was time to deal with false rumors, and to bring administrators, intergroup specialists, community leaders, and students together.
There were four separate student groups. The all-white Concerned Citizens of Delta saw itself as the opposition to the Black Student Union. There were heavy racial overtones to this group. The mostly white Student Association, a traditional student organization, wanted to work within the established context. There was the white radical group, United Students for Action. And, of course, the Black Student Union. Members from the Intergroup Office met with each group. I personally met with the Concerned Citizens and heard their demands. First, they wanted Italian history.
"Italian history?" I asked in amazement. "You mean to say that you aren't getting any Italian history? You studied the Renaissance and didn't study Italian history? Well, I'm going to look into that."
And then they said, "We want German history."
"German history? You studied European history but didn't get German history? We'll look into this too. This certainly is a legitimate demand." I could just see these students marching around the school, carrying their placards: "We Want White History."
Their posture was one to be expected. It often happens that when a minority group gets itself together and makes demandsand when any of these demands are met or at least attended to, then the majority group members begin to react with traditional minority group behavior. "How come they get all the breaks?" white workers will say when there is a push to open up union ranks to blacks or MexicanAmericans. "Our schools get nothing while ghetto schools get all the new fancy equipment!" shout teachers in the well-to-do sections.
I wasn't surprised when the Concerned Citizens made their demands. There was no need to reject or ridicule statements that pointedly showed how these students felt. The thing to do was to bring together all these groups. The parents had meetings; the home and school group had meetings; the teachers had meetings. There was plenty of time to get concerns out in the open where they belonged. By the time the students returned from their vacation, the crisis was defused. Looking back, we knew that if there had been no vacation, we would have had to use more urgent measures. Valuable energy would have had to be spent making sure the confrontation didn't explode into violence. As it was, we were able to follow a more positive course from the time we were called into the problem.
Someone asked me later on if such close calls were necessary to get things moving. He wondered whether we have to approach bloodshed before people will start doing what they should. Many people in our culture, having asked the same question, have answered for themselves: yes, violence is a requisite for change.
But, I don't believe it. As I see it, when there has to be violence to get something done, then we know that the democratic process is failing us. The model that is most useful in repairing our institutions is not violence and chaos, but rather nonviolent confrontation, then consultation (or mutual listening), then compromise, and then payoff.
What I say to young people is that they should exhaust all channels before opting for confrontation. With confrontation, you rouse your opposition to the utmost and run the risk of losing hold of your goals of having issues switched on you. You have to be sure you know what you want and how much you want it. Too often, those who initiate confrontation tactics discover that they are more interested in violence than in the cause they thought they were championing. But they generally make this discovery too late.
Sometimes, it does come down to confrontation.
In order to promote the cause of blacks, it was necessary for black men to boycott buses. It was necessary to sit at lunch counters even if it led to being physically abused. Before the sit-ins took place in the South, people were saying that it didn't happen in America. But attitudes changed after the mirror was held up to society so that it could see itself.
This type of confrontation is often necessary and often successful. It was necessary at Delta High School because the students had exhausted the other appropriate channels. Yet everything was nearly lost because the young boycotters nearly let their cause get switched to violence. It was necessary, therefore, for outsiders of goodwill to intervene and take the responsibility.
Perhaps more forthright action on the adults' part could have helped all the students grow and learn from their differences without provoking the dangerous situation that brought the school and the neighborhood to the brink of racial conflict.
