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March 23, 1973 - Op-Ed Response to Vernon Jordan
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1181442
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March 23, 1973 - Op-Ed Response to Vernon Jordan
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1973
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The original documents are located in Box 25, folder "March 23, 1973 - Op-Ed Response to
Vernon Jordan" of the Stanley Scott Papers at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library.
Copyright Notice
The copyright law of the United States (Title 17, United States Code) governs the making of
photocopies or other reproductions of copyrighted material. Bettye L. Scott donated to the
United States of America her copyrights in all of her husband's unpublished writings in National
Archives collections. Works prepared by U.S. Government employees as part of their official
duties are in the public domain. The copyrights to materials written by other individuals or
organizations are presumed to remain with them. If you think any of the information displayed
in the PDF is subject to a valid copyright claim, please contact the Gerald R. Ford Presidential
Library.
March 23, 1973
OP-ED RESPONSE TO VERNON JORDAN
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF THE NATIONAL URBAN LEAGUE
BY:
STANLEY S. SCOTT
SPECIAL ASSISTANT
TO THE PRESIDENT
THE WHITE HOUSE
RALO to a FORD IBRART
on
As youngsters growing up in Atlanta, Georgia, Vernon Jordan
and I had a first-hand look at black poverty in America and we knew
and felt the pains of racism. We also knew what it was like to not
be able to vote, and we saw gifted and talented Black people held
down to menial jobs because of their skin color.
I would have never believed that years later we might disagree
on goals for Black Americans. Nor would we have believed it only
a few years ago when we both worked for the NAACP. In fact I don't
believe it today.
I would like to think that Mr. Jordan, who is now the Executive
Director of the National Urban League, and I differ only on the way
we can reach those goals. Consequently, it comes as no surprise
that I should demur from the views Mr. Jordan recently presented
before the National Press Club in Washington.
The basic flaw of those who criticize the President's recent budget
d ecisions is a misperception of what the President has actually done,
and, in some cases, a misrepresentation of what he has said. The
common thread running through such criticism is exemplified by
Mr. Jordan's assertion that the budget "hacks away at social spending
with ruthless intensity," and that it is "designed to destroy the social
reforms of the 1960s. 11
FORD & LIBRARY RALD 30
- 2 -
The first point is completely wrong. Social spending has been
increased, not cut. What has been restrained is the level of
increase of all spending -- an action which will save the taxes of
black and white wage earners and slow down inflation which more
cruelly affects the poor.
The second point is also wrong, because it is not the social reform
of the ¹60s which is being "destroyed"; it is the misrepresentations
of the '60s which is being reformed.
For example, it is said by Mr. Jordan, and others, "How do we
explain federal withdrawal to poor black families in Bedford-Stuyvesant?"
For me, however, it is more difficult to explain to that same family
why the Urban Renewal program has evicted one million poor families
from their homes, about one-half of whom have been blacks and
Puerto Ricans. How do I explain that under the old Federal program,
for every home built, three were destroyed? How do I explain how wealthy
real estate owners and land speculators ripped off money which was
meant to assist the poor? How, indeed, can we explain to poor black
families that the rat-trap they have moved into under certain subsidized
housing programs was sold to them at a price far beyond what the
A
FORD
property was purchased for by the seller.
RALD
Frankly, I cannot accept the very popular notion among Blacks
GE
that President Nixon has retreated from assistance to the poor. The
President is spending a billion dollars more in the area of housing
and community development this year. The overall civil rights
budget has nearly quadrupled since Mr. Nixon entered the Pr esidency.
- 3 -
Aid to minority business enterprises has jumped from $200 million
to $1.2 billion. There are virtually dozens of other statistics,
equally impressive, which show that the commitment of President
Nixon has gone far beyond the commitment of any other President
in the history of the United States.
What appears to be really at issue is the direction national
policies should take. Unfortunately, we are dealing with a welfare
mentality which has survived since born in the 1960s. That old
approach -- and now, certainly, a discredited approach -- has forced
the poor and the black to be supplicants on the Federal plantation.
The old approach was to use lofty rhetoric and high-sounding names
to sweep people off their feet rather than doing the hard work which
would put them back on their feet.
What is the legacy of the Great Society and other old-line welfarism?
It is a legacy that has seen poor people in continual conflict with them-
selves over one pet project or the other. It is a legacy which has
rewarded those who have made the most noise -- usually the project
directors who have fattened themselves on Federal funds which were
intended to help the poor. And now, of course, it is the professional
poverty worker who is screaming the most about these funds being
cut. It is a legacy which was intended to promote a greater voice for
poor people while in fact it has only created a greater bureaucracy
FORD of RALD LIBRAR
of in
- 4 -
Washington. And those who continue to ask for a greater voice for
the people are the same who ask for more Federal responsibility,
the very problem which has snuffed out the power of the people.
Old-line Federal programs have been nothing more than pacification
programs. They have not stood up under the test of time. They
were programs born in haste and fear. They were programs
which were passed to put green money in wallets, but ended up
wrapping red tape around our necks. They were programs which
were often wasted, frequently mismanaged, and seldom helpful
in reducing the problems of Ame ricans.
I do not question the good intent of the old ways. Surely, they
were mistakes of the head and not of the heart. But we cannot
continue to live in the '60s in order to solve the problems of the '70s.
And we cannot continue to abide under the hot rhetoric which never
produced positive results.
The notion of returning power to people and to local governments
does not mean we return some power. It means trusting ourselves to
use the tools we have rather than the tools that Washington thinks
we ought to have. We cannot have it both ways -- ask for a return
of power and yet complain that the local government will not do the
job.
FORD & LIBRARY RALD 30
- 5 -
Which local governments do we distrust? Mr. Jordan, I would
think, did not mean Mayor Gibson of Newark, or Mayor Hatcher
of Gary, Mayor Blackwell of Highland Park, Mayor Bivens of
Inkster, or Mayor Washington in the Nation's capital, or Mayor
Evers in Mississippi, or, indeed, the hundreds upon hundreds of
newly elected Black officials who have taken office in the past year
alone.
Too often when real progress for the poor and the black has
raised its head, hopes have been dashed by myths which rise up
in America. The poverty program is not being destroyed, it is
being moved where it can be most effective. Social reform is not
stopping, it is moving more rapidly than ever before; the real
opponents of change are those who refuse to budge from the failing
programs of the past. Social spending is not getting smaller; it is
growing faster than ever. Since 1968 alone, the Defense budget has
remained about the same while Federal money to help people has doubled.
The marches, the boycotts, and the sit-ins of the 60s are dead issues
in the 70s. What is still too much alive is the thinking that the poor
black living in a Harlem tenement or a rural Georgia shack has been
helped by programs which fattened up the poverty program staff
members and kept lean and poor the people who still need our help.
RALD GE
FORD & LIBRARY
/
- 6 -
That is what Vern Jordan and I want so badly to improve.
We both know that the solutions of the 60s have not worked as promised.
I would like to think that he also shares with me the view that there
must be better ways to solve these problems which grip and destroy
so many of our people -- poor blacks, browns and whites.
FORD & LIBRARY RALD
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