City Makers; McCoy: Urban Tensions; 101

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Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. There's a beautiful campus. I know. You know. It's been easy to get lost in Iowa. You've been good to see me. You've been great to work with more. How about for some time now? Rody McCoy, you have been at the center of the decentralization of public school struggle in New York City as unit director of the Oceanale Brownsville District. Since last spring, almost not a day passed without your being involved in some form of

controversy surrounding decentralization of the schools, how do you feel now in terms of the amount of time and energy and struggle which you have had to put in in this role as the real personification of the struggle of mostly black and Puerto Rican people in New York City for community control and decentralization of their schools? Well, at this moment I have somewhat of an ambivalent feeling about it, but I think every minute has been worth it, and I basically feel that the whole country now is looking at education, something it should have done many years ago, particularly that which relates to the black and Puerto Rican community. It's unfortunate that we have to have so much conflict and controversy, but I think it's alerted the public that the black and Puerto Rican community is a committed to changing

the poor quality of education relegated to their children. So on the other hand, I feel at this moment that it may be sort of wasted effort because it appears that the establishment, all its resources, attitudes, etc., still determine that the quality of education for the children is true. The interesting thing is that you feel a sense of defeat in the struggle now that you're ready to give up in terms of bringing about effective education through decentralization and community control over our schools. No. I don't think you set a waste of your struggle. In one sense, but not a sense of defeat, no, I have a relinquish this kind of commitment to what I think the parents will relinquish the commitment, but I think in this particular district where we've been sort of the prototype, the establishment is able to bring the

bad, the kind of laws, translation laws, interpretation laws, resources that prevent getting to the basic issues that the parents were committed to. Well, they said, you are one of our outstanding students of the American society and urban and ethnic affairs. Do you think that the type of problems and conflict which, surrounded the Ocean Hill Brownsville situation were inevitable problems or do you think that's the case? That was just the question I wanted to ask and I want to say a few things about it, just indicate some of the things that have troubled me. I look back and say when the Bundy report came out a year and a half ago, you had, well, the Ford Foundation for it, Lindsey for it, the UFT, some form, not for it, not for it, but at least in words and so on, and you had the legislature for it in some form. I would say at least the man that's actually a report, a lot of education in the city

of New York. Board of Education was against it, the supervisors were against it, and the UFT, let's say, was sort of against, but I mean, if you go back a year and a half ago, possibly not, I'm not sure. And they all said that they were for it, but for different reasons. No, I think the Board of Education said it was for it, it was for it, it was for it. The old board did not say it was for it, but concretely, I wonder, why aren't there actions taken? I know the controversy, very complex and so on, where are the actions taken, which can affect, broke up and weakened the power of those people for decentralization, got to the point where the UFT was totally against it, the legislature and the strong influence from them, the UFT with its strong connections to the sort of middle class communities of New York, Jewish and other... Action on the part of the local board. Yeah, I'm thinking of, and it's not supposed to even a blame assessment, I'm sure you, you know, one can't even look at it, you know, obviously one can't look at it, I'm just...

Nathan, do you mean... Was it necessary for the Oceanale Brownsville Board to make the public demand for the transfer of those teachers at the time, which they've been... Thank you for putting it so precisely and properly, yes. Or was it necessary when those guys came back from a strike, you know, in support of those for that first group, to then say, and now you can't work here either, and there's a tradition that after the strike is over, they work. I think I understand what you're asking. Maybe the answer will sort of go in another direction, I think I suggested to you just a minute ago that each of those people who had one time or another supported some form of decentralization, which was, from my point of view, it's fraudulent, which I won't go into now, but had another, or had an ulterior motive behind what they said, now that the poor people had one commitment, one program, with no resources to do anything about it, and that was basically the educated children, or to improve the education that it children. Now...

Well, this is often lost sight of, that decentralization struggle is really still the struggle for quality education in the ghetto areas. Well, you pushed me back into talking about the fraud. I mean, that document, or as it's purported to do, is not going to educate children. It's a political piece of machinery. But what argument? Do you have a decentralization proposal, or all of them, down to the boundary one? Well, the Monday had parts in it that gave indications that it was addressing itself to education, but in certain segments, I would way have reflected the control and the vested interest, I mean, it left it moderate, which gave an interpretation that the central board could still hang on. The thing is, it's the high school, and so forth. But if you just understand what the role of the community people was, now they move to get people out who were ineffective, and we fathered the law. Now, if you stand in the order of the thought, I mean, the pleasure of saying, though, at the time, the timing of the move, in the manner of the man's name, or even its necessity in a sense. For example, I mean, just to push the matter further, at this point, I understand the hundred teachers, whoever remains from that lengthy year struggle, or half year struggle,

are back in the schools at Oceanville, Brownsville. Now, do you feel the schools at Oceanville, Brownsville, in other words, I feel it's a very critical question. Do you feel that now, that in effect, in some sense, has been a political defeat? I don't know who has been defeated, Oceanville, Brownsville, Ashanker, or what? But that complex situation, with those teachers back in there, do you feel that you still have enough powers to proceed towards leaving us, or what happens to the rest of the city? Notional, Brownsville, do you have enough powers to produce effective change in education? Absolutely not. Not? Absolutely not. Let me say it this way. We reversed the position very quickly. The returning teachers who came back in, and if you talk about defeat, was a moral defeat for the people who had made a commitment, that they were not to come back and teach their children. Now, they're back. And we're going back to that old cliché of having a body to cover classes, because that's basically what it is. In early discussion with Dr. Clark, we talked about this. And those teachers, and I don't want to lump them all together, but too many of them are

doing identically the same things that precipitated the original move. They are not teaching the children, and that's what their focus is. And this is the only thing these parents can see. This is their only concern. And the only resources that they have to do something about it is to try to take some sort of action, which obviously violates what everybody says, is the contract and the law, and so forth. Now, I want to make this point clear, there are some of those same teachers who are good teachers. We've never questioned this. As an artifact, no one spent time addressing themselves to the fact that the professional staff had actually petitioned the governing board to take back a percentage of those teachers who they had identified as being good teachers. Now, I'm saying they're back in. They're involved in the political intrigue. They're involved in such the kinds of trauma situations, calling the teacher's cabs or questioning their seniority and their ability and experience and so forth. So, as I said to you earlier, very subtly, they are still creating the kind of friction

in the community, around the very basic issue, which we were concerned about. I'm saying if they divorced their political viewpoints from what we're trying to accomplish, and they're educating the children, then you have a little different picture. Brody, could we go back a little though? As I understand the original question by Nathan Glasier, it was, in regard to the timing of the actions of the Oshnoe Bible, I would say, it was at the fore, you know, the simple fore. I think it was an expressive foreman large measure. We don't like these guys and we're getting rid of them. It wasn't true. And you see, that's one of the uncanny things of how things have come across to press, the mass media, that people hang on to, you know, understandably so. But there were many meetings held between the chapter chairman and the union representative and me regarding the teacher performance and the district opening. When we began to identify these people, we even passed this on to the chapter chairman.

As a matter of fact, one of the persons involved was the chapter chairman. And he heard this from me. It wasn't as if this came as a surprise to him. Now, let me just stretch that point to a very thin line. Some of the political machinery, some of the political platforms and so forth, that were prevalent at that time, began to have effect on morale of teachers across the district. And this naturally got back to France because they were involved. Now, at one point, we were talking about 120, 130 teachers being siphoned off this district and replaced at some subsequent time. But you can't ask a parent to put their child in a classroom where teachers overtly resents black children regardless of any contract or any law of what you had. And when we began to identify these kinds of things, we had no alternatives. Now, the thing that actually precipitated was safety of children began to be involved. Now, as you say, what was the most expedient and you say, subtle way?

It kind of got to me because this is the time I've heard, I mean, I've heard these questions before. Couldn't you have waited a while or couldn't you have used a sort of subterranean, decentralization legislation was coming up before the legislature? Yeah, but what I'm saying to you is, if you're going to exercise the law, let's do it quietly so that the people don't know that black people know the law and going to be able to function on it. Now, we just take a simple one as this. And in that city, they don't fire teachers for incompetence. Take all of the atmosphere, the negative atmosphere, it was around that project, census and census. How many teachers do you think have been fired from incompetence in the New York City? As far as we've been able to tell teachers, pretty intensive researches, they haven't fired any. None. But no teacher has ever been fired from the New York City public school system. That's the way the information, that's as much as we've been able to get. And we think it's pretty accurate. I mean, this in itself is a process, which you can readily see that community involvement

couldn't be a structure or a part of trying to read it themselves as teachers. Now, those teachers are organized. One of the things that we lost sight of, and I told you before about these communities, not having the resources, those teachers in that district were well organized. To give you a typical example, we sat in a conference similar to this. And we said, what role should the teachers to go on the board on in the community play and say, well, we think they ought to have an education advisory committee. Now, this was just a monochaptor chairman. We met the next week, and the same group with chapter chairman, were now the education advisory committee to the board. If we decided to do something in the community, every teacher in that district, who was UFT and knew about it the next day, they had a very well organized and systematic communication system. I just want to add one last dimension. It seems obvious to us that these people have been programmed. I ask you a question like this. What is your type program?

Oh, this has been part of a very deliberate plan. A very deliberate plan, yes. For example, under what conditions do you think teachers can teach? And each teacher must be careful of even looking at another teacher in a strange way. Because the observer on the premise picks up the phone, calls the board, calls the union, and says, it's a terrible situation, yes. Well, this was already when things had been bad. No, not only just now. This was true before, because this is the way that the chapter chairman walked now. You know, I was going to bring up, I was going to broaden this if I could, and you can cut me down if you don't want me to. Because, you see, when you say, for example, which is, I'm sure it's true, that practically no teachers have been fired from competence. You know, being self-conscious, I wonder, when was the last professor fired from competence? I mean, if you have tenure. It was the last policeman fired from competence. And, you know, when was the last man kicked out of the plumbers union from competence? You know, though. You're educating children. Okay. I agree. I agree.

No, but I'm not making an excuse. I'm raising the question. And it's, I think, the question in a way has to concern us, that, that, here you are. And I don't have an answer. I mean, there's just a, I don't know if you can just put on the agenda. Here you have people who, from their own perspective, teachers, policemen, skilled trade unions on, they're better off than a lot of people. You know, they're better off than a lot of poor and egos in the city. That's a no question about that. From their perspective, they're not so well-off. Now, from their perspective, this is their protection. You know, this is what the, this is a, the certainly not as well-off as professors, and not as well-off as, you know, the union administrators. You know, administrators. I'm a poor, yeah, right. That's great. I mean, the fit, and, and yet, so, and, well, I see, I have read, read an awful lot of the letters. I've been out of New York. I read them in New York times. Interesting enough, I read them a very interesting place to read them these days. The village voice. The old readers of the village voice have now become teachers. And I have seen some of the most passionate letters in the fence of the UFT and the fence of the teacher right position from all Greenwich Village people, you see.

Not so well. They're 30. And, you know, and this is, how is one going to, you know, deal with this issue, the sense of, that this is their only, if it is their sense, their only support against, uh, uh, in security. Well, gentlemen, can we back up a little on just a summary statement about the Ocean Hill Brownsville and other decentralization experiments in New York City. The fact is that these were experiments. There were three experimental districts that were funded in part by the Ford Foundation in order to test whether a local community approach to education would increase the quality of education for children in low income minority group areas. The fact that these were new would almost automatically mean that one would expect problems. Definitely. Certainly, problems from the point of view of the central board that for the first time was being asked to share some of its authority.

Problem from the point of view of a centralized UFT which didn't know what to expect from local boards. Certainly problems from the local boards who were for the first time were really being asked with minimum training to exercise certain kinds of administrative decision-making roles which previously they had been denied. So I don't suppose we could need to argue about the problems, uh, you would expect problems under such a situation, wouldn't you? I suppose so, uh, at the clock, I suppose I'd like to put it in another way. But uh, three of us are playing poker here, you see, and you see all of my cards. I don't see yours, or I don't see the key card, and I think that whole concept that was permeated here as a demonstration project was fraudulent, except that it was new. No, no, no.

I don't think so. I'm saying that the people themselves saw this as a possible way of changing education for their children. Yes. So, uh, the way that the other saw it had other kinds of meaning which weren't, which weren't obvious to the people. So on that basis you could see problems, but otherwise, uh, I'm saying if everybody was really committed to changing education as Mr. Sanger professed wrongly, then you wouldn't have had the problems, or at least to that degree because they would have been working together for common interest. Because the next New Yorker, can I suggest a kind of, uh, even slightly positive wrap up of this situation which everyone can disagree with? I think you, I think you're right. You had to expect problems with terrific, uh, with a terrific, uh, demeritious both of the key to you. Demonify, uh, tight bureaucracy. And the fisciness of black communities. Would you say problem? No. Would you anticipate conflict? I would anticipate conflict. Now, I would not say a second thing. The conflict was far greater than I, to my mind, need have happened, or then there's certainly, you know, it was quite tragic.

And I think, again, I feel that on both sides, there was a kind of, you know, shooting from the trigger, overreaction, arrest, like, this is my, my third point, and this is, but the two sides, in this case, I'll define most concretely the, uh, the community and its representatives. And I quite accept the view that it's the community, you know, it's, uh, they've been arguments, but it seems perfectly clear. That's the way the community and its representatives and the teachers and their union. And then behind them, there are other forces, admittedly. Behind the teachers and union, there's the link for the Jewish community, to the white, to the white lower middle class and middle class, and behind the, uh, the, uh, the, uh, the Oceans, Browns, the community, there's stronger links to the other black communities of the city, to the Puerto Rican, to some extent, and to other, and to reform, reform groups and so forth. But wouldn't you, would you agree, I think you might not, but that, that insuff, in the three districts that exist, there is, you know, the three experimental districts. There is a, a some reasonable measure of decentralized power, which gives the hope of change and

experiment and so on. A hope supported by, for example, by the existence of large numbers of new young teachers brought into it. That, uh, that these are not, uh, you know, failures. The real question is whether the political situation has gotten so bad that this three experimental decentralized districts remain just that and cannot be expanded into, uh, a general pattern. Zan, Zan, what are you saying is, aren't there some successes in spite of the conflicts and failures, uh, well, uh, yes, there are, I, I, I can only speak for Ocean Hill, Brownsville, but I think the question in the direction he was saying, I had to do with controls or authority, which would make these things successful. And I'm suggesting tea and answers, no, do you think that the polarizations that have occurred in the past, for example, for example, what I'm saying to you is new young teachers coming in is no measure of control. If you have vacancies, uh, and teachers, uh, to come in and fill the vacancies in large

numbers, there have to be young teachers, but that isn't your control. I mean, I am being, yeah, using control in a very extreme way, then it is, if you have a lot of vacancies to fill, you have power, you can bring in new people. Well, that's part of the system. I mean, that's nothing. Well, but so does your power. Gentlemen, what I am not too clear about, I know if I was running a department and I in one third of the locations were empty, I would feel that'd be great power to change the character of that department. But it may be that what are you saying is that he does not have the power and so far the, the power of the United Federation of Teachers and their association with the supervisors and the board of education. Well, can I make it much clear, man? I'm saying it's the system. And we recruited teams by system specific, and it's a specific hierarchy and bureaucratic processes. What I'm saying is specific. When we recruited teachers, which any normal principal would do at part of the system, even though we recruited our own teachers, which may be a little different, they had

to get approval from the board, not a difference in what you see as control is after we got them. We had to fight to keep them. I don't see this in a way of control. Really, we have skirted around one of the most disturbing and emotional of the problems which you've been elicited by the decentralization struggle in New York, namely Negro, White or Black White relations, and even more specifically, Jewish Negro relations. The UFT, in its struggle to protect the rights of its teachers, did put out some information to the effect that the Oceanale governing board and many of its supporters were really embarked on an anti-White and more specifically, an anti-Jewish campaign. They distributed thousands of pamphlets, or they weren't pamphlets, I think, a leaflet. The Union distributed thousands of leaflets, which clearly had a strong anti-Semitic component

and attributed them to the Oceanale governing board. What's your reaction to this? Well, if I can look at it objectively in a political sense, I think that's one of the kind of strategies that Shankar would have to employ in order to rally in the Shankar that there's no question. For instance, there's nothing that was ever attributed to this governing board, specifically that can be documented approved when there was any way anti-White and anti-Semitic. For example, he met the beginning, the very first principle that we selected, was everything that the system represented, was White, Jewish, and came off to still be a service list. I mean, that's so clear. That's all about faculty. There's still seven percent left. That was so widely distributed. Well, as far as I can determine, at this point, Ralph pointed one of the teachers who was very active in this whole movement, and was active in the number four, this project came into existence, had a speech or made a statement somewhere, was he associated with

the governing board? No. Had no official or no real association with the governing board, other than any other community people and people all over the city, as you just mentioned, had no contact with us at all, in that sense. And what they did was took a speech that he made, or a statement that he made long before, and put it together as being representative of the parent association of junior high school 271, and when in fact, in reality, it was a junior, it was the parent, the PTA, a parent teacher association, which he's not a member, which he has no affiliation. And if the records are correct, Mrs. Elaine Rook, who's on our board, was also the PTA president. I mean, this was one of those kinds of documents that was able to be circulated among his constituents. But it has had a great effect, particularly the Jewish community. There's enormous sensitivity in the Jewish community clearly, obviously one is not saying

anything new, it's perfectly clear, it's tremendous sensitivity of the issue of negro anti-Semitism, black anti-Semitism. In the Jewish community. You know, of course the oldest meetings, and that's in a way that's one of the questions I'd like to raise, you know, how justified is this? You know, that's maybe one of the, you know, I can think of some things myself, you know, to say about it. I just wonder, how do you react to this, you know, very great sensitivity? Well, I think that maybe even I'll shank her, would it make now, under relief from the glare of television, that might have been a mistake to have given such a wide distribution to the implicit and at times quite explicit anti-Semitism of a single individual. But the fact is that was done, and we are now confronted with the fact that there is tremendous anxiety on the part of the Jewish community, and what one of the things which disturbs me is that there's sort of a cyclic relationship between the anxiety of the Jews

about black anti-Semitism and a sort of an escalation of anti-Semitism among Negroes. It's a circular relationship with the Jewish civil rights and civil defense organizations and have an agenda. They have the power to give great publicity to this, and of course I suppose it's a, but you know, but among ordinary Jews, I have the feeling, apart from stemming out of the teacher's union issue, you know, it's an interesting thing. New York City is the only city where there is, you might say, a Jewish proletariat. Not that the teachers are proletariat. Middle class proletariat. At least, you know, in most cities, Jews, or businessmen, or professionals, they work there. There are teachers, of course, but not, but you have great, you have taxi cab drivers, you have workers, you have, you know, and so this is a kind of special situation. But the Central Labor Council of New York City is not really controlled by the Jewish

control unions. That's a skill trade, you know, it's not Jewish. Yeah, it's not the building trade, however they were very much behind the U.F.G. Let me see if I can follow your point a little bit, and I suspect that most people will disagree. And I think the reason that this anti-Semitism hung so heavily in the Jewish community was because of their conscience. Now, what I'm saying to you is, what are the predominance of Jewish teachers in the school system? Are the majority of the school teachers in New York City, Jewish? That's correct. And certainly the majority of the U.F.G. The great majority of principals and supervisors, I once did a count, but there's no question. I think the percentage is even greater than the ranks and supervisors, but go one step beyond. At a large percentage of the teachers in the ghetto area, Jewish, one has to follow the other one, if you have such an overwhelming percentage in the city, that they suddenly, they are now confronted with the failure, which they serve a majority of as the implementer.

I once heard Al Shanker, though, give an interesting explanation of this fact. He says that one of the reasons that you have a disproportionate percentage of Jewish teachers in the ghetto areas is the fact that non-Jewish teachers exercise their option to teach in middle-class white communities, more than Jewish teachers, which would certainly not reinforce. I don't believe it. And the reason I say I don't believe it, because in the non-Ghetto areas, you have your highest percentage of regular teachers, with tenure, that the higher echelons. So the reason that the Jewish teachers are in the ghettos primarily, because that's where the vacancies exist. You see? I was talking to someone this morning about the marriage system. We have a marriage system where you're supposed to take one out of the first three. There are a number of ways that principals and district superintendents can exercise little acts of centrifuges to bypass the marriage system.

They can pull a guy out, let's say number 300 on a list and just hold him. They don't declare vacancy until this guy's name comes out. Or in many instances, they just do it outright, and assume that everybody on that list is going to be appointed and nobody would challenge it. How would you know? You're all for that. You're for the substitute, you're becoming public and legal. You would want freedom for supervisors. But I don't see how that's related to the Jewish Negro confrontation in the decent. But you were referring. You may have been beginning to make an interesting point, and at a point that you think an issue of conscience. And I wonder what you meant by that, because I was intrigued by that in terms of, I mean, the anxiety among Jews concerning antisemitism among Negroes is an issue of conscience who feel... Yeah, because who's conscience? There is. In what way? Well, let me say what I'm saying again is that the tremendous failure, academic failure in the Black and Puerto Rican communities is attributable to teachers to a good measure, not all, but to a great measure.

And I say the system is equally responsible for putting them in situations, but it can't possibly teach. But I'm saying nothing has emanated from this large body of professionals, both that supervises level and the teachers level, that have improved education in each year. But this is not peculiar to New York City. No, but I'm saying each year they walk away, Scott Free, and no accountability. And suddenly the people demand accountability. Well, they can't account for it. And so the label of antisemitism gives them a belief. I think you're going further than... I don't know, but my feeling is I had contact with some New York City supervisor and teachers maybe eight, ten years ago. And I felt understood, I think, they were like and so on. And my feeling was that first of all, they were very... That they tended to be at least ten, fifteen years ago, very proud of the degree of their training and professionality, which is something I'm sure you can recall, you would agree with.

For example, one of the points was made to me, well, other places, people who teach, come from teachers' college, here we come from the City College in Brooklyn and Queens, we got a very good education. They're proud of their professionality, perhaps without reason. They said they thought they were very good. Without mercy. I mean, they didn't have a good read, I agree, they may not have been that good, they thought they were. And I don't think they probably had that little decon, because I don't think they feel they failed. You know, maybe they should. I mean, they certainly have enough evidence, I think, that they should. But they don't know if there's been a factor in there. What disturbs me is that we are talking about the failure of public education in regard to the education of black children in terms of Jewish Negro relations. Well, the fact of the matter is that this failure of public education in regard to black children cuts across the entire country in public school systems, which are not dominated by Jewish people in the professional areas. In the south where they grow, teach Negroes, you have a great failure. And according to all the test scores at any rate. So the problem of Jewish Negro relations seem to me to go beyond this question of conscience

in regard to public education failure, it involves such things as, well, the excuses that are given in New York, New York City, about, say, the Jewish landlord, or the Jewish storm merchant, you see. Now, almost in every one of those areas, you do have deficit or deficiency of service, which is tied to the person who provides the service. But I just don't see how we can. That may compound it in New York, in that sense. But again, you have to look at what the real realities are of that situation. You have all the policy makers or policy implementers in education in New York City, predominantly Jewish. That's how true and Boston, I wasn't saying, but in this particular instance, you have that situation. And then when you look at such names as housing, unemployment, the labor unions, and so forth, which are dominated by the Jewish people, the construction work of the Jewish people and

they are. And the infringes, we have one of our sensitive areas of conflict is with the police. And of course, the police are not Jewish either. In fact, one of the major crises that Mary Lindsay had in his new administration was bringing in a Jew as they talked to the policeman, which was a real Donnie Brokowski. And yet despite this, I think there is a special Negro Jewish thing here, which is not the Negro Irish or not Negro Italian, it's something special, but I think maybe it has two reasons. And I'm a little vague about both of them. But one reason is, I think both of these groups are groups with enormous sensitivity as to prejudice, oppression, ultimately genocide, in other words, the way the word genocides comes from the black communities is very striking to me. But in other words, they react fast because they've had experience and how bad things can get.

None of them have had the experience of the black people. It's facing. Well, don't underestimate me. I think you talk about the polka game, and I think it's a very good image. We didn't know what cards they were holding, but you have to think of the other side as not knowing what cards you were holding. Of course, the sensitivities, and you one has to be honest in believing in the sensitivity. Even if one can believe that they're unjustified, they're incredible. And you think of, I'd say, the feeling to the Jewish communities in this country in May June 68 over the war. In the sense, the Israeli is going to be killed, they're all going to be killed. And it's tremendous, the outpouring of money, feeling, involvement, and so on, these sensitivities are real. So it's true, it's hard to rate 300 years, again, et cetera, admittedly, but don't underestimate the feeling. Making us a former student of mine. Let's evaluate the last 10 years, go over 300 years. Just go back in the very last 10 years, you know, but just if one wants to be effective in any situation, if one wants to, you know, be effective, then one has to be aware of

the sensitivities, even if one sees them as irrational. But you only asking, if you only asking that to go one way. No, no, there, I would say it has to go both ways in fact there's no. The fact is that it does well. I would certainly insist that should go both ways. In other words, I think that I think that, you know, one of the reasons I call Jewish sensitivities irrational, and I do call them irrational, in measure is because not a way of the very good reason, you know, the accident reasons for super sensitivity and the part of blacks. Obviously, we can care this one on and on, but I'm saying to you, in one instance, that segment of the population has the resource, the power, such terms as repression, you know, and then you go back and look at it in the more social form, the ghettos and so forth, that you can put these people into a sort of framework in which you force them to operate. On the other hand, the other ones have this, or great, the amount of freedom. Let me answer the other question another way.

If you look at New York City in terms of this anti-Semitism that from the black community and see the numbers of areas where they have tremendous impact, justifiably not how they accused, and blast this across the mass media as being a problem for black people in this country, then you can obviously see it spread. Take another example. The two-clutch land was right. You had them in different places, and anybody puts on a sheet and carries on a fool's, or even coming night and you didn't identify, and you're related to the two-clutch land. So it's not unusual to see how this thing was spread. When you're going to, as I've been into other communities, black communities, who are talking about trying to change education, this question very obviously comes up because when you're talking about the union as being one of those with a foot and your throat and the board of ed and so forth and so on, they're looking at the people who are predominantly or in the control position for number of Jewish, so it's understandable. But that's, I think, the black community was spreading this kind of relationship. But that's seen from the perspective of New York City, that the critical urban problem

confrontations in New York City is, say, education, that does seem to be primarily not exclusively, but primarily a Negro Jewish confrontation. And one of the things which disturbs me is the fact that on both sides there were incredible statements which tended to escalate the polarization of Negroes and Jews, and if I were a white, prejudiced Anglo-Saxon Protestant, both anti-Negro and anti-Jewish, I would be having a wonderful time during the past year or so because the millennium, two seeming allies of the past, both with reality reacting to the fact of oppression and the possibility of oppression and have been working together on problems of justice in America and the South.

Now, when the problem moves to the North and the Negro, I can't let you go beyond that. Before I lose this, and I think my question is very simple in the terms of you put so much emphasis on anti-Semitism because of the historical background which you related here, when I would suggest to you in the American society, the emphasis should be on anti-black for its situation, but it doesn't carry the same kind of emotionalism and why? Well, maybe one reason is because we are more adapted, we've gotten used to anti-Negro feelings and one of the things which I tried to say on some panel discussions in which Nathan Blazer was a participant on some of that, maybe we should never discuss anti-Semitism among Negroes without it at the same time discussing anti-Negro feelings among Jews. Quite true, you wrote an article in 1947 in Commentary which I commissioned as your former

student on this and I think it was a very good article. I made that point as early as 1946-1947. What can I ask you a question and maybe both of you can put this in a perspective. I recall as a student in high school, maybe I had the wrong title for the book, but how the Rothschild had to do with the rise of a Jewish family and the heart of strife and he became millionaires and had influence on government politics and so forth. And I can recall as a youngster, we would view all merchants in the community as being Jewish. But you know, and relate this to such an economic area and I don't think it's... But there has to be a lot of cross discussion on this. I'm almost becoming converted into cultural education in my old age because, you know, again, how people see it is critical. That's a matter. If you look at it from the outside, there's all this business about people, look at statistics of the Negro improvement and they say, what is it, you know, but how do people see it?

Well, certainly, how do Jews see it? This is very important. For example, you know, there's no question Jews in this country are rich and powerful. No, I think that is a stereotype remind all Jews in America. I'm really speaking. I'm clear to the American state is only... Right, right. But I wanted to say something. I wanted to say something that shows how a group that is fairly... A group that is fairly well-oil and fairly well-connected. Let's put it. That's more correct. Nevertheless, can have great fears because of its history and history isn't so old. I mean, take the Jews of Germany and the Jews of Germany are also very well-oil and very well-connected and the most of them got killed. You know, so that this plays a very important role in Jewish consciousness. You know, it's not... It's only... It's only 30 years ago. It's only 30 years ago. Everybody has relatives and their relatives are arriving after the concentration camps in the 40s. You know, I have a dozen cousins who arrived in the late 40s. So if you could... To promulgate your interests and your concerns and you have ways of promulgating it and putting it into...

One into law and two. One of them has promulgating that interest too. Nathan, really, I have to come back to your statement of Jews in this country are rich and powerful. And maybe try to highlight this as maybe part of a problem. This categorization of whole groups of people, how do we get away with this kind of thing? I see. Well, we're talking terrific shorthand and tremendous dangers. And this, I think, is part of the problem in Negro-Jewish relations because one of the things that fascinate me about this is that there are many Jews who do seem to me to overreact to what seem to me to be minor in significant manifestations of antisemitism among Negroes. I quite agree with you. I feel this issue of overreaction is very important and if I were to give Jewish organizations a device a stop overreacting, do you have all these people working for you to study antisemitism

but don't jump up when a man makes a remark. Now, I can understand the sensitivity but I think the group should feel secure enough not to give it further... You gentlemen will never let me pursue this. Yes. Antisemitism among Negroes is, to me, relatively small compared to antisemitism among the general white population in America. Small quantitatively but even more important, small in terms of possible effect, Negroes could not possibly be significant dangers to the stability of Jews in America in terms of the relative power. Therefore, what I couldn't understand is why would someone as sophisticated and as intelligent as Albert Shanker blow up the sense the rantings and the ravings of a pointer into such magnitude as to get so many Jewish and Negro people exercised about this which confuse the basic

issues of education, confuse the basic issues of both groups being equally interested in trying to have a more democratic society. This leads me... Well, he's not by himself, Ken, because as I understand it this morning and I'm proficient by saying I was tacitly forced to meet with a number of rabbis during this period of antisemitism and even invited them to come out and visit the schools and so forth. Almost on a small statement they were coming they never showed but today I understand there was a demonstration in front of one of my schools by a group of contingent rabbis over a statement that a black teacher made which he characterised or they characterised the entire way and making demands. Now, I'm saying it strikes me as being unusual at this particular point that they must have heard these kinds of statements everywhere.

Why suddenly do they come into this arena, repeat with all the problems of one of which antisemitism is one and further aggravate the situation? Well, there's obviously a lot of political forces involved but I would not want to get away from... But I would not want to get away from it and I don't know if we're wearing it too much is that I would agree on the overreaction and I think the overreaction has a long history. I recall that... And it's an exciting complimentary over there. Yes, and I would recall it commentary, you know, the Jewish organizations want to start the campaign and maybe they did against vacation resorts, we said churches nearby, that was implicit. And I said, what's the nonsense? You know, why can't you say churches nearby? If it means you don't want Jews, that's the law right and Jews won't go. And yet, you know, there was this kind of, you know, to the last fragment of antisemitism has to be wiped out. I feel the last fragment of antisemitism has to be wiped out, most of the world not to be against that. So I'm not worried about the last fragment of antisemitism.

But at the same time, it has to, you know, in terms of what it has to be understood that there is the sensitivity, there is, you know, it has an important, an incredible emotional power, just as relatively small quantities of anti-negotism have enormous motivating power. For example, one of the demands to refer to the current situation here at Brandeis, I noticed in the morning's paper, is that a white student who shot a BB gun and a negro student should be expelled. Well, I don't know, maybe it was prejudice, maybe it wasn't, that's like overreaction. And I'm ice, without knowing the details, it may not be, you know, that maybe it should be expelled. I'll withdraw from that, but never strikes me as a business owner, we're going to, you know, nothing get passed. But I think that in a way we have to, we both have to let a lot of things get passed. And I would certainly give a lot of Jewish organization that advice. Let me take your cliche and say, let's go way back and talk about community control and decentralization.

Now, basically, the minority members are confined to a geographical area, of which they have no control of. And I don't want to characterize any group having control of it, in a single group having control of it, but at least the black people don't have control over their own community. And yet you can go into the other ethnic communities where they have the controls over. Now, when the black community begins to ask, he would ask for the right to, or to self-determination or for self-determination, but suddenly, and I don't call it overreaction. Suddenly, all of the political chicanery and so forth comes into being, such as antisemitism. Now, I'm saying if it was a genuine interest to make America the kind of society it's supposed to be, this kind of movement would have been facilitated in a joint effort.

We'd have just kind of what you call overreaction. You're ignoring it. I think you're ignoring a few things. One of them is that I believe you had a right to cooperation and facilitation, but there was a lot of overreaction on the other side too. You know, we're getting back to the other issue. Namely, there were those hundred teachers that wouldn't be let back in after they struck. That seemed to me like a really, that was a pretty strong action. I was up in Westchester. They dismissed the teacher for wearing mini skirts. You wouldn't want to do that, would you? No, but I'm just saying. You're telling me about preventing hundred teachers from returning. I'm saying to you where there is local control in areas that are not black, I mean, they can find things much more manually. There, I think you're making a distinction between two things. This whole notion that other people have power and black communities don't have power. They don't get true up to a point. Now, in black communities, for example, elect the representatives. They get people into... I'm going to talk about New York City.

They have people at the legislature. They have councilmen. They have substantial representation in parts of city government and so on. We don't think they have power. And they don't have power in quite a few plays. They don't have power in terms of local merchants in that area. They don't have power in terms of... They own a good deal of real estate by now. I don't know how much, but I mean, they're owning more, I hope. And I would like to see measures to get them a little more. The own more, the local stores and so on. And when it comes to the schools, if they don't have power, after all, why was decentralization so popular once in New York? Because the whites didn't have power as other schools either. How often do those white, apparent associations meet and complain and carry on? And they couldn't even get the school to admit their kids in school on a cold day with slacks, you know. Because they didn't have local control. In other words, none of them had local control. It was a board of education. It was a great central bureaucracy, which ruled it. In that sense, while I think the powerlessness has to be seen in terms of a degree rather than difference of kind. I mean, parents in the Bronx didn't have that much control.

And they didn't have that much control. You're right. That white communities did seem to have enough power to block desegregation. When the Negro community sought to increase the quality of education for their children, they were really confronted with a solid, pretty solid white community resistance to even minimum. I'm going to say they were powerless. But I'm going to say before, as I said, truthfully. And I mean, it does frighten me in another kind of way. Well, I didn't the sense it. But when you begin to describe segments of our country or community, if you get down to specific like the politicians you said, substantial representation in government, substantial, so substantial until they can't affect anything positive for the community. Be specific. Well, I mean, they don't have... We use this democratic process, correct? Yeah. And so like in Albany, we had the Black legislators up in Albany, supposedly crying and pleading for meaningful decentralization bill using the democratic process. The voices won't even hurt.

You talk about merchants. I regard... Are we union? The union, yeah. Particularly... Particularly the teacher's union. But let me go one step beyond it. You talk about owning more real estate. Yeah. We've been tricked into believing that owning real estate, which is a burden, a saddle. You're paying it back to the government in taxes. We don't own the productive real estate. You see? You talk about the stores. Owning stores in the community. The exempted that is very important. I said they don't own most of those. Yeah, but I mean, even the ones that they do own. They're saddled with having to perpetrate on to people, the higher prices and the people run to the safeways and to the... To the chain store. So I'm suggesting that when people come across as to what we do have. Yeah. I mean, a real objective analysis we don't have. Yeah, well, I agree with you what you don't have, but I think... And this is one of the reason I'm for decentralization. I think one way of increasing Black power is through sections of the city where they would have fuller control over various kinds of jobs and services and so on. Gentlemen, how do you increase Black power in that regard without concretizing racial segregation without making the walls of the ghetto really insuperable?

My honest feeling is I won't live to see it. You won't live to see what? That kind of decentralization? Black power. I mean, in a meaningful sense. Rodi, I use saying a number of really pessimistic and... I think I would. You see this, things this evening. You're saying really that you don't expect effect of decentralization of the schools of New York City, which really means that you don't expect the effect of decentralization... ...throughout the country. You don't expect that the relationship between two of America's most paciferous minorities, anyway, the Negro Black minority and the Jewish minority, will ever get a working relationship that is mutually advantageous. I know.

Now you're saying you don't expect to see effective Black power, or which is the... ...to me, and you know my bias on the Black power thing, really the ultimate of segregation on the guys that segregation offers hopes, which the struggle against segregation did not bring. But I have some very probably skewed up points of view about it. I mean, for instance, let's say right here, let's say if you two took sides, you would numerically outnumber me at what regard? I mean, just physical numbers. When you call the Jewish population a minority, if you're talking about it in relationship to numbers, that may be one thing. When you talk about it in terms of economics, then I don't think they fit in the same terminology of minorities, in the same way you want to talk about Blacks. And I don't see anybody, at least I haven't seen any indication.

And I think about the poverty programs and all of the so-called social legislation, and how it changes when it begins to address itself to a majority of Black people. And my personal feeling is that this is economics, and I don't see... I haven't seen it yet. Any way conceivable. But you're glad people don't have this power until this time, as there's a real revolution. But Rody, you are an educator, and one of the, to me, the tragedies of the endless controversies surrounding the Oceanale Brownsville thing up to the present, is the fact that you have not... given the opportunity to really function and devote most of not all of your energies to educational innovation, seeking new ways of motivating and teaching children who previously had not been adequately taught. Now, how are you going to reconcile your training and your primary concern with problems of education with a sort of... underlying pessimism, which...

I think you have to understand which direction I want to go and what my commitments are. And I say that I feel at this point I have served a useful function. That is an attempt to educate the children, not necessarily book learning, not necessarily just children. But all sorts of barriers have been put in your name. That's correct. Absolutely. And they're still being set up as impediments in various subtle forms, sophisticated forms, and so forth by the vested interest groups, and so forth. But what I'm saying to you is if I really can educate parents and children in the black communities, and this thing will catch fire and people will continue to carry on this struggle. Because I just don't believe that in the span of my life this thing is going to change. But I have some real drastic forms of revolution. Well, I... I must say that's very depressing, because, you know, I'm all for the educational change. My own political perspective suggests that if the major content of the education is going to be that nothing changes, unless the revolution comes, unless some radical redistribution of power, which I literally can't envisage, you know, just what is the redistribution that's going to be? Nathan, are you still a proponent of pluralism as the basis of American democracy?

Well, I am, which is why I don't feel... I feel more positive in the sense about black power than you do. I think this is a kind of valuable and necessary... Okay, let's hold it stage. I'm not trying to be patronized. A sample of some acquisition of power by blacks. Other than rhetoricals. What do you see this in terms of time? I'll give you some examples. I think they're very important examples. I think, for example, the fact that in most top schools, let's say, colleges around the country, you are now running to a point of about four or five percent black students. As against the only three years ago, one percent or a half percent, I think that's black power. Oh, Nathan. The plans for that have been laid since the 54 decisions. Well, I'm not saying that that's a result of black power. You're saying, give me examples where there is power. Where there is an increase of power for black...

Potential for power. I would say 5 percent or 4 percent black students. We're going up probably to 10 in the next few years. In top schools is power. It's power because if you have degrees from those schools, you have access to important jobs, you have access to greater income and so on. In other words, that's an example. In other example, I'll just give you a few. I think the fact that you have a few hundred Negro legislators around the country is power. It's true. It's the fact that the five from Brooklyn or New York couldn't swing decentralization as well, not true. Nobody swings everything. Or, you know, it's... After all, it's also not a majority. We talk about accomplishments rather than power. Now, let me just take your time. Power is power. It's not either or. Not either have it or don't have it. It can't give away everything. It can't be. It can't be. No, what I'm saying is... What I'm saying is... And it was very significant to me in which you portrayed it. The numbers of black students in the top colleges are increasing.

And then they go into better jobs, higher paying jobs. But they've been programmed, by and large, the majority have been programmed to leave the black community. Oh, I don't know that, do you? Have you been reading about the kinds of protests that black students have been making? Some of them have even been asking for black colleges within the colleges, which they're part of. Those things haven't become, shall I say, real in some instances and significant in others. There is a real question whether they should become real and significant. Whether if one is in a... Whether one wants a black college within the white college, whether it's a bright idea, you know? Well, it's obviously not a bright idea. You just need to be a sort of a regression childish wish for the past in a way. I think you have to take into consideration what students see. Well, that's why I'm talking about that. I'm going to say the students are all wise. They may be. Oh, come now.

I mean, they're human beings. Well, obviously, there is a real disagreement on this issue. Is that the generation? A sense in which blacks do participate in areas of power. And I certainly, there are huge areas they don't participate in, you know, like big business and so on. If you look at government, I think there's a substantial participation. Look at New York City government in terms of areas of control and significance. I mean, if a blacks make up what, 15% of the population, they have their share. You know, may not be 15% share, but in some ways maybe that too. Nathan, I guess one of the things that Rody has in the back of his mind, which I hope does not reinforce his pessimism, is the possibility that when it grows, do push for a greater share in policy-making position. Even when he's described as their share. They say, judgeships or commissioners. I use their for any group of new units. I guess the gentleman, you won't permit me to even get my sentence out. That they can be, and there are examples of Negroes being nominally in these positions,

but without the power that whites had when they were actually in those positions. For example, as a unit administrator in the Ocean Hill Brownsville area, maybe one of the mistakes that Rody McCory made was to believe that in this role, which was equivalent to a field superintendent, that he could exercise the powers which ordinarily are given to field superintendents who are white or Jewish. When he attempted to do this, he brought the whole white establishment down upon him. I think we're actually, in this case, we overemphasized the notion of the black administrators not allowed to do this. I think an administrator, namely that, you know, what other administrators send off letters to 12 students, teachers saying, you know, you're out. May they do it some other way? You know, these were different actions. Less professional. Are you saying that when Negroes get into positions that they previously had not been in, that there is a tendency for them to be too literalistic about the power of the people I have in them?

No, this is such a complex issue. I didn't fool myself to believe that I was going to have comparable powers. But I felt that I was nobligate. I think it would be pretty sad if it's true, then it's sad. You know, there are two possibilities. Either when Negroes get into positions of power, they tell them that I really don't have the power. Which is such a sad. Or else, it's really true when they get in, they checkmate it and don't have the power. I worked for Bob Weaver at HHFA for a year. And, you know, he was as far as I could see, he was boss. Now, it's also true that many people felt he wasn't aggressive enough ahead of HHFA and HUD and so on. That's true of many cabinet officials. You should have heard that he was saying about Celebrizy when he was head of HEW. I think Weaver was doing better than that. Does that come back to the high percentage? I just don't see the... I think, you know, we put a black man up position of power in some of them a week and some of them are strong. But I don't think that the rest of the world combines to strip them of the power of them. But gentlemen, we were talking when we were talking about Jewish Negro relations.

We all agree that there was currently hypersensitivity on both sides of that issue. Could it be that part of the predicament of minority status in America is to be hypersensitive about our status? I think that's true. I think there's another issue here. And oddly enough, it hasn't come up. It's one of the aspects of hypersensitivity is Israel. And I wonder whether, you know, when there's this peculiar business in which Jews see Negroes or some Negroes, and of course, who get an awful lot of publicity like the SNCC statement or an occasional statement, my Stokely Carmichael, in which they see blacks identified with the Arabs. And I don't know if blacks see themselves identified with the Arabs. But there is that kind of peculiar business. And I think that I think probably black nationalists do is a third world alliance itself with. That's a kind of another little gimmick, you know, in the... Because I don't know if there is any significant proportion of Negroes who identify with Arabs.

I recall Malcolm X on his first pilgrimage to Jamaica came back and was quite identified with the Arab world. And Malcolm X initially made no bones about his... And he said it was not anti-Semitism. He said that his reactions to Jews was, essentially, the Jews were white. And you remember in that report he said... The Arabs, they were non-discriminatory. That's right, they were Africans, in a way. But his second trip to... He came back, I think, a much more sophisticated man. Because he saw that these distinctions were not that easy to make, you see. Most Stinkros, as far as I can see, do not have a stand. Do not take a position on... But you just discussed what we did rather earlier about the parallelisms of the history of the Jewish people. And they're suffering and so forth and so on.

It's not unusual to find the same kind of parallelism of the conflict between the Jews and the Arabs among at least discussed positionally by the blacks. It's not a new common thing, you think? I think it's quite common. Oh, what type of Negroes tend to even be aware of the arrow... I don't think there's any line drawn to say it's certain groups. I think it's a point of discussion among numbers of groups representing cross-section of a black population. And with the tendency to identify with the Arabs... The play of the Arabs is a relationship to their own play. And if you're talking in particular, those blacks who are looking at the political and economic implications for black people all over the world. And they tend to see the Arabs as black? In some senses, the Arabs don't see themselves as blacks. I can recall that the Africans didn't see themselves black for a number of reasons. This is also true. We have a lot of Jews don't see themselves as Jews. I'm thinking of a lot of the young radicals, some of whom are teaching in the Oceanal Brownsville schools.

Why do we call them that? Are you saying that they don't see themselves as Jews because they're teaching in the Oceanal Brown school? No, no, I saw that bad. I don't see themselves as a stereotype, official sort of orient the Jew that we've been talking about. The one, you know, as all the Jewish radicals. What I mean is that they probably, they don't particularly, I don't know. But many of them would feel less strongly about Israel than their parents do. Many of them would feel less strongly about antisemitism and the less sensitive about it. But isn't it conceivable that a Jewish youngster or a young Jewish person could feel very strongly about Israel? And by virtue of how strong he feels about self-determination in Israel. Identify himself with the quest for self-determination. That's quite illegal. But I don't think a line moves that way. I think it's rather the young Jews who become more radical. Of course.

And they have a disaffiliated, well, it's a first perfectly fair description. They mean radical in the sense that they don't see the people. Is the Peace Corps radical? The Peace Corps is not radical. Well, my observation of the young whites who might see in IAS 201 and then Oceanale Brownville is that they remind me of nothing more than Peace Corps types in motivation and sometimes a high degree, a greater sentimentalism than maybe professional commitment. No, I would not limit this kind of commitment to young Jews who are radicals. Certainly not. In other words, I'm not saying that only Jews who are radicals have a kind of commitment to greater power for Negroes or the teaching and ghetto schools or to independence for the potentialized districts and so on. Many other Jews too. I was merely saying that young Jews who are radical would very often have this kind of commitment. And other Jews also. Let me see if I can read the rest of this for a minute then. Well, back to what you were talking about in terms of those small handful of blacks who weeps the certain level of accomplishment.

And you talked about weefer. See, one of the problems I see today is that unless the stamp of approval of the establishment, and I make that very broad, then the establishment doesn't recognize the black or the Puerto Rican. So if he comes out of an indigenous community group and they don't put the stamp of approval on him, then he's not a leader or he's not a spokesman or he's not something. Oh, no, he's true, white is true. We suffer in that predicament because of other reasons. But when you tell us about the accomplishments of weefer and other people like this, then you say really to the black people, I mean, these are people who the establishment picks and establishes of being powerful figures and so forth, which is in a sense to them, another kind of fraud. I mean, now you go back to the radicals who come in and this is not unusual. We've heard this regular. We have all kinds of attempts on the part of, and in this particular instance, talk about Jewish populace and destroy the credibility of somebody own institutions who lean towards or have a sympathetic ear towards the black community.

For instance, the pamphlet put out by the, what was that? And the defamation link? No, the one that was written on the truth about due process. Oh, the New York Civil Liberties Union. Right, and almost immediately their credibility was destroyed. I don't think destroyed. I'm a huster, certainly. Okay. You wrap it up in the gentleman. One of the things which I think we ought to spend a little time on is the fact that in our complex, large American cities, particularly those in the Northeast, a underlying urban problem is the problem of ethnic competition, ethnic politics, et cetera. As I see it, the movement of the civil rights struggle into the urban areas has as one of its bi-products and one of its associating factors. The fact that for the first time, Negroes and in New York City, Puerto Ricans and in Los Angeles, Mexican Americans,

are really entering into the ethnic politics, the ethnic competition, demanding shares of power and spoils which 40 or 50 years ago, other ethnic groups were fighting about among themselves. There, it was not a black white confrontation in the beginning of the century or not the 30s. It was Jews against Irish Catholics or Poles against Italians or Italians against others. Now, we've introduced into the American historical urban ethnic competition, the additional factor of race and color. Do you think this will have the same type of resolution as the past ethnic politics or will it be more associating, more disturbing, more complicated? Yeah, because we've seen evidences of it, for instance, the mayor has his mobile city hall.

And they go to the various communities and get a sounding of the communities on important issues and so forth. And where formerly the same situation exists between, let's say, Catholics and Protestants. There was a time when Jews were fighting Catholics for a stake in the educational system. Right in a community where that existed prior to, let's say, our present conflict, they now have joined the Soviets to fight the black. Because this is race now, let's say. Well, I generally, I don't know why I've come out to optimistic tonight. I mean, I can't but believe this. I can't hear it. Yeah, that this thing is not going to be settled roughly with a lot more trouble. I would agree it's going to be the conflict of much more severe, the race angle and so on. But I'll tell you why I think it's going to be settled the other way or at least it can be settled. I mean, the way it's been settled in the past. And this is a, and here, you know, as you can see, you might disagree.

The way it's been settled in the past is that people that have been pushed out have always been pushed up. When the Irish rose to take power in Boston and they kicked out the Anglo-Saxon people from politics and not from the banks, but at least from politics and from the schools, they went out to the suburbs. And they had the other place to go to. And they weren't losing that much. When the Jews moved into the public school system, it didn't mean that the Irish teachers and the German teachers were now forced to become, I don't know, ditched diggers. They moved on to other things. They didn't lose data. They didn't lose data. They just increased it. Now, my belief about the nature of the society is that if you just simply look at changes in kinds of occupation, in fact, they're much less laborers than they used to be. Much less service than they used to be. Many fewer unskilled workers than they used to be. The patterns of the society are such that it always tends to produce, not always, but at least a growing economy, tends to produce more jobs at the top than at the bottom.

This is a peculiar thing. I mean, more jobs at the middle. And so most people don't believe it, but it's kind of true. In other words, the hard, back-breaking, low-status jobs simply decline. Under those circumstances, the people that they're in competition with, they say economically, and who are going to fight, in a fight very hard, nevertheless, will be pushed up towards the top. I mean, not towards the top. We'll have other opportunities. Now, the question is, this is a very Olympian statement. Oh, they'll have other opportunities. All those 50,000 teachers don't see it quite that way now. They require a lot of a tremendous amount of statesmanship, but protection for some, acceptance of sharing, and a reduced power for many others, and so on. And do you think in this process there'll be a reduction of racism? Well, I think that I don't see a reduction for some time to come, in the sense of a racial-type feeling. But I think that this system, this process can be ruined.

People can ruin a process. People can ruin a process by such unbendingness, such hatred, such stubbornness, that the opportunities for a successful resolution can be destroyed. This, I think, is a great danger. So, Ken doesn't say that I'm continuously pessimist. Let me take a different point of view, and let's say I'm playing the devil's advocate at this point. And I'm following you pretty close. I think you have your fingers on a pulse of certain groups of people. But let me cite two examples to sort of put a... These are optimistic examples. They're not really, but to put a little, not here. When you sit with a group of people, I mean, I identify them in ethnic groups, Jewish people, who have gone up to social and economic ladder. And they say to you, 25 years ago, I lived in the Lower East Side, which was a ghetto then. You see? And we made it. And when they flew the ghetto,

who did they turn that scene and ghetto over to? The person lower on the totem part. Take another example. I sat with a group of what I think I influenced your education. We talked about this very same topic of community control, and self-determination and so forth. And the topic got around to a point where finally, I said, well, if you've got to do your thing, revolution, go ahead and do it. And there's sufficient national guard and police to repression. And the conversation escalated to the fact that there are a lot of black people, and so repression is going to be expensive. And it even escalated to a point where, if we're doing this and while we're doing this, we have to be concerned about national and international limits. And that seems to me very contradictory in a sense to what you're suggesting here, in which I would hope to be useful. I don't see the self-contradictory. I mean, I don't see the first one a self-contradictory, because the fact is, you know, if you just look at the facts and figures

and people often don't want to accept it, something similar is happening to ghettos. Less people live in Harlem, and in Bedford Stives, and then used to, or less people live in Huff and Watts. That's people are a smaller percentage of people. A smaller percentage. And actually, well, they're smaller percentage. You need to see that. Absolutely, somewhat less. But what happens in that particular picture, just like what's happening in New York in some of the other urban centers now, where these absentee landlords have perpetrated and perpetuated the ghettos, and suddenly with the influx of federal funds and new programs in housing, they let these houses go to rock bottom, which forces the black people out to some degree, and then they move in and build a tremendous... Brody, I like to ask you very specifically. Do you see this downward spiral as the future? No, now I have a note of optimism. Please.

I would say to you that once the children are youth, I educate them. That's the check. And my strongly that our future in this country rests with our youth. And that's why you are spending your energy. That's absolutely great for all of you. Because we adults can only sit and philosophy and do a number of kinds of public postures that are not really related to change. The thing that you say is, upgrading the quality of education for minority group youngsters. Totally educating these youngsters. And I think that's the checkpoint, because I think these young, as you call them, radicals and so forth, are more receptive. That generation gap is coming together. A more understanding and more receptive. And it's not so much that they have not been programmed by their backgrounds. But there's more empathy and more determination to bring these two societies together. What kind of society do you think they would create in terms of Black, White, or, you know, the in terms of different ethnic and racial groups? Sure. They would think they would create an integrated society? I've got to answer my question away. I answered Ken before. I don't know.

I have a lot of faith in them. And I believe they are wise. Do you have faith in the young people? Absolutely. Even though these young people are the products of the things that you don't have faith in. That's correct. But there are a number of people who are doing their best, people who, you know, are in yourself included, the educated mass public, which the children are receiving to benefit from. And some points. What do you see as the future, you can blazer and tell us about the cities and the ethnic problems which underlie as to the other problems of our society? I think before you answer them, let me just go in a little quick one. We've even gone so far as to find. Some of our young radical whites, Jewish, and others, long with blacks, taking over, poor housing right there in our community, renovating it, moving in. I've got a lot of faith in these youngsters. I think there is one, you know, terribly serious danger, and one that troubles me very much. And that is that the society is conceived of as being far more rigid, unchanging, racist,

and monolithic than it is. Because I have a conviction that, you know, that people, what people, society is very much what people think it is. Not entirely, obviously, but a very substantial part of its direction and future is determined by how people envision it. If they envision it in this way, they will carry out the actions that will tend to make it this way. And this is one of the things that concerns me. That's why I bank on the use. I would like them to see that there is their degrees of flexibility and opportunities for change, and so on. This is why I have a kind of an investment in seeing Ocean Hill Browns will even add present with its state, whoever they are, operate, trust these. As more successful than you suggested. Overseas. All right, so you do see if we could change our perspective as well as change the realities of our cities.

We certainly have to change realities too, but I think our ability to change them is, in part, dependent on open perspectives. And you think that that offers hope for the future? I think so. But I think he's talking about the same group that I'm talking about. Because the old people don't see it. So you're really going to light off older people too, which includes middle-class representatives? No, no. I tell you today, you can't write me off. I belong here, and I think I have something to offer if it's no more than guidance. Well, just as I didn't want Nathan to categorize all Jews as rich and powerful, I wouldn't want you to categorize all middle-aged people as unchangeable or not having much to contribute to a state of resolution and problems. Thank you very, very much. Thank you very much.

Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much.

Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much.

Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much.

Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much.