FIFTY YEARS AFTER BROWN VS. BOARD OF EDUCATION

Some good articles and information about this historic day.

A Proposal to Fight Cultural Segregation

Tech Central Station
By Arnold Kling
May, 17 2004

"The growing insularity of the elites means, among other things, that political ideologies lose touch with the concerns of ordinary citizens...

Both left- and right-wing ideologies, in any case, are now so rigid that new ideas make little impression on their adherents. The faithful, having sealed themselves off from arguments and events that might call their own convictions into question, no longer attempt to engage their adversaries in debate."

-- Christopher Lasch, The Revolt of the Elites, p. 80-81

Fifty years ago this month, the Supreme Court struck a blow against segregated schools by handing down its decision in Brown vs. Board of Education. In spite of this and other achievements of the civil rights movement, there remains a disturbing tendency for Americans to segregate, particularly along cultural lines.

Pundits have coined many names for this cultural segregation. Coverage of the 2000 election gave us Red America vs. Blue America. George Lakoff would describe it as Strict-father America vs. Nurturant-parent America. Michael Barone writes of Hard America vs. Soft America, a divide that Walter Russell Mead would probably label as Jacksonian America vs. Jeffersonian America. In a political context, Democrats and Republicans are more gridlocked and mutually antagonistic than at any time in memory. (full article)


Civil rights pioneer uses pain of past to send message today

One of Little Rock Nine speaks out against silent witnesses

By Kevin Drew
CNN
Monday, May 17, 2004

Tucked away on the fourth floor of a building downtown, Elizabeth Eckford is busy tracking the daily progress of people on probation in her role as a public servant for the Pulaski County courts.

Diminutive and quiet -- especially so on this spring day because she's hoarse -- Eckford doesn't appear extraordinary or obvious as a pioneering soldier in the American civil rights movement.

But then what would such a person look like?

"We were ordinary people," Eckford says of herself and the eight other African-Americans selected to desegregate Little Rock's Central High School in the 1957-58 school year. (full article)