EXCLUSIVE
PROPOSED 1898
HISTORIC MARKER
LANGUAGE RELEASED
By Cash Michaels
staff writer
Nothing
becomes official until the NC Highway Historical Marker Advisory Committee
meets on May 22nd to formally review, and ultimately if it sees fit,
approve it, but as of now, the proposed 1898 historical marker planned for
Market Street between Fourth and Fifth streets later this year, has new
language.
And
that new language eliminates the previous guesswork of exactly how many
African-Americans were killed on Nov. 10, 1898 – the day the Wilmington race
massacre began.
Titled
“WILMINGTON COUP,” the new proposed language for the approved historical marker
reads:
Armed white mob met, Nov. 10, 1898, at
armory here, marched 6 blocks and burned office of daily Record, black-owned
newspaper. Violence left untold numbers of African Americans dead. Led to
overthrow of city government & installation of coup leader as mayor. Was
part of a statewide political campaign based on calls for white supremacy and
the exploitation of racial tensions.
The
initial language of the marker that caused considerable controversy
inaccurately stated that “Violence left up to 60 black dead…,” but research by
the 1898 Wilmington Race Riot Commission in 2006 determined that the true
number of black killed during the massacre on that first day, let alone
ultimately during the entire racial siege of Wilmington by white supremacists,
was “unknown,” and may never be known.
The
new draft language also leaves off the name of Alex Manley, the publisher of
the Daily Record (primarily because there already is a marker with his name at
the spot on Seventh Street where the
Daily Record was burned down). The new proposed marker language also
deletes the name of Alfred Moore Waddell, the coup leader who was ultimately
installed as mayor after the violent takeover.
The
term “race riot” is also removed from the previous language.
In
an recent exclusive interview with The
Wilmington Journal, Michael Hill, Research Supervisor at the NC Office of
Archives and History, a division of the NC Dept. of Natural and Cultural
Resources, confirmed that staff at the NC Highway Historical Program determined
that some the proposed language of the planned 1898 marker needed to be changed
before it is unveiled.
“We
wish to seek input from the local community. We’ve received several emails,
including from the local NAACP, and probably about a half dozen others,” Mr.
Hill told The Journal.
Ansley
Wegner, the administrator of the NC Highway Historical marker Program,
developed several new drafts, based of community input.
“The
next stage will be to share the new drafts with all interested local parties,”
Hill continued, including Rend Smith of the nonprofit group, Working
Narratives, which made the original application for the 1898 marker, and
Deborah Dicks Maxwell, president of the NHC NAACP.
The
New Hanover African-American Heritage commission will also be included.
Smith,
as the applicant, will then have the right of first appeal to the marker advisory
committee when they meet on May 22nd.
Editor’s
note – Those wishing to write the NC Highway Historical Marker Program to
express your thoughts about the proposed inscription on the 1898 race massacre
marker, should address your correspondence to : 4610 Mail Service Center,
Raleigh, NC 27699-4610, attention Ansley Wegner, administrator., or email Ms.
Wegner at ansley.wegner@ncdcr.gov
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WILL US SUPREME COURT
STAY
LEGISLATIVE MAPS
RULING TOO?
By Cash Michaels
Contributing writer
A
federal three-judge panel has ruled that the NC legislative redistricting maps
produced by its special master will be used for the upcoming 2018 midterm
elections – the candidate filing period for which is scheduled to begin on Feb.
12th unless officially delayed.
And
that delay very well may happen. Republican legislative leaders have vowed to,
once again, appeal yet another negative redistricting ruling they don’t like to
the US Supreme Court.
“It is a
shocking move for one of the same judges just reigned in by a bipartisan U.S.
Supreme Court less than 24 hours ago to again attempt to create chaos and
confusion in an election process set to begin in just three weeks,” wrote Rep.
David Lewis [R-Harnett] and Sen. Ralph Hise [ R-Mitchell], co-chairs of the
joint Redistrict Committee, referring to US Fourth Circuit Court Judge James Wynn, who served on both
separate three-judge panels that ruled against Republican NC redistricting
plans for both congressional and legislative districts.
It
was just two weeks ago that Judge Wynn, an Obama appointee, led two other
District Court judges in ruling that the NC Legislature’s partisan
congressional redistricting was unconstitutional, and ordered that they be
immediately redrawn. State Republican petitioned the US Supreme Court to stay
that order, which it did last week, pending review.
NC
Republicans are hoping the US High Court will also stay the legislative map
order.
“It
is now up to #SCOTUS to preserve the role of State Legislatures under our
Constitutional System,” tweeted Dallas Woodhouse, executive director of the NC
Republican Party.
Some
legal analysts say while SCOTUS stayed the NC congressional redistricting
ruling because the question of partisan gerrymandering is one yet to be decided
by the US Supreme Court (a case involving Wisconsin was heard late last year,
an a similar case in Maryland has yet to be heard), North Carolina’s
legislative redistricting case was already proven to involve racial
gerrymandering, which the High Court had already declared unconstitutional, and
sent back to the three-judge panel to remedy after concurring.
Part
of that remedy was ultimately ordering the special master redrawing on new
legislative maps because the judicial panel determined that 9 of the 28
districts redrawn were still legally problematic.
Republicans
are arguing the state legislature should have been given the opportunity to fix
those nine districts, not the special master. The GOP adds that the court had
no right appointing the special master to do their job.
In
it’s 92-page order, the three-judge panel, this time led by federal District
Court Judge Catherine Eagles, firmly disagreed.
“The
[US] Supreme court long has held that when a federal court concludes that a
state districting plan violates the [US] Constitution, the appropriate state
redistricting body should have the first opportunity to enact a plan remedying
the constitutional violation. But after finding unconstitutional race-based
discrimination – as this Court did here – a district court also has a “duty” to
ensure that any remedy “so far as
possible eliminate(s) the discriminatory effects of the past as well as bar(s)
like discrimination in the future.”
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DR. TALBERT O. SHAW, FORMER
SHAW U PRESIDENT, DIES AT 89
By Cash Michaels
Contributing writer
He will forever be known as “the man who saved Shaw University.”
Dr. Talbert Oscall Shaw, the 12th president of Shaw University, died last week in Boca Raton, Florida. He was 89.
Dr. Shaw served a president for 15 crucial years in the school’s history – from 1987 to 2002. During that time, he literally save “the oldest historically black university in the South” from closing due to fraud and fiscal mismanagement; dramatically increased the endowment; doubled the enrollment; renovated various buildings on campus; and constructed the Talbert O. Shaw Living Learning Center.
Per the curriculum, Dr. Shaw, an ordained minister in his native Jamaica prior to coming to the United States in the late 1950’s, implemented an Ethics and Values course that was hailed as trailblazing.
In a Dec. 2002 interview with the Black Press shortly before he retired, Dr. Shaw, then 74, said he never dreamed of becoming the president of a distinguished HBCU. He had earned his M.A. and Ph. D. in Ethics from the University of Chicago, going on to become the interim Dean of Howard University Divinity School, and tenured Dean of Arts and Sciences at Morgan State University (where he said he was “quite comfortable”) when he was approached in the late 1980s by a member of the Shaw University Search Committee.
Shaw said “no” at first, but later relented. However, he had no idea just how large the challenge would be, given the dire financial condition the school was in.
“Yes, Shaw was in dire need when I got here,” the then outgoing president confirmed. “Dangling on the [edge] of extinction. But I came with a vision and courage.”
The IRS had filed two liens against the school because of $750,000 owed in unpaid withholding taxes, interest and penalties. There was no endowment. Employees weren’t being paid. Over $1.2 million in federal loans were in default, and the university was drowning in over $5 million of red ink.
Slowly but surely, under Dr. Shaw’s leadership, faculty, staff and students embraced his school credo, “ Strides to Excellence. Why Not The Best?,” and it wasn’t long before the university was on solid footing again. Funding was raised, debts paid off or restructured, and the business community began investing.
Even the major white newspaper in Raleigh, The News and Observer, which had been publishing stories on why Shaw University needed to be closed, switched gears after Dr. Shaw confronted publisher Frank Daniels Jr., who then gave the school a $100,000 donation.
Shaw alumni from all over the state and nation reacted to the news of Dr. Shaw’s death with sadness, but also with pride that they attended the school during his tenure.
“He planted the seed of becoming a college president in me when I was 19 years-old,” says former Shaw University President Tashni-Ann Dubroy.
“He is someone I respected, loved, cherished and endeared, she continued. “Rest in peace, Uncle Talley. The Shaw family was blessed to have you as our president.”
“This institution has a purpose,” Dr. Shaw said before stepping down in 2003. “It is deeply rooted in the Christian faith.”
There will be a public viewing from 6 to 8 p.m. at The Gardens of Boca Raton in Boca Raton, Fl. for President Emeritus Talbert O. Shaw on Saturday. The funeral service will be held Sunday at 12 noon at the Deerfield Beach SDA Church in Deerfield Beach, Fl.
-30-
STATE NEWS BRIEFS FOR
1-25-18
STATE PRISON SYSTEM
PUTS “INCARCERATION” BOOK BACK ON SHELF
[RALEIGH]
Faced with a possible lawsuit from the NC American Civil Liberties Union, The
NC prison system has decided to unban a controversial book it had previously
removed from its library shelves. “The New Jim crow: Mass Incarceration in the
Age of Colorblindness” by Michelle Alexander was the book prison inmates were
not allowed to read. But a terse letter from the NCACLU to prison officials made
it clear that it had no legal grounds for banning the book, and to continue to
do so would be unconstitutional. NC State Director of Prisons Kenneth Lassiter
says he will now review the system’s list of “disapproved publications” to
determine what other titles can be unbanned, and placed back on prison library
shelves.
REV. WYATT TEE
WALKER, MLK ADVISOR, DIES AT 89
[CHESTER,
VA] Rev. Wyatt Tee Walker, a close advisor to civil rights leader Dr. Martin
Luther King, Jr., died Tuesday morning at an assisted living facility in
Chester. Family members say Dr. Walker had been in failing health for several
years. Under King, Dr. Walker served as executive director of the Southern
Christian Leadership Conference, the organization Dr. King founded. Prior to
leading the SCLC, Rev. Walker was a well-known civil rights leader in Virginia.
Rev. Walker is also credited with assisting Dr. King with his historic, “Letter
from Birmingham Jail.”
RUSSIAN SPY SHIP SEEN
100 MILES OFF COAST OF WILMINGTON
[WILMINGTON]
What was the Viktor Leonov, a Russian spy ship, doing 100 miles off the coast
of Wilmington Monday? US military officials would like to know. They ordered
the USS Cole and other naval vessels to track the Leonov. CNN reports that the
Leonov had been traveling up the eastern seaboard near US naval installations
at Cape Canaveral, Kings Bay, New London and Norfolk.
-30-
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