Negro Digest - Freedom Archives

me to exclaim unconsciously aloud
as soon as I had read it . 1 was
aware that if you write a book
called Tan Ghetto people will think
you moderate ; Dark Chetto, a militant
; and Black Ghetto, a flaming
radical . Hence it did not surprise
me a few paragraphs later when I
read that Clark had denounced our
movement as "psychotic" while
commending the ways of Nabrit .
In September, Nabrit was to announce
that he had never written
a letter of resignation and would
not, indeed, that he might defy the
mandatory rule and stay on several
years . Then, the day after the first
fight of my current boxing comeback
in December, in which 1 won
by a knockout in 2 minutes and 22
seconds of the first round, Nabrit
announced in the press for the second
time that he would not retire .
We went to court in August-I
belatedly and reluctantly, for I felt
that that would turn the matter over
to the mercy of the Great White
Courts which might rule on a legal
technicality rather than on pure
justice . Also, Howard students and
teachers, should any still care or
remember by September, would
tend to accept the court's decision
as infallible or, equally as bad,
await it passively . Our lawyers assured
us that the case would be
over by September and I felt I had
to go along because other faculty
members thought that my staying
out would hurt their case . The
judge who handled it, an octogenarian,
had a reputation for con-
7 2
servatism as well as for making the
wrong decision in the opinion of the
Courts of Appeals (where the case
is now) . We did not, therefore, expect
a favorable decision, and time
and again during the courtroom
proceedings the biased and illogical
comments of the elderly judge
brought down the courtroom in
laughter .
1 discovered, meanwhile, that
the members of the Black Power
Committee had been imprisoned in
a summer "riot-prevention" roundup
of black militants, in this case
for "conspiring to incite a riot ." As
bail money could not be raised for
them at the time, they could not
return to Howard . This left me
standing on the battlefield with no
forces ; and so I worked along with
other student leaders who planned
a boycott for September . I also remembered
all the help local black
leaders-not to mention Howard
students and professors-unsolicited
by me-had promised throughout
the preceding year, and I
planned at last to solicit their aid .
However, student leaders were
strongly against "outside" forces .
Then, just before school started,
the students were reinstated,
though most o± them went elsewhere,
generally to better schools .
One of them is said to have told
the other students to work on forming
a "student judiciary committee"
instead of risking protest . I
personally heard a dismissed professor
discourage rebellion before
he left for another college . Student
March 1968 NEGRO DIGEST