Reporting “Reporting Civil Rights”

It is said, frequently by journalists flattering themselves, that journalism is the first draft of history. If that is so, then the long review by William Finnegan in today’s New York Times of REPORTING CIVIL RIGHTS, a two volume collection of writing about civil rights from 1941 to 1973 in the Library of America series, should be regarded as a second draft. The draft still needs work.

The review is worth reading, I suppose, but as with so much history (whether first, second, or final draft) it reveals more of the author’s view of the present than new understanding of the past. “Many obscure and enchanting particulars are rescued from oblivion in a big collection like this,” Finnegan observes at one point. “Who remembers,” he asks, “that Charlton Heston was on the platform with Harry Belafonte at the 1963 March for Jobs and Freedom in Washington?”

Imagine that! Who’d a thought that someone who was, or at least who would become, a conservative actually stood up for civil rights? But Finnegan knows his audience (because I assume he knows himself): No doubt Times readers will in fact be surprised by this unexpected discovery. “Whatever happened to them?” I can hear them wondering. “Why didn’t they keep walking the walk?”

You can see Finnegan’s answer in his conclusion:

The civil rights movement morphed, after its heyday, into many smaller, local struggles, and then into rear-guard fights, as affirmative action came under attack and resegregation in education and housing gained momentum.

The demand for racial preference, in short, is seen as the natural progression of the civil rights movement’s demand for equal treatment. Anyone who was unable to make that radical transition (actually reversal) is thus seen as abandoning civil rights.

For people who continue to believe that character content is more important than skin color, it is the reminder that Harry Belafonte was on the platform that is the shocker.

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  1. juan andrade March 28, 2003 at 1:01 pm | | Reply

    soy yo

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