This past week-end might be considered monumental in the life of the AmericanNegro. More than one hundred conferees gathered at the Arden House Campusof Columbia University at Harriman, New York to consider the relationship ofthe new independent nations of Africa and the black community of this nation.
The great significance of the conference was not the assembling of these peoplewho constitute the major and minor facets of Negro life in America alone; ratherit was the purpose for which they met which attaches such great significance tothe Arden House Conference: The American Negro's growing awareness of hisworld citizenship is an earmark of his developing maturity!
That such animposing array of leadership representative of the broad base of the Negrocommunity should concern itself with its relevant role in taking a look atAmerica's foreign policy as it relates to the emergent nations in Africa belies thefact that the strides we have made as a minority community here at home havebrought with it a healthy break with provincialism that allows us to be concernedbeyond what happens on 125th Street in New York or Beale Street in Memphis.
The conference was jointly sponsored by organizations identified with civilrights, labor, fraternal or intergroup ties. It was formally named the AmericanNegro Leadership Conference on Africa and the mechanics were heroicallyhandled by Theodore Brown, former civil rights staffer of the AFL- CIO.
The Negro recognizes that he lives in a world community. There was a timewhen the intensity of our own problems excluded our awareness of the existenceof injustice anywhere as a threat to justice everywhere.
Colonialism and segregation are nearly synonymous; they are children in thesame family, for their common end is economic exploitation, politicaldomination and the debasing of human personality. In many ways the future ofthe emergent African nations (particularly those below the Sahara) and theAmerican Negro are intertwined. As long as segregation and discrimination existin our nation, the longer the chances of survival are for colonialism and viceversa,for the very same set of complex politico-economic forces are operative inboth instances. There seems always the choice between political expediency andthat which is morally compelling, or the choice between advantageous economicaid and military alliances versus the establishment of racial and political justice.
It is tragic that our foreign policy on Africa is so ambivalent; for example, onthe one hand, we decry in some mild manner the apartheid policy of the Unionof South Africa but economically we continue "business-as-usual" in spite of thestringent racist policies being enforced and intensified. We do not supporteconomic sanctions in the United Nations though we impose them ourselves.One of the means by which we could demonstrate sincerity of purpose is abroader use of Negro Americans in our diplomatic corps that serves theindependent and emergent nations.
In a diplomatic corps of more than a hundred ambassadors, it is regrettablethat there are only two Negroes. This represents no increase at all since the lastAdministration.
The current struggle to win the minds of men and nations to the free worldwill not be won militarily. The most significant thrust will be the launching of amoral offensive for freedom and justice. America must come to see that this isthe most powerful weapon she can use to defeat the communist attempt to winthe minds of the colored nations of the world. Unless our foreign policy towardcolonially-dominated nations in Africa is drastically changed, we will not beable to use our moral influence along with other political and economicstratagems to thwart the inevitability of a bloodbath in the sub- Sahara Africannations.
It is toward these noble ends that the focus of the Arden House Conferencewas directed. It is our hope that the American Negro Leadership Conference onAfrica can play some meaningful role in shaping American foreign policy thatwill be consistent with our own democratic posture. This can be aidedimmeasurably by decisiveness in dealing with the dilemma of race and colorprejudice here in America.
A strong functional attitude on the part of the present Administration againstracism at home will consequently evolve a strong functional attitude againstracism in our foreign policy. It is unthinkable that we can allow ourselvesknowingly or unknowingly to be a party to continued political and economicdomination of native Africans who so desperately need relief.
Copyright © Martin Luther King Jr, 1962.
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