European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - June 24, 1977, Darmstadt, Hesse Page 12 the stars and stripes Friday june 24, 1977 John p. Roche Core has degenerated How Many More the Congress of racial Equality Cor according to the recent devastating expose by Gary Thatcher in the Chris Tian science Monitor has degenerated from a civil rights movement into essentially a Racket. In fiscal 1976, for reported contributions of Over Al million and spent less than 40 cents per Dollar for minority programs. Tie other 60 cents went into fund raising and Lush Sala Ries for Roy Tennis and other top officers. This hit me hard. I think it was in 1941that i went to Chicago to help organize the then committee on racial Equality. The conditional tense is required because we of the Norman Thomas socialist persuasion set up about 10 organizations a year Aid the Southern tenant Farmers Union com Mittee youth committee to free Ehr sign and alter Etc usually in Chicago or new York and generally with the same cast of characters. In 1939-41, our key group was the youth committee against War which combined democratic socialists with a solid group of religious Paci Farmer a talented Young negro. Ese but America can a lowly pickpocket hobnob., m two Prudential aides and an attorney general James j. Kilpatrick Burger has been innovator too Justice Warren Karl Burger i observing his eighth anniversary on the supreme court he has earned a vote of thanks not for the brilliance of his opinions no such opinions come readily to mind but for another reason Burger has become the country s Foremost apostle of court Reform and such Reform is keenly number of observers have remarked the Many contrasts Between Burger and his predecessor. A Lew things could be noted in common. Karl Warren who died in 1s7-i. Looked like a chief Justice. So Dot Burger. The two will he remembered As a pair i f Obrar imm. Warren and Hurt came Down on a sum.1 Side m the inv of censorship Burger has followed whirr in i Lead in most matters of school desegregation the contrasts Are tar More evident Warren who came up through California politics was a gregarious fellow he could lumber amiably across a drawing room to Greet a columnist who had just denounced him Burger s frosty thought is to keep the press at Arm s length Warren was the in Novator he wrote from the heart. Burgers the strict constructionist the Model of judicial restraint who writes from the head instead. As he demonstrated just the other Day. Burger would walk Over grandmother to preserve the Rule that administrative remedies must be exhausted before a plaintiff gets into is in the area of court administration that the contrast is most evident. Warren tended to regard judicial administration with a Large unconcern. Burger regards i with a positive passion. Better than any leading figure in Public life. Burger has recognized what he has termed the inherently litigious nature of and he has campaigned incessantly for an efficient court system that will serve the Public deman Burger ordinarily is thought of As the stickler or rules formalities deadlines protocol. He is ill of that. Hu1 in a Little noticed spi ech last month. Burger demonstrated that he. Too in his own Field can Belij innovative As Karl Varron playing tinker toys with the sixth in new York to a National con Ference on minor disputes Burger advocated the development of a kind of bargain basement Justice for bargain basement cases the consumer with j300 in controversy for car repairs or a dispute on a defective roofing Job. Or a malfunctioning Home appliance prefers a reasonably satisfactory Resolution to the protracted Legal proceed Ings that Are characteristic of courts. 1 suggest that most people will prefer an effective commonsense tribunal of non Law yers or a mix of two non lawyers and one lawyer rather than the traditional court system to resolve his minor but irritating claim Burger is exactly right. The major prob Lem of american Justice is not the Gargan Tuan lawsuit these Lake care of themselves. The major problem lies in the inability of our system to Deal promptly and justly with the Little cases that can create festering sores and undermine Confidence in far As the Law is concerned Here is where alienation begins n the delays the frustrations the inc Rule jazz to of Legal formal sins in Ipi with problems says Burfe like people with pains want Relief and t icy w iat it As quickly and inexpensively As possible " Given a Choice Between total frustration and tolerable they will Settle for a tolerable solution it would be Gratifying to see a few state begin to Experiment actively with Burger s idea. Earl Warren will be remembered for the landmarks he raised however Jerry built a few of them May have been. Burger s contributions to the nuts and bolts Busi Ness of judicial procedure Are not nearly As dramatic but they have great meaning when it comes to making the Law work. A a Titington sur was the natural Leader for our interracial civil rights offshoot and so in 1941, Core was launched. Whether i was in Chicago la irrelevant since i was automatically a member As was my wife to be then a socialist undergraduate at Oberlin College where the big push was to get barbershops . Indeed in 1964, when the f.b.i., then engaged in a full Field Check on my subversive potential asked me to list Al organizations i had belonged to 1 simply wrote on the form from 1938 to 47, War service excluded if i did not belong to a socialist party creation it was an Accident from 1947 on the same principle applied to off shoots of americans for for several Days 1 had a live in , agent going Over my flies As i had also suggested and he emerged with a mind boggling fact he was rather intrigued did you Ever do anything in College and graduate school but go to meetings he asked. I told him about activities at Cornell in the postwar years where on monday night we would Battle a stalinist takeover in the american veterans committee tuesday night harass the stalinist dominated local of the teacher s Union wednesday night tackle them again in a nip and tuck fight for the a act chapter take thursday off and wind up the week arguing strategy in the student league for Industrial democracy Slid our social democratic base of operation people got confused on occasion. I recall one night at the a act when the stalinist whip got up and denounced Charles Bouteas a running dog of imperialism and the like. Bolte was the National chairman of the american veterans committee when pointed this out to my permanent floating opponent he said. It was a slip of the Tongue i meant Walter White head of the a act was a running i would say that 80 per cent of both the stalinist and anti stalinist caucuses were in this sort of constant motion. I met my wife in Slid Jim Farmer was then its National Secretary and she too was on the weekly circuit with the exception of the american veterans committee and Shehas been on the circuit now bless her for Over 30 years. We kept Core alive but barely. Jim Farmer handled it out of the Slid office. It had a Letterhead but like the rest of our organizations no Money. When i think of what we could have done with that j4 Mil lion at the risk of sounding retrospectively moral we would never have shot 60 cents per Dollar on overhead we might have raised Jim s salary to $200 a month but would have targeted our intake on civil rights. Most people probably Don t realize in the Light of events Over the last 15 years Thil Young radicals of my generation ran puritanical capitalism Means some for example rejected marriage As a Bourgeois relic but live together on a completely monogamous basis. To go bed hopping would be to betray a Comrade the ultimate disgrace. In Candor this still makes sense what really triggered this autobiographical diversion was not just sadness about the degeneration of Core but the extent to which Many organizations that on Elui i grass or Asphalt roots constituencies and programs have become mail order houses. Instead of organizing a group from the Philadelphia american civil liberties Union Branch to desegregate swimming pools Las we did in the Early 1950s, you Send a Check and forget it like Core i suspect a number of these political mail order outfits Liberal conservative or whatever have made staff salaries and Perks a higher priority than their ostensible Mission. It s Worth further investigation. To opinion e Prem a the columns in Cotom tilt my to a of in ulna is no in now to b. Consi oium
