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Eugene Callender address on evangelization in Harlem, 1960s.
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- speaker[Internal dating places this in 1967] We are very pleased and proud to be able to present. Dr Eugene Callender.
- speakerThank you very much Dr Peters. I speak out of the context of
- speakera ministry in central Harlem, which is perhaps the most famous ghetto in the
- speakercountry. Central Harlem is located on a small
- speakerportion of the island of Manhattan, one of the boroughs that make up New York City.
- speakerIt lies between one hundred tenth Street in one hundred fifty fifth Street, which is not quite two
- speakermiles long and Morningside Avenue and Fifth Avenue which
- speakeris less than a mile long. In that small piece of geography
- speakerwe have over a quarter of a million people living.
- speakerHarlem is a black ghetto. It is ninety nine and forty four
- speakerone hundred percent pure black.
- speakerTo be exact it is actually ninety six point four Negro.
- speakerThree percent. Puerto Rican and seven tenths of a percent others.
- speakerHarlem is a black ghetto that was created and perpetuated not only by successive
- speakermigrations of negroes and West Indians from the south and the Caribbean,
- speakerbut it has remained a ghetto because of the ignorance,
- speakerfear, prejudice, superstition and
- speakerbenevolence of New York's white majority.
- speakerHarlem is the servant quarters of the great
- speakerestate known as New York City.
- speakerIt is the restrictive patterns of white
- speakerreal estate brokers that is responsible for
- speakerthousands of Harlem residents to be squeezed into the vermin-ridden cold
- speakerwater flats that are too prominent in our
- speakercommunity. Harlem ranks number one
- speakerin all of the indices of social pathology that
- speakerdetermine the stability and strength and health of New York City,
- speakerexcept in one area. Harlem ranks number one in infant
- speakermortality, alcoholism, juvenile delinquency,
- speakernarcotics, venereal disease and aid to dependent children.
- speakerThe only statistic that Harlem can boast about with any
- speakerkind of pride is the fact that it has the lowest suicide
- speakerrate in New York City. And I think there's a good reason for that.
- speakerYou see we in Harlem are used to misery and deprivation
- speakerand trouble. And so when things hit us hard, it's not
- speakera new experience and we don't head for the George Washington Bridge. It's just part of our daily existence.
- speakerSixty five percent of all the residents in Harlem
- speakerare on public assistance. According to the nineteen sixty
- speakercensus track, the median income of Central Harlem is twenty
- speakernine hundred dollars a year.
- speakerFifty one percent of all the children under eighteen years old in central Harlem and
- speakerthere are some seventy thousand of them. Fifty-one percent of
- speakerall of those youngsters live with only one parent.
- speakerSeventy percent of all the housing in central Harlem was
- speakerdeclared ten years ago as sub standard.
- speakerAnd only ten percent of all of Harlem's housing, housing,
- speakerhas been built since nineteen twenty nine.
- speakerEighty percent of all the youngsters who went to school in central Harlem are
- speakerthree, from one to three years behind in the mathematical and reading
- speakerachievement by the time they reach the sixth grade.
- speakerAnd fifty five percent of all the youngsters who went to high school in
- speakercentral Harlem drop out by their third
- speakeryear. Every time I repeat these statistics,
- speakerthey make me exceedingly angry. And after listening to the
- speakertremendous speech by Dr Williams. I'm afraid that it might not
- speakerbe quite appropriate to be angry this morning, but I have neither his goodness not his scholarship
- speakeror his saintliness, so I'm afraid that I shall sound at
- speakertimes this morning like an angry man. But if I do
- speakerit will be in the spirit of him who drove the money changers from the temple.
- speakerIt will be my indulgence in the old fashioned and now apparently outmoded
- speakervirtue of moral indignation. But it will come
- speakerfrom a heart that tries to be with him who, when pinioned on
- speakerthe cross, cried, "Father forgive them. For they know not
- speakerwhat they do." It is highly popular today
- speakerto sound off about juvenile delinquency. And everybody is talking
- speakerabout the long hot summers of the ghettos.
- speakerAnd all of us have been concerned about riots and the criminal actions of young people
- speakerfrom our urban ghettos. Most of them Negroes and some
- speakerof them with Spanish names. Some commentators
- speakerhave described these youngsters as wild animals.
- speakerAnd indeed, no one wants to condone lawlessness or criminal activity.
- speakerAnd perhaps some of these so-called "wild animals" certainly must be
- speakercaged. But I went out recently to visit
- speakerthe real wild animals in our city in one of our zoos.
- speakerAnd I noticed that most of the large cages are occupied by only one
- speakeror two lions or tigers or hyenas.
- speakerAnd that their cages open up on patios where they can romp or
- speakersleep in the sun and fresh air. At feeding time
- speakerthese animals were served well with carefully selected
- speakerviands. If their stomachs or teeth ache,
- speakerwe supply professional care of a high order.
- speakerAnd then I walked again through the streets of Harlem
- speakerand was reminded of the five and six and seven and in some
- speakerplaces as many as eleven adults and children caged up in
- speakerone room with something called a toilet serving four, eight,
- speakersix and more families on a floor. And I asked the
- speakerquestion who is treating whom like wild
- speakeranimals? Who is making whom wild?
- speakerWhile we apply the nightstick in the polite concentration camp to ghetto
- speakerescapees, who is cleaning up the ghetto swamp where the wildness is bred?
- speakerOver and over as I visit settlement houses in the ghetto areas, I hear workers in despair
- speakerdescribing the wide and deep involvement of these young victims in narcotics and
- speakerdope. And, as we send in added police,
- speakerare they to give attention to the dope pusher, who is
- speakernot a resident of the community, but who preys upon the young lives in
- speakerthe community? Who is responsible for the exploitation of these
- speakeryoung caged lions with grass and heroin? Who makes
- speakerfantastic sums of money out of this, while young people are plied with poisons
- speakerwhose thrall is so terrifying as to make a killer out of a gentle
- speakerfarmer's son. Where is the moral indignation of the nice people
- speakerof the country? Where is the insistence upon protection of these youngsters from
- speakerthis vice? Who is to take up the lash of public opinion to drive out
- speakerthe money changers who desecrate the temple of beings made in the image of God?
- speakerWho will touch the leper or extend his hand to protect protect Mary Magdalen
- speakerfrom the barrage of death dealing stone.
- speakerOther angry men would go out into New York Bay
- speakerand throw a shroud over the Statue of Liberty
- speakerand doused the light that welcomes the world's huddled masses to our shore.
- speakerThey would turn her back upon United States citizens from Mississippi or the Caribbean
- speakeruntil we clean up the ghetto. We've
- speakerforgotten that in the past we have welcomed into these same slums Irish,
- speakerItalian, Jew, Rican, German people of every conceivable strain,
- speakersubjected them to get a living and out of the brawling competitive streets seen them build the towers that
- speakerchallenge the sky. Who has gotten afraid of the American venture just because
- speakerthe new immigrants to our city have colored skins and Spanish names?
- speakerWho will suffer little children and the heavenly burden to come unto him?
- speakerAre we to continue to blame our problems on slums and ghettos? Upon
- speakerthe latest newcomers? And
- speakerthere are those who would discourage the newcomer and slam the door of relief in his face.
- speakerThey say to him if you have been in our city or in our country for three hundred sixty
- speakersix days, we shall not let you or your children starve.
- speakerBut if you have been here only three hundred sixty four days, you can grovel for your
- speakercrusts with the dogs. What kind of arithmetical morality is this?
- speakerWhere is the spirit of him who lifted up the afflicted and fed the multitude with
- speakerloaves and fishes and walked the streets with the poor and the lonely?
- speakerThe immorality of the ghetto breeds the immorality of the segregated schools.
- speakerI mentioned before that eighty percent of the youngsters who went to kindergarten, by the time they reach
- speakerthe sixth grade are from one to three years behind in their reading. And,
- speakerthe Board of Education in New York City says this is because they are poor and culturally
- speakerdisadvantaged. We have demonstrated with an exhaustive
- speakerstudy the main reason why these children are not achieving is because
- speakerthe board of education of our city has assumed that they can't learn and has set out
- speakerto prove that assumption by not teaching them.
- speakerTen years ago. Ten years ago responsible studies revealed that
- speakerseventy percent of our public elementary schools and junior high school are segregated.
- speakerThe Supreme Court has reminded us that modern psychological knowledge indicates clearly
- speakerthat segregated, racially homogenous schools damage the personality of
- speakerminority group children and white children are also damaged, whether this segregation occurs
- speakerby law or by fact. Twelve years ago the Board
- speakerof Education of New York City rose to the challenge. And in December of one nine hundred
- speakerfifty four proclaimed its interpretation of the May seventeenth decision of the United States
- speakercourt as a legal and moral reaffirmation of our fundamental educational
- speakerprinciples. Declared that racially homogenously public schools are educationally
- speakerundesirable. And the board twelve years ago committed itself to approach more clearly the
- speakerracially integrated school in all localities. And, since that time, segregated
- speakerschools have increased in New York City, rather than decreased.
- speakerThe flesh is so often weaker than the spirit.
- speakerAnd the moral drive that produced the policy lags in its implementation. People in high places
- speakerafter all say the segregated schools are only a little sin. And since we have been sinning
- speakermore or less comfortably for so long, let's don't clean it up too fast. Let's
- speakerbe practical has been substituted for let's be moral.
- speakerThe ghetto pattern. Ghetto thinking degrades us all, those in the
- speakerghetto and those outside. When he
- speakersaid, "Suffer little children to come unto me." Did he mean for them to march up
- speakerin separate phalanxes, black and white, Jew and Gentile, Irish and Puerto
- speakerRican? In this issue psychology and morality I hand
- speakermeeting. We can run, but we can't hide.
- speakerAnd many of us have come to see that the a large measure of delinquency, school segregation and
- speakerracial tension is grounded in racially restricted residential pattern.
- speakerThe president of the United States has vigorously and repeatedly called our attention to the depressed
- speakercountries and nations of the world. He has said that they will not rest content in
- speakertheir poverty while other nations nearby are fat and privileged. He
- speakerpredicts conflict and explosion unless the rich and powerful nations of East and West
- speakerincreasingly share their resources and know how with the poor and rich.
- speakerWell what about the depressed areas and districts of our urban communities?
- speakerDistricts which are increasing in restlessness and discontent, who are
- speakertired of having the iron feet of oppression on their necks.
- speakerAnd we can predict that there will be spreading conflicts and explosions within these
- speakerghetto communities, unless we find ways more rapidly to increase the share of
- speakerthese districts in the full stream of our country's life.
- speakerBusiness and Industry seem content to employ the labor of these
- speakerpeople but take little responsibility for their existence in crowded tenements and stinking
- speakerslum. Business and Industry and the government must share
- speakerthe moral and realistic responsibility for increases in the housing supply at
- speakercosts which these workers can afford, for enforcement of housing codes and laws as
- speakervigorously as policing the streets, and for opening up the total housing supply to all people
- speakeron the same terms regardless of race, religion, and national origin. And every landlord
- speakeror are real estate operator or mortgage lender who turns his back on one of these
- speakerfamilies contributes to the sharpening resentment and tension, and so does every housing
- speakerinspector who looks the other way at code infraction; every court that penalizes
- speakerhousing lawlessness by slaps on the wrist; and all the policemen with their hands in the back
- speakerdoor, profiting from numbers, gambling, prostitution, and the dope traffic. The ghetto must
- speakerbe recognized for what it really is a stinking cancerous blot upon the
- speakermorality of the entire community. There are devils to be cast out. There are
- speakermoney changers to be whipped out of the temple. There is a high need for moral indignation,
- speakernot at the victims, but at the perpetrators and exploiters of the ghetto.
- speakerThe unfortunate truth is that the one institution which
- speakerexists to make this kind of moral protest, has been most
- speakersilent on this matter of the immorality of the ghetto.
- speakerAnd that is the church. And those of us who are
- speakerconfined to the ghetto pattern are not without our moral responsibilities.
- speakerIndeed we dwellers of urban ghettos are responsible to do all in our power to preserve the integrity of our family
- speakerlife, to condemn lawlessness by black and white alike, to educate our children
- speakerto knock on the door when the opportunities are open, to organize to vote, to fight despair, to
- speakerjoin with the forces in and out of the ghetto, who are fighting to eliminate the ghetto itself.
- speakerFor respect comes not to those who whimper or whine, but
- speakerto those who stand on their own feet and do all they can
- speakerwith what they have, little as it may be. And this is what
- speakerwe're trying to do at the Church of the Master. [Church of the Master Presbyterian Church] with our youth program introducing
- speakerthe host so-called hardcore teenagers. We have about two hundred fifty
- speakerof them that meet at the church every Wednesday night. We have a an academy
- speakerof transition where youngsters who have dropped out of school. And we have demonstrated
- speakerthat these youngsters can learn. Their I.Q.'s can be increased. Of one hundred
- speakerfifty of them that have attended these academies, twenty-five are now in prep school, having dropped out of high school
- speakermind you. Seven are now in college and twelve have already been admitted to college in the fall.
- speakerRight from our academy of transition. But
- speakertime is running out. Our national and international obligations are
- speakerpressing America on every side. And even the great Sir Lancelot could not find the Holy Grail
- speakerbecause his honor rooted in dishonor stood. The Lord has allowed us
- speakerto develop a way of life based upon the everlasting sanctity of every human being.
- speakerHe will not permit us to be custodian of that light unless our hands are clean.
- speakerCivilizations that have failed this trust have gone down into the dust. The
- speakercommunists and many of the darker uncommitted peoples will not let us stand before the
- speakerworld in raiment of shining light which hides the cancers and sores and the cloven
- speakerhoof of racial injustice and ghetto immorality.
- speakerBut important as our world role may be, even more vital
- speakeris the cleanliness and sanctity of our own nation. Its internal moral
- speakerfiber. We have an expression in our Negro community
- speakerwhen someone does something bad. He sometimes chastised by shaking
- speakerthe head and saying God don't love ugly.
- speakerCertainly he doesn't love immorality. And I would believe he doesn't love the
- speakerghetto. What he does not love he may punish with hell fire itself.
- speakerBut his compassion is great and redeems us when we reject the immoral
- speakerand the ugly and embrace the true and the beautiful. I
- speakerplead that one of our evangelistic thrusts from this extension of the
- speakerministry. I plead for the moral indignation and the hard
- speakertough work that must be done to eradicate the
- speakerimmorality of the ghetto.
