WOI: News Clip 181

first of all there isn't any question that for insert internal security reasons we're going to have to have equal opportunity it's absolutely no question about that all you have to do is to begin to look at the kind of alienation that prevails in too many of our centers today to look at situation riots to look at the various conflict situations and the great movement towards separatism in too many of our ghetto communities to realize that if we're actually going to remain a viable society that it's going to be necessary for us for internal purposes to actually come up with equal opportunity we're going to have to do something to see to it that every individual whether they be black brown or white can exist in our society with dignity and without all forms of degradation and I think that this is one of the things that we're gonna have to spend a great deal of time more time working on I'm certain and I don't need to spend a great deal of time talking to you about the fact that for economic reasons we're going to have to have equal opportunity we're either going to have to have individuals participating in society as positive members as contributors as taxpayers rather than dependents we're going to pay for it one way or another and it seems to me that the best way to do it is in terms of individuals really carrying their own and I think that we can never lose sight of the fact that if we really firmly believe that our way of life is the the right way of life the way of life that we defend in all parts of the world we're going to have to begin to close up the gap between our promises and our performance that is if we want to continue to be a world leader and as I see it those are the three major reasons why we're going to have to have equal opportunity when the kerner Commission came out with its report there was a great deal of reaction to this the militant black people thought the report was good and the only reason many of them thought it was good was it called white people racist many white people reacted to the report because they didn't like to be called racist everyone really when they look at the term racism they look at it from the standpoint of whether or not they are prejudiced whether or not they have discriminatory attitudes against other individuals and right away anytime someone indicts us as an individual we react and I think that not enough people really looked at what the Kerner commission was saying when they said that there is racism the basic problem in America today is racism what do we mean by racism as I see it they were not talking about necessarily an individual's attitude the thing that they were really talking about is the fact that in America today we have in essence a system which to a very great extent results in the subordination of an individual because of the color of their skin their national origin or their background in other words racism as I see it what they were really talking about was institutional racism a system of subordination based on an individual's color national origin race background now what are the what are the forms how does racism manifest itself what are the forms racism all of us know about overt racism we can talk about discrimination and employment we can talk about the kind of discrimination that prevails in the south and voting we can talk about discrimination in housing this is the kind of racism that most people think that we're talking about but as I see it there's another form of racism now since most of you are architects or planners you know what I'm really getting at one of the things that we're very concerned about relates to this whole area of zoning as you know in this country today Congress has said that during the next ten years we shall build 26 million housing units 6 million of which shall be for low and moderate-income people now in order to do this this is going to mean 600,000 low-income units built each year and you and I both know that if if you really even if you wanted to you couldn't build 6 million housing units in the Central City many of these housing units are going to have to be built in suburbian communities but in too many communities the way that they're zoned there isn't any question that right now you know that they're not going to be any black people in those communities or there are not going to be very many poor people because of the fact the restrictions against them for example high-rise housing against certain kinds of modular housing there's a study currently underway by the National Committee against discrimination in housing in six counties in the New York metropolitan area for example they've been looking in Westchester County New York and found that of the land that is available for resident for housing construction over 70% of it that's available is in terms of one half half acre lots now there isn't any question about what the net effect of that kind of law that kind of ordinance is now I'm certain that you would say that the people who were responsible for these ordinances did not sit down and consciously decide that they were going to discriminate against individuals but it has the same effect as as though they set out to to consciously discriminate against individuals I can say the same thing in terms of some of our other plans for for land use for example how an area of This plan in terms of land use may determine whether or not the FHA the federal government is actually going to ensure mortgages if if the community has planned the land for primarily for industrial purposes in any question [and in it?] going to be possible for FHA to ensure mortgages so I think that as we look ahead in terms of zoning as we look at problems relating to land use we're going to have to be more conscious we're going to have to be more color conscious than we have in the past in terms of what are the net effect of these practices on the opportunities of individuals there are other practices which are sacred for example in the area of employment which have an adverse effect on the upward mobility of minority groups and many of these practices have no meaningful use today but it's a traditional kind of thing that we followed and continue along with for example we see all over this nation the extensive use of tests for individuals for industrial type employment we find that there's too little validation of these tests to determine whether or not these tests are actually testing for the skills or the insights that is going to make it possible for an individual to perform the job more effectively well you when you ask someone why they are doing it what we've always done it and we think tests are important they don't stop to think they don't stop to look at these tests to determine whether or not the net effect of these tests is that they end up really having an adverse effect on many minority group individuals these are the kind of things that I think we're going to have to look more critically at than we have in the past the old standard of living materialistic index measurement is no longer enough we're wealthy enough as a nation there are still groups in our society unfortunately that don't share that wealth and that is another major national problem but from this point on because a couple of months ago or weeks ago our gross national product product passed the annual rate of nine hundred billion dollars and in terms of the functioning of our economy and our wealth we seem to even solve the the business cycle we're a very wealthy and very rich and very powerful and very talented country but there's no question at all but that the result of all this has been a a disproportionate national problem and that that our that the results need to be called in question there's no doubt that we're a very prosperous prosperous people but the events that we read about every day on the front pages of our newspaper say that there's trouble with regard to the prosperity of the human spirit in this country and they say to us that there is a questioning of the performance of our institutions and of our treatment of human beings and I believe this is a very healthy thing if we treat it as an opportunity to have a very great and unparalleled debate about our future now I was told before I came and I read up a bit that one of the things that concerns Iowa is that you're one of the slowest growing states and that you you you that this bothers you and I want to soothe you on this point I'm going to soothe you and challenge you in the next breath however I happen to be in Vermont with Senator George aiken one of the great men of the Congress not long after the 1960 census and and Vermont was one of I think two or three states between 1950 and 1960 not only didn't grow it lost population and a reporter asked the senator a very penetrating question he said senator the census results have just been announced and Vermont has has has one of the few states that lost population does this disturb you well it didn't disturb Aiken at all and he looked him right in the eye and he said well he said some of us in Vermont we sit and we look around us in these other states in the country and see what they call growth he said we're not disturbed we're gonna wait and grow right and it seems to me that those states that have not grown so rapidly that they have piled up on their doorsteps enormous perhaps insoluble problems in the short run should be congratulated at this time there are great urban complexes today my friends that are sick that suffer from degenerative diseases I don't know and I'll get more specific whether New York is a dying city or whether you can do anything about improving the environment of the Los Angeles region to get even more specific but I I am saying to you that we have as a result of this imbalance in our national progress in our national performance created enormous problems where most of the people live and at the solving of these problems is the work of two or three decades and that part of the solution of that problem depends upon the viability and the creativity in other parts of our country because it means that you have a greater opportunity you don't have as many problems it isn't nearly as costly for you to undo the spoiling damage that besets and harasses most of the American cities today because I I deeply believe from everything that I see and I've been deliberately getting around to campuses all over this country and speaking the last three months keeps you on your toes [Alan/Allen?] and I believe we are seeing a long overdue questioning our basic values in this country it's not alone the young it's sensitive people conservationists architects designers businessmen some of them who are increasingly asking the question whether our national priorities and national goals are not out of whack and I think the ferment on the campuses and in the country is part of this questioning of our failures of the past of institutions that don't solve problems and and is in essence saying we're we're we're aiming too low and that we should aim much higher and yet when we look at how we spend our national wills and of course our private affluence and what we have inside our homes and the vehicles that we move about in we're so beguiled as a people with speed with movement I think perhaps the most penetrating comment made in recent years on American travel because travel depends upon the eye and what the eye discovers and what man learns and we move so much and so fast that we're not interested or less and less interested and Frank Dobie the Texas writer said in his last year's he said we don't travel anymore we're just transported and what I think of I happen to like this generation of jet aircraft because you have a magnificent view of this continent if you like geography and you can settle down and maybe write something or read something and the SST we're that we're moving towards we're proposing to spend several billions of dollars to produce it and put you in a tube and get you there in two hours and in terms of the past American Progress this is what we're far faster is always better bigger is always better rather than having better be what is more human and I recall the last week of the late unlamented administration and our last cabinet meeting when the president went around the table see if anybody had any last comments and being one of the three members of the cabinet who had been there for eight years I decided to say something and the thing that I said was that when I looked at this country and its total environment and I was not reflecting what I thought had happened in my own area because this concerned the work of the new HUD Department the Transportation Department agriculture so many others that I was not at all sure that the thing that we would look back upon that was most important that we achieve was not a piece of legislation was not a bill a program or the the money or lack of money in programs but that we had successfully orchestrated what was happening in the country which was a change of the basic attitude and outlook of the American people with regard to their environment and I pointed out as proof of this the difficulty that the man proposed as my successor was then having with the Congress and and that somebody could have said what he said and unfortunately he there are code words in conservation as well as civil rights he used the wrong words without knowing what he was saying but some 10 years ago could have said the same things and there would have been a few criticisms from the fringe but he when he said them this time it caused a national furor and I suspect already it's had a rather chastening influence on him and on his conduct so that there is a growing groundswell I think if there wasn't in this state in this region you wouldn't be having a conference of this kind I not only commend you for the scope of the conference because I think it's it's foolish for my conservationist friends to get off by themselves and discuss a little piece of the natural environmental problem without having the others there because everything is interlinked the works of man the works of nature it's all one battle for one environment and recognition of that fact was part of this new awareness of the 1960s