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In the Name of Integration
by Intrepid
The vicious injustice of uniform segregation in the South (and de-facto segregation in much of the North) remained a blight on our Republic, a stain on our Constitution and a sin against all black Americans for over 100 years after the Civil War. Not until the agonies of the Civil Rights movement (in the 1950s-60s) and the far-sightedness of the Democratic party did we finally--and painfully--remove institutional segregation from our land and end the stigma of second class citizenship from Americans of color.
However, after half a century since Brown vs. the Board of Education, it is necessary to remember that the only "even playing field" in a just society is the highest standard of excellence that all must be held to. In order for all children to succeed in life, they must be trained to do their utmost in meeting the same standard. In other words, we must expect the most from all children, and not the least from some.
The continued failure of our once superb public school system to educate our inner city youth in the basic skills necessary for functional lives has now caused two generations of poor, black children to fall even further behind the second-class citizenship of the segregated past. Now they are warehoused within this nation's new plantation system--the projects of our 'Massah' Welfare State--while our Board of Education and our Teachers Union continue to let them down, and get away with it. The first sin of post-reconstruction segregation was a sin against all citizens and our nation. But this surely is a sin against God!
The Supreme Court ruling is a first attempt to address (if not rectify) public school education's great moral failure to properly educate poor black children while covering its tracks--in the name of INTEGRATION.
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