The League of Women Voters of New Mexico will host a webinar featuring Senator Fred Harris, now a resident of Corrales and an adjunct professor at UNM, talking about the current demonstrations and how the findings of the 1968 Kerner Commission and how can help us better understand the frustrations of the African American community.

Zoom Webinar
Monday, June 15^th 6:30 to 7:30
Registration required
Information to follow on Constant Contact

 

 

After civil unrest in some major cities in 1967 Senator Fred Harris (D-OK) and other senators asked for the creation of a commission to study the causes of the unrest. In July, 1967, President Johnson agreed to create the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders that became known as the Kerner Commission after the then Governor of Illinois who was named chair of the commission. Senator Harris was named to the Commission.

The Commission delivered its report in February 1968 and concluded that the unrest was a result of frustration on the part of African American community at the lack of economic community. It criticized governments, law enforcement and the media for contributing to the problem.

The report's most famous passage warned, "Our nation is moving toward two societies, one black, one white—separate and unequal." The report was a strong indictment of white America: "What white Americans have never fully understood but what the Negro can never forget — is that white society is deeply implicated in the ghetto. White institutions created it, white institutions maintain it, and white society condones it.”

The report was an instant bestseller, but President Johnson and most of society chose to ignore it. To quote an article in the Smithsonian magazine “The 1968 Kerner Commission Got it Right, But Nobody Listened”  

Will we listen now?

 

For more info on the Commission you can visit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kerner_Commission