[LWVNM Action] Zoom Webinar Monday, June 15th 6:30 to 7:30 - Senator Harris on the 1968 Kerner Commission and its relevance to current events.

[Richard Mason]

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 15th 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
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