Attny General Says US Is a “nation of cowards” on racial matters

Eric Holder, the nation's first black attorney general, said Wednesday the United States was "a nation of cowards" on matters of race, with most Americans avoiding candid discussions of racial issues. In a speech to Justice Department employees marking Black History Month, Holder said the workplace is largely integrated but Americans still self-segregate on the weekends and in their private lives.

"Though this nation has proudly thought of itself as an ethnic melting pot, in things racial we have always been and I believe continue to be, in too many ways, essentially a nation of cowards," Holder said.

Race issues continue to be a topic of political discussion, but "we, as average Americans, simply do not talk enough with each other about race."

Holder's speech echoed President Barack Obama's landmark address last year on race relations during the hotly contested Democratic primaries, when the then-candidate urged the nation to break "a racial stalemate we've been stuck in for years" and bemoaned the "chasm of misunderstanding that exists between the races." Obama delivered the speech to try to distance himself from the angry rhetoric of his former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

 

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The Story of Black New Orleans

By Leland C. Abraham, Esq.

Outside of the New Orleans, very few of Black Americans have heard of this historic place. Faubourg Treme (hereinafter called “Treme”) was one of the first communities of black free men during slavery. Treme began as a plantation like any other plat of land during the time. Near the end of the 18th century, Claude Treme purchased the land. Within a few decades of this purchase, a canal was built that split the land. Some developers then began to make the land into neighborhoods. These neighborhoods would go on to house whites, creoles and free people of color throughout the 1800s.
Louisiana was a little different from the other southern states in that blacks could purchase their freedom. In fact, some blacks had their own slaves during this time period. Treme was extremely unique in that it was a precursor to a lot of black history. For example, the first black newspaper publication came from Treme. The Tribune started out as a French language publication but later became bilingual. This was important because after the civil war, the Tribune urged it black readers to “boycott” the rail system until there was equal treatment among the races. This would have been in the latter portion of the 19th Century, well before the “Birmingham Bus Boycott.”

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