The Million Man March and The Moynihan Report (op-ed)
Prologue: Months before my daughter was born I said to her mother, “We’re starting a family. There are things we need to decide now. Are we going to put her in a public or private school? Are we--”
My daughter’s mother cut me off and said…
2015 is the twentieth anniversary of The Million Man March and the fiftieth anniversary of The Moynihan Report.
The Million Man March (1995) was the largest gathering in the nation’s capital since The March on Washington (1963), but the Million Man March was not a replica of its predecessor.
The 1963 march was officially titled: The March on Washington for Freedom and Jobs. Their demand was directed toward the federal government. This march applied proactive pressure on the government to pass The Civil Rights Act of 1964.
The Million Man March, subtitled The Day of Atonement, didn’t direct any demand toward the federal government. The organizers of this march directed their demand to the audience that gathered. Keynote speaker Louis Farrakhan told the audience, “We got to resolve today we’re going back home to do something about what’s going on in our lives and in our families.”
Farrakhan emphasized self-sufficiency (This was a reaction to the 1994 republican takeover of congress. The republicans promised to end dependency on the government and Black leaders took that as a threat to erode the gains of The Civil Rights Movement.), Farrakhan also emphasized rebuilding the black family. (That’s why the march was for men only. The organizers were demanding black men to reclaim their position as head of the household.) Both the republican mandate and the family demand of the Million Man March were in response to what the Moynihan report predicted thirty years prior.
In 1965 Daniel Patrick Moynihan, assistant secretary of labor, authored a report called The Negro Family: A Case for National Action. In general the report stated black poverty, poor educational achievement, and crime are the result of a poor black family structure. Moynihan stated the legacy of slavery and Jim Crow worked against the emergence of a strong father figure and a matriarchal structure formed which alienated black children from a society dominated by male authority. Startled by the increase of illegitimacy rates and welfare dependency Moynihan predicted if government subsidies replaced male responsibility in time the two parent household in the black community will disappear.
When the Moynihan report was released to the public it was dismissed as racist. Moynihan was accused of blaming the victim, being hung-up on white middle class family norms, and not understanding that a matriarchal family structure was common among oppressed people throughout the history of western civilization. The case Moynihan made for national action was ignored.
Twenty years later a CBS documentary called The Vanishing Black Family -- Crisis in Black America proved Moynihan’s prediction correct. But it was too late for national action between 1960 and 1987 the percentage of black children born out of wedlock rose from 23 percent to 62 percent while the percentage of black women ages 25 to 29 who were married dropped from 60 percent to 32 percent.
Twenty years after the Million Man March has the demand directed toward black men been supplied?
In a recent op-ed, fifty years after the Moynihan report, economist Walter Williams wrote, “The most crippling problem in the black community … is the breakdown of the black family. Actually, “breakdown” is the wrong word; the black family doesn’t form in the first place.”
Epilogue: My daughter’s mother cut me off and said, “What the hell are you talking about? I’m just having a child. That doesn’t mean we’re starting a family.”
First published in the New Pittsburgh Courier 9/23/15
My daughter’s mother cut me off and said…
***
2015 is the twentieth anniversary of The Million Man March and the fiftieth anniversary of The Moynihan Report.
The Million Man March (1995) was the largest gathering in the nation’s capital since The March on Washington (1963), but the Million Man March was not a replica of its predecessor.
The 1963 march was officially titled: The March on Washington for Freedom and Jobs. Their demand was directed toward the federal government. This march applied proactive pressure on the government to pass The Civil Rights Act of 1964.
The Million Man March, subtitled The Day of Atonement, didn’t direct any demand toward the federal government. The organizers of this march directed their demand to the audience that gathered. Keynote speaker Louis Farrakhan told the audience, “We got to resolve today we’re going back home to do something about what’s going on in our lives and in our families.”
Farrakhan emphasized self-sufficiency (This was a reaction to the 1994 republican takeover of congress. The republicans promised to end dependency on the government and Black leaders took that as a threat to erode the gains of The Civil Rights Movement.), Farrakhan also emphasized rebuilding the black family. (That’s why the march was for men only. The organizers were demanding black men to reclaim their position as head of the household.) Both the republican mandate and the family demand of the Million Man March were in response to what the Moynihan report predicted thirty years prior.
In 1965 Daniel Patrick Moynihan, assistant secretary of labor, authored a report called The Negro Family: A Case for National Action. In general the report stated black poverty, poor educational achievement, and crime are the result of a poor black family structure. Moynihan stated the legacy of slavery and Jim Crow worked against the emergence of a strong father figure and a matriarchal structure formed which alienated black children from a society dominated by male authority. Startled by the increase of illegitimacy rates and welfare dependency Moynihan predicted if government subsidies replaced male responsibility in time the two parent household in the black community will disappear.
When the Moynihan report was released to the public it was dismissed as racist. Moynihan was accused of blaming the victim, being hung-up on white middle class family norms, and not understanding that a matriarchal family structure was common among oppressed people throughout the history of western civilization. The case Moynihan made for national action was ignored.
Twenty years later a CBS documentary called The Vanishing Black Family -- Crisis in Black America proved Moynihan’s prediction correct. But it was too late for national action between 1960 and 1987 the percentage of black children born out of wedlock rose from 23 percent to 62 percent while the percentage of black women ages 25 to 29 who were married dropped from 60 percent to 32 percent.
Twenty years after the Million Man March has the demand directed toward black men been supplied?
In a recent op-ed, fifty years after the Moynihan report, economist Walter Williams wrote, “The most crippling problem in the black community … is the breakdown of the black family. Actually, “breakdown” is the wrong word; the black family doesn’t form in the first place.”
***
Epilogue: My daughter’s mother cut me off and said, “What the hell are you talking about? I’m just having a child. That doesn’t mean we’re starting a family.”
First published in the New Pittsburgh Courier 9/23/15
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