Woman's Rights Party Platform: 1922

[Ed. Note: Contrary to what is often taught, the women's movement didn't pass out of
existence following the winning of women's suffrage in 1920 in the United States. The
women's movement was alive and well, but suffered from a total blackout by the
patriarchal press. The following is the Declaration of Principles of the Women's Party dated
May 21, 1922]

"WHEREAS, Women today, although enfranchised, are still in every way subordinate to
men before the law, in government, in educational opportunities, in professions, in the
church, in industry, and in the home:

"BE IT RESOLVED, That as a part of our campaign to remove all form of the subjection of
women, we shall work for the following immediate objects:
"That women shall no longer be regarded and shall no longer regard themselves as
inferior to men, but the equality of the sexes shall be recognized.
"That women shall no longer be the governed half of society, but shall participate
equally with men in the direction of life.
"That women shall no longer be denied equal educational opportunities with men, but
the same opportunities shall be given to both sexes in all schools, colleges, and universities
which are supported in any way by public funds.
"That women shall no longer be barred from any occupation, but every occupation to
men shall be open to women and restrictions upon the hours, conditions and remuneration
of labor shall apply alike to both sexes.
"That women shall no longer be discriminated against in the legal, the medical, the
teaching, or any other profession, but the same opportunities shall be given to women as to
men in training for professions and in the practice of these professions.
"That women shall no longer be discriminated against in civil and government service,
but shall have the same right as men to pay in the executive, the legislative, and the judicial
branches of the government service.
"That women shall no longer be discriminated against in the foreign trade, consular
and diplomatic service, but women as well as men shall represent our country in foreign
lands."
"That women shall no longer receive less pay than men for the same work, but shall
receive equal compensation for equal work in public and private employment.
"That women shall no longer be barred from the priesthood or ministry, or any position
of authority in the church, but equally with men shall participate in ecclesiastical offices
and dignites.
"That a double moral standard shall no longer exist, but one code shall obtain for both
men and women.
"That exploitation of the sex of women shall no longer exist, but women shall have the
same right to control of their persons as have men.
"That women shall no longer be discriminated against in treatment of sex diseases and
in punishment of sex offenses, but men and women shall be treated in the same was for sex
diseases and sex offenses.
"That women shall no longer be deprived of the right of trial by a jury of their peers, but
jury service shall be open to women as to men.
"That women shall no longer be discriminated against in inheritance laws, but men and
women shall have the same right to inherit property.
"That the identity of the wife shall no longer be merged in that of her husband, but the
wife shall retain her separate identify after marriage and be able to contract with her
husband concerning the marriage relationship.
"That a woman shall no longer be REQUIRED by law or custom to assume the name of
her husband upon marriage but shall have the same right as a man to retain her own name
after marriage.
"That the wife shall no longer be considered as supported by the husband, but their
mutual contribution to the family maintenance shall be recognized.
"That the headship of the family shall no longer be in the husband alone, but shall be
equally in the husband and the wife.
"That the husband shall no longer own his wife's services, but these shall belong to her
alone as in the case of any free person.
"That the husband shall no longer own his wife's earnings, but these shall belong to her
alone.
"That the husband shall no longer own or control his wife's property, but it shall belong
to her and be controlled by her alone.
"That the husband shall no longer control the joint property of his wife, but the wife
shall have the right to obtain divorce on the same grounds as the husband.
"That the husband shall no longer have a greater right to make contracts than the wife,
but a wife shall have equal right with her husband to make contracts.
"That married women shall no longer be denied the right to choose their own
citizenship, but shall have the same independent choice of citizenship as is possessed by
their husbands.
"That women shall no longer be discriminated against in the economic world because
of marriage, but shall have the same treatment in the economic world after marriage as
have men.
"That the father shall no longer have the paramount right to the care, custody, and
control of the child, to determine its education and religion, to the guardianship of its estate
and to the control of its services and earnings, but these rights shall be shared equally by
the father and mother in the case of all children, whether born within or without the
marriage ceremony.
"That no form of the Common Law or Civil Law disabilities of women shall any longer
exist, but women shall be equal with men before the law.
"In short - That women shall no longer be in any form of subjection to man in law to
custom, but shall in every way be on an equal plane in rights, as she has always been and
will continue to be, in responsibilities and obligations.

[Ed. Note: The Declaration of the Woman's Party in 1922 followed the first declaration for
Women's Rights in the convention in Seneca Falls by 80 years and was in turn followed 40
years later by the declaration of intent of the National Organization for Women in 1966. It
is now more than 150 years since Seneca Falls and women STILL don't have equal rights
under the laws of the United States of America!

THE OUTLINE OF THE Women's Party PLAN OF CAMPAIGN is as follows:

"I. National Work - Make certain that your United States Senators and your
Congressmen give their whole-hearted support and their vote to all Equal Rights legislation
before Congress.
"II. State Work - Make certain that your Senators and your Representatives in the State
Legislature give their whole-hearted support and their vote to All Equal Rights legislation.
"III. Local Work - Make certain that your own locality is at least one sport in the United
States where every girl that is born has an equal change in life with every boy and where,
throughout life, there are not handicaps of any kind placed upon women because of their
sex.
"To this end make certain:
"(1) That women are nominated for all elective offices in your local community,
your county and your state, and are supported in the elections and are placed equally with
men in the offices which control the life of your community.
"(2) That women are appointed equally with men to all appointive positions under
your local, your county, and your state government.
"(3) That the same opportunities are given to girls as to boys in all schools, colleges,
and universities in your community which are supported in whole or in part by public funds;
that in these educational institutions girls have the same opportunities as boys to study in
all department; that entrance requirements are equal; the opportunity for trade and
vocational training is equal; that opportunity for physical training and for entrance into the
athletic life of the institutions is equal; the opportunity for physical training and for
entrance into the athletic life of the institution is equal; that opportunity for obtaining
academic honors, scholarships, fellowships, and all other honors is equal.
"(4) That in your community, all occupations and professions, whether public or
private, are open to women on the same terms as to men; that women equally with men are
appointed to the administrative and other positions involving power and high salaries; that
women have the same opportunities to advancement in these occupations and professions;
that they are paid equally for the same work; that they have equal opportunity to enter the
Unions of their trade and to participate in the government of the Unions; that women
engaged in business or working at any paid occupations are encouraged and supported;
that whenever public money is spent, women receive the appointments, contracts, or
commissions equally with men.
"(5) That in the churches in your community women have an equal share with men
in the governing of the church, and in participation in the ministry and all ecclesiastical
offices and dignities.
"(6) That in your community, the public sentiment supports a single moral and
ethical code for men and women, and that all actus which are considered dishonorable or
wrong in one sex, are considered the same in the other sex.
"(7) That in your community one sex in no way preys upon the other by the white
slave trade; by forcing it into prostitution or in any other way; that men and women receive
the same examination, quarantine and treatment for sex diseases; that when men and
women are punished for sex offenses they are punished in the same way for the same
offense.
"(8) That in your community married women are not dismissed from government
service, the schools, or from private employment because of their marriage.”
 MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.,
“l HAVE A DREAM”

Speech delivei^ed at the March on Washington^

August 28, ig6^

I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in his-

tory as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of
our nation.
Fivescore years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow
we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This mo-
mentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of
Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injus-
tice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their cap-
tivity.
But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hun-
dred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the
manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hun-
dred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the
midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years

229
 Appendix

later, the Negro is still languished in the corners of American soci-

ety and finds himself an exile in his own land. And so we’ve come
here today to dramatize a shameful condition.
In a sense we’ve come to our nation’s capital to cash a check.
When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of
the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were
signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir.
This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white
men, would be guaranteed the “unalienable Rights of Life, Liberty,
and the pursuit of Happiness.” It is obvious today that America has
defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of color are
concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has
given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back
marked “insufficient funds.”
But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We
refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults
of opportunity of this nation. And so we’ve come to cash this check,
a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the
security of justice.
We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of
the fierce urgency of now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of
cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is
the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to
rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit
path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the
quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now
is the time to make justice a reality for all of God’s children.
It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the
moment. This sweltering summer of the Negro’s legitimate discon-
tent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom
and equality. Nineteen-sixty-three is not an end, but a beginning.
And those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and

230
 Appendix

will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns
to business as usual. There will he neither rest nor tranquility in
America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The
whirlwdnds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our
nation until the bright day of justice emerges.
But there is something that I must say to my people, who stand on
the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice: In the pro-
cess of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful
deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking
from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our
struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not
allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again
and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical
force with soul force. The marvelous new militancy which has en-
gulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all
white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their
presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up
with our destiny. And they have come to realize that their freedom is
inextricably hound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone.
And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always
march ahead. We cannot turn back. There are those who are asking
the devotees of civil rights, “When will you be satisfied?”
We can never he satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the
unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We can never be satisfied as
long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain
lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities.
We cannot he satisfied as long as the Negro’s basic mobility is from
a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as
our children are stripped of their selfhood and robbed of their dig-
nity by signs stating “For Whites Only.” We cannot be satisfied as
long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York
believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not

231
 Appendix

satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like
waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.
I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great
trials and tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow
jail cells. Some of you have come from areas where your quest for
freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and stag-
gered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans of
creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned
suffering is redemptive. Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama,
go back to South Carolina, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisi-
ana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, know-
ing that somehow this situation can and will be changed. Let us not
wallow in the valley of despair.
I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficul-
ties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply
rooted in the American dream.
I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out
the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-
evident, that all men are created equal.”
I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons
of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to
sit down together at the table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state
sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of op-
pression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but
by the content of their character. I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day down in Alabama, with its vicious
racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of
“interposition” and “nullification,” one day right there in Alabama
little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little

232
 Appendix

white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers. 1 have a dream
today.
I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every
hill and mountain shall be made low; the rough places will be made
plain, and the crooked places will be made straight; and the glory of
the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.
This is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the South
with. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of
despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform
the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of
brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to
pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up
for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day. This
will be the day, this will be the day when all of God’s children will be
able to sing with new meaning:

My country, ’tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing.

Land where my fathers died, land of the pilgrim’s pride.
From every mountainside, let freedom ring!

And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true.

And so let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New
Hampshire.
Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York.
Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of
Pennsylvania.
Let freedom ring from the snowcapped Rockies of Colorado.
Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California.
But not only that: Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of
Georgia.
Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee.
Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi.
From every mountainside, let freedom ring.

233
 Appendix

And when this happens, when we allow freedom [to] ring, when
we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state
and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s
children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants
and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the
old Negro spiritual:

Free at last! Free at last!

Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!

234
44 Malcolm X Speaks
Why, this man - he can find Eichmann hiding down in
Argentina somewhere. Let two or three American soldiers,
.
who are m inding somebody else's business way over in
South Vietnam, get killed, and he'll send b attleships, stick�
ing his nose in their business. He wanted to send troops
down to Cuba and make them have what he calls free
elections - this old cracker who doesn't have free elections
in his own country. No, if you never see me another time
in your life, if I die in the morning, I ' ll die saying one
thing: the ballot or the bullet, the ballot or the bullet.
If a Negro in 1 964 has to sit around and w ait for
$ome cracker senator to fIlibuster when it comes to the
rights of black people, why, you and I should hang our
heads in shame. You talk about a march on Washington
in 1 963, you haven't seen anything. There' s some more
going down in '64. And this time they're not going like
they went last year. They' re not going singing 'We Shall
Overcome." They're not going with white friends. They're
not going with placards already painted for them. They're
not going with round�trip tickets. They're going with on�
w ay tickets.
And if they don't want that non-nonviolent army going
down there, tell them to bring the fIlibuster to a h alt. The
black nationalists aren't going to wait. Lyndon B. Johnson
is the head of the Democratic Party. If he's for civil rights,
let him go into the Senate next week and declare himself.
Let him go in there right now and declare himself. Let
him go in there and denounce the Southern branch of his
party. Let him go in there right now and take a moral
stand - right now, not later. Tell him, don't wait until
election time. If he waits too long, brothers and sisters,
he will be responsible for letting a condition develop in
this country which will create a climate that will bring
seeds up out of the ground with vegetation on the end of
them looking like something these people never dreamed
of. In 1 964, it's the ballot or the bullet. Thank you.
IV . THE BLAC K REVOLUT ION
On April 8, 1 964, Malcolm X gave a speech on "The
Black Revolution" at a meeting sponsored by the Militant
Labor Forum at Palm Gardens in New York. This forum
is connected with The Militant, a socialist weekly, which
Malcolm considered "one of the best newspapers anywhere. "
The audience was around three-quarters white. Most of it
responded favorably to the talk. There were some sharp
exchanges during the discussion period between the
speaker and white liberals who resented his attacks on
liberalism and the Democratic Party and tried to pin the
label of hatem onger on him.
The talk gave Malcolm an opportunity for a fuller
presentation of his arguments for internationalizing the
b lack struggle by indicting the United States government
before the United Nations for racism. It is notable also
for his statement that a "bloodless revolution" was still
possible in the United States under certain circumstances.
Friends and enemies: Tonight I hope that we can have
a little fireside chat with as few sparks as possible being
tossed around. Especially because of the very explosive
condition that the world is in today. Sometimes, when a
person's house is on fire and someone comes in yelling
fire, instead of the person who is awakened by the yell
being thankful, he makes the mistake of charging the
one who awakened him with having set the tire. I hope
that this little convers ation tonight about the black
revolution won't cause m any of you to accuse us of
igniting it when you find it at your doorstep. . . .
During recent years there has been much talk about
a population explosion. W henever they are speaking of
the population explosion, in my opinion they are referring
primarily to the people in Asia or in Africa - the black,
 48 Malcolm X Speaks
to you may represent a small minority in the so-called
Negro community. But they just happen to be composed
of the type of ingredient necessary to fuse or ignite the
entire black community.
And this is one thing that whites - whether you call
yourselves liberals or conservatives or racists or whatever
else you might choose to b e - one thing that you have to
realize is, where the black community is concerned,
although the large majority you come in contact with may
impress you as being moderate and patient and loving and
long-suffering and all that kind of stuff, the minority who
you consider to be Muslims or nationalists happen to b e
made of the type of ingredient that can easily spark the
black community. This should be understood. Because to
me a powder keg is nothing without a fuse.
1 964 wilJ. be America's hottest year; her hottest year
yet; a year of much racial violence and much racial blood­
shed. But it won't be blood that's going to flow only on
one side. The new generation of black people that have
grown up in this country during recent years are already
forming the o pinion, and it's a just opinion, that if there
is to be bleeding, it should be reciprocal - bleeding on both
sides.
It should also be understood that the racial sparks
that are ignited here in America today could easily turn
into a flaming fire abroad, which means it could engulf
all the people of this earth into a giant race war. You can­
not confme it to one little neighborhood, or one little
community, or one little country. What happens to a black
man in America today h appens to the black man in Africa.
What happens to a black man in America and Africa
h appens to the black man in Asia and to the man down
in Latin America. What happens to one of us today hap­
pens to all of us. A nd when this is realized, I think that
the whites - who are intelligent even if they aren't moral
or aren't just or aren't impressed by legalities - those
who are intelligent will realize that when they touch this
one, they are touching all of them, and this in itself will
have a tendency to be a checking factor.
The seriousness of this situation must be faced up to.
I was in Cleveland last night, Cleveland, Ohio. In fact I
49
The Black Revolution
was there Friday, Saturday and yesterday. Last Friday
the warning was given that this is a year of bloodshed,
that the black man has ceased to turn the other cheek,
that he has ceased to be nonviolent, that he h as ceased to
feel that he must · be confined by all these restraints that
are put upon him by white society in struggling for what
white society says he was supposed to have had a hundred
years ago.
So today, when the black man starts reaching out for
what America says are his rights, the black man feels that
he is within his rights - when he becomes the victim of
brutality by those who are depriving him of his rights ­
to do whatever is necessary to protect himself. An example
of this w as taking place last night at this same time in
Cleveland, where the police were putting water hoses on
our people there and also throwing tear gas at them - and
they met a hail of stones, a hail of rocks, a hail of bricks.
A couple of weeks ago in Jacksonville, Florida, a young
teen-age Negro was throwing Molotov cocktails.
Well, Negroes didn't do this ten years ago. But what
you should learn from this is that they are waking up. It
was stones yesterday, Molotov cocktails today; it will be
hand grenades tomorrow and whatever else is av ailable
the next da.y. The seriousness of this situation must be
faced up to. You should not feel that I am inciting some­
one to violence. I'm only warning of a powder-keg
situation. You can take it or leave it. H you take the
warning, perhaps you can still save yourself. But if you
ignore it or ridicule it, well, death is already at your
doorstep. There are 22 million African-Americans who are
ready to fight for independence right here. When I say
fight for independence right here, I don't mean any non­
violent fight, or turn-the-other-cheek fight. Those days are
gone. Those days are over.
If George W ashington didn't get independence for this
country nonviolently, and if Patrick Henry didn't come up
with a nonviolent statement, and you taught me to look
upon them as patriots and heroes, then it's time for you to
realize that I have studied your books well. . . .
1964 will see the Negro revolt evolve and merge into
the world-wide black revolution that has been taking place
 50 Malcolm X Speaks
on this earth since 1 945. The so-called revolt will become
a real black revolution. Now the black revolution has been
taking place in Africa and Asia and Latin America; when
I say black, I mean non-white - black, brown, red or
yellow. Our b rothers and sisters in Asia, who were
colonized by the Europeans, our brothers and sisters in
Africa, who were colonized by the Europeans, and in Latin
America, the peasants, who were colonized by the Eu­
ropeans, have been involved in a struggle since 1 945 to
get the colonialists, or the colonizing powers, the Euro­
peans, off their land, out of their country.
This is a real revolution. Revolution is always based
on land. Revolution is never based on begging somebody
for an integrated cup of coffee. Revolutions are never
fought by turning the other cheek. Revolutions are never
. b ased upon Iove-your-enemy and pray-for-those-who­
spitefully-use-you. And revolutions are never waged
singing "We Shall Overcome." Revolutions are based
upon bloodshed. Revolutions are never compromising.
Revolutions are never based upon negotiations. Revolu­
tions are never based upon any kind of tokenism
whatsoever. Revolutions are never even based upon that
which is begging a corrupt society or a corrupt system to
a ccept us into it. Revolutions overturn systems. And there
is no system on this e arth which has proven itself more
corrupt, more criminal, than this system that in 1 964 still
colonizes 22 million African-Americans, still enslaves 22
million Afro-Americans.
There is no system more corrupt than a system
that represents itself as the example of freedom, the
example of democracy, and can go all over this earth
telling other people how to straighten out their house,
when you have citizens of this country who have to use
bullets if they want to cast a ballot.
The greatest weapon the colonial powers have used in
the past against our people has always been divide-and­
conquer. America is a colonial power. She has colonized
22 million Afro-Americans by depriving us of first-class
citizenship, by depriving us of civil rights, actually by
depriving us of human rights. She has not only deprived
us of the right to be a citizen, she has deprived us of the
right to be human beings. the right to be recognized and
The Black Revolution 51
respected a s men and women. I n this country the · black
can be fd'ty years old and he is still a "boy."
I grew up with white people. I was integrated before
they even invented the word and I have never met white
people yet - if you are around them long enough - who
won't refer to you as a "boy" or a "gal," no matter how
old you are or what school you came out of. no m atter
what your intellectual or professional level is. In this
society we remain ''boys.''
So America's strategy is the same strategy as that
which was used in the past by the colonial powers: divide
and conquer. She plays one Negro leader against the
other. She plays one Negro organization against the other.
She m akes us think we have different objectives, different
goals. As soon as one Negro says something. she runs
to this Negro and asks him, "What do you think about
what he said?" Why. anybody can see through that today
- except some of the Negro leaders.
All of our people have the same goals, the same
objective. That objective is freedom. justice, equality. All
of us want recognition and respect as human beings. We
don't want to be integrationists. Nor do we want to be
separationists. We want to be human beings. Integration
is only a method that is used by some groups to obtain
freedom, j ustice, equality and respect as human beings.
Separation is only a method that is used by other groups
to obtain freedom, justice, equality or human dignity.
Our people have made the mistake of confusing the
methods with the objectives. As long as we agree on ob­
jectives, we should never fall out with each other just
because we believe in different methods or tactics or
strategy to reach a common objective.
We have to keep in mind at all times that we are not
fighting for integration, nor are we fighting for separation.
We are fighting for recognition as human beings. We are
fighting for the right to live as free humans in this society.
.' In fact, we are actually fighting for rights that are even
greater than civil rights and that is human rights.
Among the so-called Negroes in this country, as a
rule the civil-rights groups, those who believe in civil
rights, spend most of their time trying to prove they are
52 Malcolm X Speaks
Americans. Their thinking is usually domestic, confined
to the boundaries of America, and they always look upon
themselves as a minority. When they look upon themselves
upon the American stage, the American stage is a white
stage. So a black man standing on that stage in America
automatically is in the minority. He is the underdog, and
in his struggle he always uses an approach that is a
begging, hat-in-hand, compromising approach.
Wherea� the other segment or section in America,
known as the black nationalists, are more interested in
human rights than they are in civil rights. And they place
more stress on human rights than they do on civil rights.
The difference between the thinking and the scope of the
Negroes who are involved in the human-rights struggle
and those who are involved in the civil-rights struggle is
that those so-called Negroes involved in the human-rights
struggle don't look upon themselves as Americans.
They look upon themselves as a part of dark man­
kind. They see the whole struggle not within the confmes
of the American stage, but they look upon the struggle
on the world stage. And, in the world context, they see that
the dark man outnumbers the white man. On the world
stage the white man is just a microscopic minority.
So in this country you find two different types of
Afro-Americans-the type who looks upon himself as a
minority and you as the majority, because his scope is
limited to the American scene; and then you have the type
who looks upon himself as part of the majority and you
as part of a microscopic minority. And this one uses a
different approach in trying to struggle for his rights. He
doesn't beg. He doesn't thank you for what you give him,
because you are only giving him what he should have had
a hundred years ago. He doesn' t think you are doing him
any favors.
He doesn't see any progress that he has made since
the Civil War. He sees not one iota of progress because,
number one, if the Civil War had freed him, he wouldn't
need civil-rights legislation today. If the Emancipation
Proclamation, issued by that great shining liberal called
Lincoln, had freed him, he wouldn't be singing "We Shall
Overcome" today. If the amendments to the Constitution
53
The Black Revolution
had solved his problem, his problem wouldn't still be here
today. And if the Supreme Court desegregation decision of
1 954 was genuinely and sincerely designed to solve his
problem, his problem wouldn't be with us today.
So this kind of black man is thinking. He can see
where every maneuver that America has made, supposedly
to solve this problem, has been nothing but political trick­
ery and treachery of the worst order. Today he doesn't
have any confidence in these so-called liberals. (1 know
that all that have come in here tonight don't call
yourselves liberals. Because that's a nasty name today.
It represents hypocrisy. ) So these two different types of
black people exist in the so-called Negro community and
they are beginning to wake up and their awakening is
producing a very dangerous situation.
.
You have whites in the community who express SlD­
cerity when they say they want to help. Well, how can they
help? How can a white person help the black man solve
his problem? Number one, you can't solve it for him.
You can help him solve it, but you can't solve it for him
today. One of the best ways that you can help him solve it
is to let the so-called Negro, who has been involved in the
civil-rights struggle, see that the civil-rights struggle must
�
be expanded beyond the level of Civil rights o human
. .
rights. Once it is expanded beyond the level of clvil nghts
to the level of human rights, it opens the door for all of
our brothers and sisters in Africa and Asia, who have
their independence, to come to our rescue.
When you go to Washington, D.C., expecting those
crooks down there-and that's what they are-to pass
some kind of civil-rights legislation to correct a very
criminal situation, what you are doing is encouraging the
black man, who is the victim, to take his case into the
court that's controlled by the criminal that made him the
victim. It will never be solved in that way. . . .
The civil-rights struggle involves the black man taking
his case to the white man's court. But when he fi,ghts it at
the human-rights level, it is a different situation. It opens
the door to take Uncle Sam to the world court. The black
man doesn't have to go to court to be free. Uncle Sam
should be taken to court and made to tell why the black
54 Malcolm X Speaks
man is not free in a so-called free society. Uncle
Sam should be taken into the United Nations and charged
with violating the UN charter of human rights.
You can forget Civil rights. How are you going to get
civil rights with men like Eastland and men like Dirksen
and men like Johnson? It has to be taken out of their
hands and taken into the hands of those whose power and
authority exceed theirs. Washington has become too cor­
rupt. U ncle Sam has become bankrupt when it comes to a
conscience - it is impossible for Uncle Sam to solve the
problem of 22 million black people in this country. I t is
absolutely impossible to do it in Uncle Sam's courts
- whether it is the Supreme Court or any other kind of
court that comes under Uncle Sam's jurisdiction.
The only alternative that the black man has in
America today is to take it out of Senator Dirksen's and
Senator Eastland's and President Johnson's jurisdiction
. and take it downtown on the East River and place it
before that body of men who represent international law,
and let them know that the human rights of black people
are being violated in a country that professes to be the
m oral leader of the free world.
Any time you have a filibuster in America, in the
Senate, in 1 964 over the rights of 22 million black people,
over the citizenship of 22 million black people, or that
will affect the freedom and justice and equality of 22
million black people. it's time for that government itself
to be taken before a world court. How can you condemn
South Africa? There are only 1 1 million of our people
in South Africa, there are 22 million of them here. And
we are receiving an injustice which is just as criminal as
that which is being done to the black people of South
Africa.
So today those whites who profess to be liberals - and
as far as I am concerned it's just lip-profession- you
understand why our people don't have civil rights. You're
white. You can go and hang out with another white liberal
and see how hypocritical they are. A lot of you Sitting
right here know that you've seen whites up in a Negro's
face with flowery words, and as soon as that Negro walks
away you listen to how your white friend talks. We have
The Black Revolution 55
black people who can pass as white. We know how you
talk.
We can see that it is nothing but a governmental con�
spiracy to continue to deprive the black people in this
country of their rights. And the only way we will get these
rights restored is by taking it out of Uncle Sam's hands.
Take him to court and charge him with genocide, the
mass murder of millions of black people in this country
- political m urder, economic murder. social murder,
mental murder. This is the crime that this government has
committed, and if you yourself don't do something abQut
it in time, you are going to open the doors for something
to be done about it from outside forces.
I read in the paper yesterday where one of the
Supreme Court j ustices, Goldberg, was crying about the
violation of . human rights of three million Jews in
the Soviet Union. Imagine this. I haven't got anything
against Jews. but that's their problem. How in the world
are you going to cry about problems on the other side of
the world when you haven't got the problems straightened
out here? How can the plight of three million Jews in
Russia be qualified to be taken to the United Nations by
a man who is a justice in this Supreme Court, . and is
supposed to be a liberal, supposed to be a friend of black
people, and hasn't opened up his mouth one time about
taking the plight of black people down here to the United
Nations? . . .
If Negroes could vote south of the - yes, if Negroes
could vote south of the Canadian border- south South, if
Negroes could vote in the southern part of the South,
Ellender wouldn't be the head of the Agricultural and
Forestry Committee, Richard Russell wouldn't be head of
the Armed Services Committee, Robertson of Virginia
wouldn't be head of the Banking and Currency Commitee.
Imagine that, all of the banking and currency of the gov­
ernment is in the hands of a cracker.
In fact, when you see how many of these committee
men are fro m the S outh, you can see that we have nothing
but a cracker government in Washington, D.C. And their
head is a cracker president. I said a cracker president.
Texas is just as much a cracker state as Mississippi. . . .
56 Malcolm X Speaks
The first thing this man did when he came in office
was invite all the big Negroes down for coffee. James
F armer was one of the first ones, the head of CORE. I
have nothing against him. He's all right - F armer, that is.
But could that same president h ave invited James F armer
to Texas for coffee? And if James Farmer went to Texas,
could he have taken his white wife with him to have coffee
with the president? Any time you have a man who can't
straighten out Texas, how can he straighten out the coun­
try? No, you're b arking up the wrong tree.
If Negroes in the South could vote, the Dixiecrats
would lose p ower. When the Dixiecrats lost power, the
Democrats would lose power. A Dixiecrat lost is a Demo­
crat lost. Therefore the two of them have to conspire with
each other to stay in power. The Northern Dixiecrat puts
all the blame on the Southern Dixiecrat. It's a con game,
a giant political con game. The job of the Northern Demo­
crat is to make the Negro think that he is our friend. He
is always smiling and wagging his tail and telling us how
much he can do for us if we vote for him. But at the same
time that he's out in front telling us what he's going to do,
behind the door he's in cahoots with the Southern Demo­
crat setting up the machinery to make sure he'll never
have to keep his promise.
This is the conspiracy that our people have faced in
this country for the past hundred years. And today you
have a new generation of black people who have come
on the scene, who have become disenchanted with the
entire system, who have become disillusioned over the
system, and who are ready now and willing to do some­
thing about it.
So, in my conclusion, in speaking about the black
revolution, America today is at a time or in a day or at
an hour where she is the first country on this earth that
can actually have a bloodless revolution. In the past,
revolutions have been bloody. Historically you just don't
have a peaceful revolution. Revolutions are bloody, revolu­
tions are violent, revolutions cause bloodshed and death
follows in their paths. America is the only country in his­
tory in . a position to bring about a revolution without
The Black Revolution 57
violence and bloodshed. But America is not morally
equipped to do so.
Why is America in a position to bring about a blood­
less revolution? Because the Negro in this country holds
the balance of power, and if the Negro in this country
were given what the Constitution says he is supposed to
have, the added power of the Negro in this country would
sweep all of the racists and the segregationists out of
office. It would change the entire political structure of the
country. It would wipe out the Southern segregationism
that now controls America's foreign policy, as well as
America' s domestic policy.
And the only way without bloodshed that this can be
brought about is that the black man has to be given full
use of the ballot in every one of the fIfty states. But if the
black m an doesn't get the b allot, then you are going to be
faced with another man who forgets the ballot and starts
using the bullet.
Revolutions are fought to get control of land, to re­
move the absentee landlord and gain control of the land
and the institutions that flow from that land. The black
man has been in a very low condition because he
has had no control whatsoever over any land. He has
been a beggar economically, a beggar politically, a
beggar socially, a beggar even when it comes to trying
to get some education. The p ast type of mentality, that
was developed in this colonial system among our people
today is being overcome. And as the young one �
come up, they know what they want. And as they listen
to your beautiful preaching about democracy and all
those other flowery words, they know what they're sup ·
posed to have.
So you have a people today who not only know what
they want, but also know what they are supposed to have.
And they themselves are creating another generation that
is coming up that not only will know what it wants and
know what it should have, but also will be ready
and willing to do whatevet is necessary to see that what
.
th ey should have materializes immediately. Thank you.
 Gloria Anzaldúa

lafíaMd
The New Mestiza

aunt lute books

SAN FRANCISCO
 5
How to Tame a Wild Tongue

"We're going to have to control

your tongue," the dentist says, pulling out all the metal from my
mouth. Silver bits plop and tinkle into the basin. My mouth is a
motherlode.
The dentist is cleaning out my
roots. I get a whiff of the stench when I gasp. "I can't cap that
tooth yet, you're still draining," he says.
"We're going to have to do
something about your tongue," I hear the anger rising in his
voice. My tongue keeps pushing out the wads of cotton, pushing
back the drills, the long thin needles. "I've never seen anything as
strong or as stubborn," he says. And I think, how do you tame a
wild tongue, train it to be quiet, how do you bridle and saddle it?
How do you make it lie down?
"Who is to say that robbing a people of
its language is than war?"
less violent
— Ray Gwyn Smith^

I remember being caught speaking Spanish at recess — that

was good for three licks on the knuckles with a sharp ruler. I

remember being sent to the corner of the classroom for "talking

back" to the Anglo teacher when all I was trying to do was tell her
how to pronounce my name. If you want to be American, speak
'American.' If you don't like it, go back to Mexico where you
belong."
"I want you to speak English. Pa' hallar buen trabajo tienes
que saber hablar el inglés bien. Qué vale toda tu educación si
 54
How to Tame a Wild Tongue

todavía hablas inglés con un 'accent,'" my mother would say,

mortified that spoke EngHsh Hke a Mexican. At Pan American
I

University, I, and all Chicano students were required to take two

speech classes. Their purpose: to get rid of our accents.
Attacks on one's form of expression with the intent to
censor are a violation of the First Amendment. El Anglo con cara
de inocente nos arrancó la lengua. Wild tongues can't be tamed,
they can only be cut out.

Overcoming the Tradition of Silence

Ahogadas, escupimos el oscuro.

Peleando con nuestra propia sombra
el silencio nos sepulta.

En boca cerrada no entran moscas. "Flies don't enter a closed

mouth" is a saying I kept hearing when I was a child. Ser
habladora was to be a gossip and a liar, to talk too much. Mucha-
chitas bien criadas, well-bred girls don't answer back. Es una falta
de respeto to talk back to one's mother or father. I remember one

of the sins I'd recite to the priest in the confession box the few
times I went to confession: talking back to my mother hablar pa'
,

'tras, repelar. Hocicona, repelona, chismosa, having a big mouth,

questioning, carrying tales are all signs of being mal criada In my

.

culture they are all words that are derogatory if applied to

—
women I've never heard them applied to men.

The first time I heard two women, a Puerto Rican and a

Cuban, say the word "nosotras," I was shocked. I had not known
the word existed. Chicanas use nosotros whether we're male or
female. We are robbed of our female being by the masculine
plural. Language is a male discourse.

And our tongues have become

dry the wilderness has
dried out our tongues and
we have forgotten speech.
—Irena Klepfisz^

Even our own people, other Spanish speakers nos quieren

poner candados en la boca. They would hold us back with their
bag of reglas de academia.
 a

55
How to Tame a Wild Tongue

Oye como ladra: el lenguaje de la frontera

Quien tiene boca se equivoca.

— Mexican saying

"Pocho, cultural traitor, you're speaking the oppressor's

language by speaking English, you're ruining the Spanish lan-
guage," I have been accused by various Latinos and Latinas.
Chicano Spanish is considered by the purist and by most Latinos
deficient, a mutilation of Spanish.
But Chicano Spanish is a border tongue which developed
naturally. Change, evolución, enriquecimiento de palabras
nuevas por invención o adopción have created variants of Chi-
cano Spanish, un nuevo lenguaje. Un lenguaje que corresponde a
un modo de vivir. Chicano Spanish is not incorrect, it is a living
language.
For a people who are neither Spanish nor live in a country in
which Spanish is the first language; for a people who live in a
country in which English is the reigning tongue but who are not
Anglo; for a people who cannot entirely identify with either
standard (formal, Castillian) Spanish nor standard English, what
recourse is left to them but to create their own language? A
language which they can connect their identity to, one capable of
communicating the realities and values true to themselves —
language with terms that are neither español ni inglés, but both.
We speak a patois, a forked tongue, a variation of two languages.
Chicano Spanish sprang out of the Chícanos' need to iden-
tify ourselves as a distinct people. We needed a language with

which we could communicate with ourselves, a secret language.

For some of us, language is a homeland closer than the
—
Southwest for many Chícanos today live in the Midwest and
the East. And because we are a complex, heterogeneous people,
we speak many languages. Some of the languages we speak are:
1. Standard English
2. Working class and slang English
3. Standard Spanish
4. Standard Mexican Spanish
5. North Mexican Spanish dialect
6. Chicano Spanish (Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and Cali-
fornia have regional variations)
7. Tex-Mex
8. Pachuco (called caló)
 56
How to Tame a Wild Tongue

My "home" tongues are the languages I speak with my sister

and brothers, with my friends. They are the last five listed, with 6
and 7 being closest to my
heart. From school, the media and job
situations, I've picked up standard and working class English.
From Mamagrande Locha and from reading Spanish and Mexi-
can literature, I've picked up Standard Spanish and Standard
Mexican Spanish. From los recién llegados, Mexican immigrants,
and braceros, I learned the North Mexican dialect. With Mexi-
cans I'll try to speak either Standard Mexican Spanish or the
North Mexican dialect. From my parents and Chícanos living in
the Valley, I picked up Chicano Texas Spanish, and I speak it with
my mom, younger brother (who married a Mexican and who
rarely mixes Spanish with English), aunts and older relatives.
With Chicanas from Nuevo México ov Arizona I will speak
Chicano Spanish a little, but often they don't understand what
I'm saying. With most California Chicanas I speak entirely in
English (unless I forget). When I first moved to San Francisco,
I'd rattle off something in Spanish, unintentionally embarrassing

them. Often it is only with another Chicana tejana that I can talk
freely.

Words distorted by English are known as anglicisms or

pochismos. The pocho is an anglicized Mexican or American of
Mexican origin who speaks Spanish with an accent characteristic
of North Americans and who distorts and reconstructs the lan-
guage according to the influence of English.^ Tex-Mex, or Spang-
lish, comes most naturally to me. I may switch back and forth

from English to Spanish in the same sentence or in the same

word. With my sister and my brother Nune and with Chicano
tejano contemporaries I speak in Tex-Mex.
From kids and people my own age I picked up Pachuco.
Pachuco (the language of the zoot suiters) is a language of
rebellion, both against Standard Spanish and Standard English. It
is a secret language. Adults of the culture and outsiders cannot

understand it. It is made up of slang words from both English and

Spanish. Ruca means girl or woman, vato means guy or dude,
chale means no, simón means yes, churro is sure, talk is periquiar,
pigionear means petting, que gacho means how nerdy, ponte
águila means watch out, death is czWed la pelona Through lack of
.

practice and not having others who can speak it, I've lost most of
the Pachuco tongue.
 57
How to Tame a Wild Tongue

Chicano Spanish
Chícanos, after 250 years of Spanish/Anglo colonization
have developed significant differences in the Spanish we speak.
We collapse two adjacent vowels into a single syllable and some-
times shift the stress in certain words such as maíz/ -maiz, cohete/
cuete. We leave out certain consonants when they appear
between vowels: lado/lao, mojado /mojao. Chícanos from South
Texas pronounce/ as/ as injue (fue). Chícanos use "archaisms,"
words that are no longer in the Spanish language, words that
have been evolved out. We say sem.os, truje, haiga, ansina, and
naiden. We retain the "archaic"/, as in jalar, that derives from an
earlier ^, (the French /?¿?/í?ror the Germanic ^i?/ow which was lost
to standard Spanish in the I6th century), but which is still found
in several regional dialects such as the one spoken in South
Texas. (Due to geography. Chícanos from the Valley of South
Texas were cut off linguistically from other Spanish speakers.
We tend to use words that the Spaniards brought over from
Medieval Spain. The majority of the Spanish colonizers in Mex-
ico and the Southwest came from Extremadura —
Hernán Cortés
—
was one of them and Andalucía. Andalucians pronounce //like
a 7, and their ds tend to be absorbed by adjacent vowels: tirado
becomes tirao. They brought el lenguaje popular, dialectos y
regionalismos.'^)
Chícanos and other Spanish speakers also shift // to y and z
to s.^ We
leave out initial syllables, saying tar for estar, toy for
estoy, hora for ahora {cubanos d^ná puertorriqueños also leave out
initial letters of some words.) We
also leave out the final syllable
such as pa for para. The intervocalic j/, the // as in tortilla, ella,
botella, gets replaced by tortia or tortiya, ea, botea. add an We
additional syllable at the beginning of certain words: atocar for
tocar, agastar for gastar. Sometimes we'll say lavaste las vacijas,
other times lavates (substituting the ates verb endings for the
aste).
We
use anglicisms, words borrowed from English: bola
from carpeta from carpet, machina de lavar (instead of
ball,
lavadora) from washing machine. Tex-Mex argot, created by
adding a Spanish sound at the beginning or end of an English
word such as cookiar for cook, watchar for watch, parkiar for
park, and rapiar for rape, is the result of the pressures on Spanish
speakers to adapt to English.
We don't use the word vosotros/as or its accompanying
verb form. We don't say claro (to mean yes), imagínate, or me
 58
How to Tame a Wild Tongue

emociona, unless we picked up Spanish from Latinas, out of a

book, or in a classroom. Other Spanish-speaking groups are
going through the same, or similar, development in their
Spanish.

Linguistic Terrorism

Deslenguadas. Somos los del español deficiente. We are

your linguistic nightmare, your linguistic aberration, your
linguistic m.estisaje, the subject of your burla. Because we
speak with tongues of fire we are culturally crucified.
Racially, culturally and linguistically somos huérfanos — we
speak an orphan tongue.

Chicanas who grew up speaking Chicano Spanish have

we speak poor Spanish. It is illegiti-
internalized the belief that
mate, a bastard language. And because we internalize how our
language has been used against us by the dominant culture, we
use our language differences against each other.
Chicana feminists often skirt around each other with suspi-
cion and hesitation. For the longest time I couldn't figure it out.
Then it dawned on me. To be close to another Chicana is like
looking into the mirror. We are afraid of what we'll see there.
Pena. Shame. Low estimation of self. In childhood we are told
that our language is wrong. Repeated attacks on our native
tongue diminish our sense of self. The attacks continue through-
out our lives.
Chicanas feel uncomfortable talking in Spanish to Latinas,
afraid of their censure. Their language was not outlawed in their
countries. They had a whole lifetime of being immersed in their
native tongue; generations, centuries in which Spanish was a
first language, taught in school, heard on radio and TV, and read
in the newspaper.
If aperson, Chicana or Latina, has a low estimation of my
native tongue, she also has a low estimation of me. Often with
mexicanas y latinas we'll speak English as a neutral language.
Even among Chicanas we tend to speak English at parties or
conferences. Yet, at the same time, we're afraid the other will
think we're agringadas because we don't speak Chicano Spanish.
We oppress each other trying to out-Chicano each other, vying to
be the "real" Chicanas, to speak like Chícanos. There is no one
Chicano language just as there is no one Chicano experience. A
 59
How to Tame a Wild Tongue

monolingual Chicana whose first language is English or Spanish

is just as much a Chicana as one who speaks several variants of
Spanish. A Chicana from Michigan or Chicago or Detroit is just
as much a Chicana as one from the Southwest. Chicano Spanish is
as diverse linguistically as it is regionally.
By the end of this century, Spanish speakers will comprise
the biggest minority group in the U.S., a country where students
in high schools and colleges are encouraged to take French classes
because French is considered more "cultured." But for a language

to remain alive it must be used.^ By the end of this century

English, and not Spanish, will be the mother tongue of most
Chícanos and Latinos.

So, if you want me, talk badly about my

to really hurt
language. Ethnic identity twin skin to linguistic identity I am
is —
my language. Until I can take pride in my language, I cannot take
pride in myself. Until I can accept as legitimate Chicano Texas
Spanish, Tex-Mex and all the other languages I speak, I cannot
accept the legitimacy of myself. Until I am free to write bilingu-
ally and to switch codes without having always to translate, while
I still have to speak English or Spanish when I would rather

speak Spanglish, and as long as I have to accommodate the

English speakers rather than having them accommodate me, my
tongue will be illegitimate.
I will no longer be made to feel ashamed of existing. I will

have my voice: Indian, Spanish, white. I will have my serpent's

—
tongue my woman's voice, my sexual voice, my poet's voice. I
will overcome the tradition of silence.

My fingers
move sly against your palm
Like women everywhere, we speak in code ....
— Melanie Kaye/Kantrowitz^

"Vistas," corridos, y comida: My Native Tongue

In the 1960s, I read my first Chicano novel. It was City of
Night by John Rechy, a gay Texan, son of a Scottish father and a
Mexican mother. For days I walked around in stunned amaze-
ment that a Chicano could write and could get published. When I
read / Am Joaquin^ I was surprised to see a bilingual book by a
Chicano in print. When I saw poetry written in Tex-Mex for the
 60
How to Tame a Wild Tongue

first time, a feeling of pure joy flashed through me. I we

felt like
really existed as a people. In 1971, when I started teaching High
School English to Chicano students, I tried to supplement the
required texts with works by Chicanos, only to be reprimanded
and forbidden to do so by the principal. He claimed that I was
supposed to teach "American" and English literature. At the risk
of being fired, I swore my students to secrecy and slipped in
Chicano short stories, poems, a play. In graduate school, while
working toward a Ph.D., I had to "argue" with one advisor after
the other, semester after semester, before I was allowed to make
Chicano literature an area of focus.
Even before I read books by Chicanos or Mexicans, it was the
Mexican movies I saw at the drive-in — the Thursday night spe-
cial of $1.00 a carload — that gave me a sense of belonging.
"Vamonos a las vistas," my mother would call out and we'd
all — grandmother, brothers, sister and cousins — squeeze into
the car. We'd wolf down cheese and bologna white bread sand-
wiches while watching Pedro Infante in melodramatic tear-
Mexican movie
jerkers like Nosotros los pobres, the first "real"
(that was not an imitation of European movies). I remember
seeing Cuando los hijos se van and surmising that all Mexican
movies played up the love a mother has for her children and what
ungrateful sons and daughters suffer when they are not devoted
to their mothers. I remember the singing-type "westerns" of
Jorge Negrete and Miquel Aceves Mejia. When watching Mexi-
can movies, I felt a sense of homecoming as well as alienation.
People who were to amount to something didn't go to Mexican
movies, or bailes or tune their radios to bolero, rancherita, and
corrido music.

The whole time I was growing up, there was norteño music
sometimes called North Mexican border music, or Tex-Mex
music, or Chicano music, or cantina (bar) music. I grew up
listening to conjuntos, three- or four-piece bands made up of folk
musicians playing guitar, bajo sexto drums and button accordion,
,

which Chicanos had borrowed from the German immigrants

who had come to Central Texas and Mexico to farm and build
breweries. In the Rio Grande Valley, Steve Jordan and Little Joe
Hernández were popular, and Flaco Jiménez was the accordian
king. The rhythms of Tex-Mex music are those of the polka, also
 61
How to Tame a Wild Tongue

adapted from the Germans, who in turn had borrowed the polka
from the Czechs and Bohemians.
I remember the hot, sultry evenings when corridos songs —
of love and death on the Texas-Mexican borderlands rever- —
berated out of cheap amplifiers from the local cantinas and
wafted in through my bedroom window.
Corridos first became widely used along the South Texas/
Mexican border during the early conflict between Chícanos and
Anglos. The corridas are usually about Mexican heroes who do
valiant deeds against the Anglo oppressors. Pancho Villa's song,
"La cucaracha," is the most famous one. Corridos of John F.
Kennedy and his death are still very popular in the Valley. Older
Chícanos remember Lydia Mendoza, one of the great border
corrido singers who was called la Gloria de Tejas. Her "El tango
negro," sung during the Great Depression, made her a singer of
the people. The everpresent corridos narrated one hundred years
of border history, bringing news of events as well as entertaining.
These folk musicians and folk songs are our chief cultural myth-
makers, and they made our hard lives seem bearable.
I grew up feeling ambivalent about our music. Country-

western and rock-and-roll had more status. In the 50s and 60s, for
the slightly educated and agringado Chícanos, there existed a
sense of shame at being caught listening to our music. Yet I
couldn't stop my feet from thumping to the music, could not stop
humming the words, nor hide from myself the exhilaration I felt
when I heard it.

There are more subtle ways that we internalize identifica-

tion, especially in the forms of images and emotions. For me food
and certain smells are tied to my identity, to my homeland.
Woodsmoke curling up to an immense blue sky; woodsmoke
perfuming my grandmother's clothes, her skin. The stench of
cow manure and the yellow patches on the ground; the crack of a
.22 rifle and the reek of cordite. Homemade white cheese sizzling
in a pan, melting inside a folded tortilla. My sister Hilda's hot,
s^'icy menudo chile colorado making it deep red, pieces oi panza
,

and hominy floating on top. My brother Carito h^thQc^umgfajitas

in the backyard. Even now and 3,000 miles away, I can see my
mother spicing the ground beef, pork and venison with chile. My
mouth salivates at the thought of the hot steaming tamales I
would be eating if I were home.
 "

62
How to Tame a Wild Tongue

Si le preguntas a mi mamá, "¿Qué eres?"

"Identity is the essential core of who

we are as individuals, the conscious
experience of the self inside."
— Kaufman^
Nosotros los Chícanos straddle the borderlands. On one side
of us,we are constantly exposed to the Spanish of the Mexicans,
on the other side we hear the Anglos' incessant clamoring so that
we forget our language. Among ourselves we don't say nosotros
los americanos, o nosotros los españoles, o nosotros los hispanos.
We say nosotros los mexicanos (by mexicanos we do not mean
citizens of Mexico; we do not mean a national identity, but a
racial one). We distinguish h^ivjeen mexicanos del otro lado and
mexicanos de este lado. Deep in our hearts we believe that being
Mexican has nothing to do with which country one lives in. Being
—
Mexican is a state of soul not one of mind, not one of citizen-
ship. Neither eagle nor serpent, but both. And like the ocean,
neither animal respects borders.

Dime con quien andas y te diré quien eres.

(Tell me who your friends are and I'll tell you who
you are.)

— Mexican saying
Si le preguntas a mi mam,á, "¿Qué eres?" te dirá, "Soy
mexicana. " My brothers and sister say the same. I sometimes will
answer "soy mexicana" and at others will say "soy Chicana" o
"soy tejana. " But I identified as "Raza" before I ever identified as
"mexicana" or "Chicana.
As a culture, we call ourselves Spanish when referring to
ourselves as a linguistic group and when copping out. It is then
that we forget our predominant Indian genes. We are 70-80%
Indian. ^° We call ourselves Hispanic^ or Spanish-American or
^

Latin American or Latin when linking ourselves to other

Spanish-speaking peoples of the Western hemisphere and when
copping out. We call ourselves Mexican-American^^ to signify we
are neither Mexican nor American, but more the noun "Ameri-
can" than the adjective "Mexican" (and when copping out).
 63
How to Tame a Wild Tongue

Chícanos and other people of color suffer economically for

not acculturating. This voluntary (yet forced) alienation makes
for psychological conflict, a kind of dual identity we don't —
identify with the Anglo-American cultural values and we don't
totally identify with the Mexican cultural values. We are a syn-
ergy of two cultures with various degrees of Mexicanness or
Angloness. I have so internalized the borderland conflict that
sometimes I feel like one cancels out the other and we are zero,
nothing, no one. A veces no soy nada ni nadie. Pero hasta cuando
no lo soy, lo soy.
When not copping out, when we know we are more than
nothing, we call ourselves Mexican, referring to race and ances-
try; mestizo when affirming both our Indian and Spanish (but we
hardly ever own our Black ancestory); Chicano when referring to
a politically aware people born and/or raised in the U.S.; Kaza
when referring to Chicanos; téjanos when we are Chícanos from
Texas.
Chicanos did not know we were a people until 1965 when
Ceasar Chavez and the farmworkers united a.nd I Joaquin was Am
published and la Raza Unida party was formed in Texas. With
that recognition, we became a distinct people. Something
momentous happened to the Chicano soul we became aware of —
our reality and acquired a name and a language (Chicano Span-
ish) that reflected that reality. Now that we had a name, some of
the fragmented pieces began to fall together who we were, —
what we were, how we had evolved. We began to get glimpses of
what we might eventually become.
Yet the struggle of identities continues, the struggle of
borders is our reality still. One day the inner struggle will cease
and a true integration take place. In the meantime, tenemos que
hacerla lucha. ¿Quién está protegiendo los ranchos de mi gente?
¿Quién está tratando de cerrar la fisura entre la india y el blanco
en nuestra sangre? El Chicano, si, el Chicano que anda como un
ladrón en su propia casa.

Los Chicanos, how patient we seem, how very patient.

There is the quiet of the Indian about us.^^ We know how to
survive. When other races have given up their tongue, we've kept
ours.We know what it is to live under the hammer blow of the
dominant norteamericano culture. But more than we count the
blows, we count the days the weeks the years the centuries the
 64
How to Tame a Wild Tongue

eons until the white laws and commerce and customs will rot in
the deserts they've created, lie bleached. Humildes yet proud,
quietos yet wild, nosotros los mexicanos -Chicanos will walk by
the crumbling ashes as we go about our business. Stubborn,
persevering, impenetrable as stone, yet possessing a malleability
that renders us unbreakable, we, the mestizas and mestizos, will
remain.
PRES. GEORGE W. BUSH’S ADDRESS TO THE NATION AFTER THE TERRORIST
ATTACKS OF 9/11

BUSH: Mr. Speaker, Mr. President Pro Tempore, members of Congress, and fellow
Americans, in the normal course of events, presidents come to this chamber to report on
the state of the union. Tonight, no such report is needed; it has already been delivered by
the American people.

We have seen it in the courage of passengers who rushed terrorists to save others on the
ground. Passengers like an exceptional man named Todd Beamer. And would you please
help me welcome his wife Lisa Beamer here tonight?

(APPLAUSE)

We have seen the state of our union in the endurance of rescuers working past exhaustion.

We've seen the unfurling of flags, the lighting of candles, the giving of blood, the saying of
prayers in English, Hebrew and Arabic.

We have seen the decency of a loving and giving people who have made the grief of
strangers their own.

My fellow citizens, for the last nine days, the entire world has seen for itself the state of
union, and it is strong.

(APPLAUSE)

Tonight, we are a country awakened to danger and called to defend freedom. Our grief has
turned to anger and anger to resolution. Whether we bring our enemies to justice or bring
justice to our enemies, justice will be done.

(APPLAUSE)

I thank the Congress for its leadership at such an important time.

All of America was touched on the evening of the tragedy to see Republicans and Democrats
joined together on the steps of this Capitol singing ``God Bless America.''

And you did more than sing. You acted, by delivering $40 billion to rebuild our communities
and meet the needs of our military. Speaker Hastert, Minority Leader Gephardt, Majority
Leader Daschle and Senator Lott, I thank you for your friendship, for your leadership and
for your service to our country.

(APPLAUSE)
And on behalf of the American people, I thank the world for its outpouring of support.

America will never forget the sounds of our national anthem playing at Buckingham Palace,
on the streets of Paris and at Berlin's Brandenburg Gate.

We will not forget South Korean children gathering to pray outside our embassy in Seoul, or
the prayers of sympathy offered at a mosque in Cairo.

We will not forget moments of silence and days of mourning in Australia and Africa and
Latin America.

Nor will we forget the citizens of 80 other nations who died with our own. Dozens of
Pakistanis, more than 130 Israelis, more than 250 citizens of India, men and women from El
Salvador, Iran, Mexico and Japan, and hundreds of British citizens.

America has no truer friend than Great Britain.

(APPLAUSE)

Once again, we are joined together in a great cause.

I'm so honored the British prime minister had crossed an ocean to show his unity with
America.

Thank you for coming, friend.

(APPLAUSE)

On September the 11th, enemies of freedom committed an act of war against our country.
Americans have known wars, but for the past 136 years they have been wars on foreign
soil, except for one Sunday in 1941. Americans have known the casualties of war, but not at
the center of a great city on a peaceful morning.

Americans have known surprise attacks, but never before on thousands of civilians.

All of this was brought upon us in a single day, and night fell on a different world, a world
where freedom itself is under attack.

Americans have many questions tonight. Americans are asking, ``Who attacked our
country?''

The evidence we have gathered all points to a collection of loosely affiliated terrorist
organizations known as al Qaeda. They are some of the murderers indicted for bombing
American embassies in Tanzania and Kenya and responsible for bombing the USS Cole.
Al Qaeda is to terror what the Mafia is to crime. But its goal is not making money, its goal is
remaking the world and imposing its radical beliefs on people everywhere.

The terrorists practice a fringe form of Islamic extremism that has been rejected by Muslim
scholars and the vast majority of Muslim clerics; a fringe movement that perverts the
peaceful teachings of Islam.

The terrorists' directive commands them to kill Christians and Jews, to kill all Americans
and make no distinctions among military and civilians, including women and children.

This group and its leader, a person named Osama bin Laden, are linked to many other
organizations in different countries, including the Egyptian Islamic Jihad, the Islamic
Movement of Uzbekistan.

There are thousands of these terrorists in more than 60 countries.

They are recruited from their own nations and neighborhoods and brought to camps in
places like Afghanistan where they are trained in the tactics of terror. They are sent back to
their homes or sent to hide in countries around the world to plot evil and destruction.

The leadership of Al Qaeda has great influence in Afghanistan and supports the Taliban
regime in controlling most of that country. In Afghanistan we see Al Qaeda's vision for the
world. Afghanistan's people have been brutalized, many are starving and many have fled.

Women are not allowed to attend school. You can be jailed for owning a television. Religion
can be practiced only as their leaders dictate. A man can be jailed in Afghanistan if his beard
is not long enough.

The United States respects the people of Afghanistan--after all, we are currently its largest
source of humanitarian aid--but we condemn the Taliban regime.

(APPLAUSE)

It is not only repressing its own people, it is threatening people everywhere by sponsoring
and sheltering and supplying terrorists.

By aiding and abetting murder, the Taliban regime is committing murder. And tonight the
United States of America makes the following demands on the Taliban.

Deliver to United States authorities all of the leaders of Al Quaeda who hide in your land.

(APPLAUSE)

Release all foreign nationals, including American citizens you have unjustly imprisoned.
Protect foreign journalists, diplomats and aid workers in your country. Close immediately
and permanently every terrorist training camp in Afghanistan. And hand over every
terrorist and every person and their support structure to appropriate authorities.

(APPLAUSE) Give the United States full access to terrorist training camps, so we can make
sure they are no longer operating.

These demands are not open to negotiation or discussion.

(APPLAUSE)

The Taliban must act and act immediately.

They will hand over the terrorists or they will share in their fate.

I also want to speak tonight directly to Muslims throughout the world. We respect your
faith. It's practiced freely by many millions of Americans and by millions more in countries
that America counts as friends. Its teachings are good and peaceful, and those who commit
evil in the name of Allah blaspheme the name of Allah.

(APPLAUSE)

The terrorists are traitors to their own faith, trying, in effect, to hijack Islam itself.

The enemy of America is not our many Muslim friends. It is not our many Arab friends. Our
enemy is a radical network of terrorists and every government that supports them.

(APPLAUSE)

Our war on terror begins with Al Qaeda, but it does not end there.

It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped and
defeated.

(APPLAUSE)

Americans are asking ``Why do they hate us?''

They hate what they see right here in this chamber: a democratically elected government.
Their leaders are self-appointed. They hate our freedoms: our freedom of religion, our
freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and disagree with each other.

They want to overthrow existing governments in many Muslim countries such as Egypt,
Saudi Arabia and Jordan. They want to drive Israel out of the Middle East. They want to
drive Christians and Jews out of vast regions of Asia and Africa.
These terrorists kill not merely to end lives, but to disrupt and end a way of life. With every
atrocity, they hope that America grows fearful, retreating from the world and forsaking our
friends. They stand against us because we stand in their way.

We're not deceived by their pretenses to piety.

We have seen their kind before. They're the heirs of all the murderous ideologies of the
20th century. By sacrificing human life to serve their radical visions, by abandoning every
value except the will to power, they follow in the path of fascism, Nazism and
totalitarianism. And they will follow that path all the way to where it ends in history's
unmarked grave of discarded lies.

(APPLAUSE)

Americans are asking, "How will we fight and win this war?''

We will direct every resource at our command--every means of diplomacy, every tool of
intelligence, every instrument of law enforcement, every financial influence, and every
necessary weapon of war--to the destruction and to the defeat of the global terror network.

Now, this war will not be like the war against Iraq a decade ago, with a decisive liberation of
territory and a swift conclusion. It will not look like the air war above Kosovo two years
ago, where no ground troops were used and not a single American was lost in combat.

Our response involves far more than instant retaliation and isolated strikes. Americans
should not expect one battle, but a lengthy campaign unlike any other we have ever seen. It
may include dramatic strikes visible on TV and covert operations secret even in success.

We will starve terrorists of funding, turn them one against another, drive them from place
to place until there is no refuge or no rest.

And we will pursue nations that provide aid or safe haven to terrorism. Every nation in
every region now has a decision to make: Either you are with us or you are with the
terrorists.

(APPLAUSE)

From this day forward, any nation that continues to harbor or support terrorism will be
regarded by the United States as a hostile regime. Our nation has been put on notice, we're
not immune from attack. We will take defensive measures against terrorism to protect
Americans.

Today, dozens of federal departments and agencies, as well as state and local governments,
have responsibilities affecting homeland security.
These efforts must be coordinated at the highest level. So tonight, I announce the creation of
a Cabinet-level position reporting directly to me, the Office of Homeland Security.

And tonight, I also announce a distinguished American to lead this effort, to strengthen
American security: a military veteran, an effective governor, a true patriot, a trusted friend,
Pennsylvania's Tom Ridge.

(APPLAUSE)

He will lead, oversee and coordinate a comprehensive national strategy to safeguard our
country against terrorism and respond to any attacks that may come.

These measures are essential. The only way to defeat terrorism as a threat to our way of life
is to stop it, eliminate it and destroy it where it grows.

(APPLAUSE)

Many will be involved in this effort, from FBI agents, to intelligence operatives, to the
reservists we have called to active duty. All deserve our thanks, and all have our prayers.

And tonight a few miles from the damaged Pentagon, I have a message for our military: Be
ready. I have called the armed forces to alert, and there is a reason.

The hour is coming when America will act, and you will make us proud.

This is not, however, just America's fight. And what is at stake is not just America's
freedom.

This is the world's fight. This is civilization's fight. This is the fight of all who believe in
progress and pluralism, tolerance and freedom.

We ask every nation to join us. We will ask and we will need the help of police forces,
intelligence service and banking systems around the world. The United States is grateful
that many nations and many international organizations have already responded with
sympathy and with support--nations from Latin America to Asia to Africa to Europe to the
Islamic world.

Perhaps the NATO charter reflects best the attitude of the world: An attack on one is an
attack on all. The civilized world is rallying to America's side.

They understand that if this terror goes unpunished, their own cities, their own citizens
may be next. Terror unanswered can not only bring down buildings, it can threaten the
stability of legitimate governments.

And you know what? We're not going to allow it.

(APPLAUSE)

Americans are asking, ``What is expected of us?''

I ask you to live your lives and hug your children.

I know many citizens have fears tonight, and I ask you to be calm and resolute, even in the
face of a continuing threat.

I ask you to uphold the values of America and remember why so many have come here.

We're in a fight for our principles, and our first responsibility is to live by them. No one
should be singled out for unfair treatment or unkind words because of their ethnic
background or religious faith.

(APPLAUSE)

I ask you to continue to support the victims of this tragedy with your contributions. Those
who want to give can go to a central source of information, Libertyunites.org, to find the
names of groups providing direct help in New York, Pennsylvania and Virginia.

The thousands of FBI agents who are now at work in this investigation may need your
cooperation, and I ask you to give it. I ask for your patience with the delays and
inconveniences that may accompany tighter security and for your patience in what will be a
long struggle.

I ask your continued participation and confidence in the American economy. Terrorists
attacked a symbol of American prosperity; they did not touch its source.

America is successful because of the hard work and creativity and enterprise of our people.
These were the true strengths of our economy before September 11, and they are our
strengths today.

And finally, please continue praying for the victims of terror and their families, for those in
uniform and for our great country. Prayer has comforted us in sorrow and will help
strengthen us for the journey ahead.

Tonight I thank my fellow Americans for what you have already done and for what you will
do.

And ladies and gentlemen of the Congress, I thank you, their representatives, for what you
have already done and for what we will do together.

Tonight we face new and sudden national challenges.

We will come together to improve air safety, to dramatically expand the number of air
marshals on domestic flights and take new measures to prevent hijacking.

We will come together to promote stability and keep our airlines flying with direct
assistance during this emergency.

(APPLAUSE)

We will come together to give law enforcement the additional tools it needs to track down
terror here at home.

(APPLAUSE)

We will come together to strengthen our intelligence capabilities to know the plans of
terrorists before they act and to find them before they strike.

(APPLAUSE)

We will come together to take active steps that strengthen America's economy and put our
people back to work.

Tonight, we welcome two leaders who embody the extraordinary spirit of all New Yorkers,
Governor George Pataki and Mayor Rudolph Giuliani.

(APPLAUSE)

As a symbol of America's resolve, my administration will work with Congress and these two
leaders to show the world that we will rebuild New York City.

(APPLAUSE)

After all that has just passed, all the lives taken and all the possibilities and hopes that died
with them, it is natural to wonder if America's future is one of fear.

Some speak of an age of terror. I know there are struggles ahead and dangers to face. But
this country will define our times, not be defined by them.

As long as the United States of America is determined and strong, this will not be an age of
terror. This will be an age of liberty here and across the world.

(APPLAUSE)

Great harm has been done to us. We have suffered great loss. And in our grief and anger we
have found our mission and our moment.
Freedom and fear are at war. The advance of human freedom, the great achievement of our
time and the great hope of every time, now depends on us.

Our nation, this generation, will lift the dark threat of violence from our people and our
future. We will rally the world to this cause by our efforts, by our courage. We will not tire,
we will not falter and we will not fail.

(APPLAUSE)

It is my hope that in the months and years ahead life will return almost to normal. We'll go
back to our lives and routines and that is good.

Even grief recedes with time and grace.

But our resolve must not pass. Each of us will remember what happened that day and to
whom it happened. We will remember the moment the news came, where we were and
what we were doing.

Some will remember an image of a fire or story or rescue. Some will carry memories of a
face and a voice gone forever.

And I will carry this. It is the police shield of a man named George Howard who died at the
World Trade Center trying to save others.

It was given to me by his mom, Arlene (ph), as a proud memorial to her son. It is my
reminder of lives that ended and a task that does not end.

(APPLAUSE)

I will not forget the wound to our country and those who inflicted it. I will not yield, I will
not rest, I will not relent in waging this struggle for freedom and security for the American
people.

The course of this conflict is not known, yet its outcome is certain. Freedom and fear, justice
and cruelty, have always been at war, and we know that God is not neutral between them.

(APPLAUSE)

Fellow citizens, we'll meet violence with patient justice, assured of the rightness of our
cause and confident of the victories to come.

In all that lies before us, may God grant us wisdom and may he watch over the United States
of America.

Thank you.
(APPLAUSE)

© 2001 The Washington Post Company

 Race 231

summon her spirit, or whether honoring her memory demanded

something more.
I thought about what that woman in Houston had whispered
to me, and wondered how we might be judged, in those days
after the levee broke.

When I meet people for the first time, they sometimes quote
back to me a line in my speech at the 2004 Democratic National
Convention that seemed to strike a chord: “There is not a black
America and white America and Latino America and Asian
America—there’s the United States of America.” For them, it
seems to capture a vision of America finally freed from the past
of Jim Crow and slavery, Japanese internment camps and Mexi-
can braceros, workplace tensions and cultural conflict—an Amer-
ica that fulfills Dr. King’s promise that we be judged not by the
color of our skin but by the content of our character.
In a sense I have no choice but to believe in this vision of Amer-
ica. As the child of a black man and a white woman, someone who
was born in the racial melting pot of Hawaii, with a sister who’s
half Indonesian but who’s usually mistaken for Mexican or Puerto
Rican, and a brother-in-law and niece of Chinese descent, with
some blood relatives who resemble Margaret Thatcher and oth-
ers who could pass for Bernie Mac, so that family get-togethers
over Christmas take on the appearance of a UN General Assem-
bly meeting, I’ve never had the option of restricting my loyalties
on the basis of race, or measuring my worth on the basis of tribe.
Moreover, I believe that part of America’s genius has always
been its ability to absorb newcomers, to forge a national identity
out of the disparate lot that arrived on our shores. In this we’ve
been aided by a Constitution that—despite being marred by the
original sin of slavery—has at its very core the idea of equal citi-
zenship under the law; and an economic system that, more than
232 T h e AU DAC I T Y o f H O P E

any other, has offered opportunity to all comers, regardless of

status or title or rank. Of course, racism and nativist sentiments
have repeatedly undermined these ideals; the powerful and the
privileged have often exploited or stirred prejudice to further
their own ends. But in the hands of reformers, from Tubman to
Douglass to Chavez to King, these ideals of equality have gradu-
ally shaped how we understand ourselves and allowed us to form
a multicultural nation the likes of which exists nowhere else on
earth.
Finally, those lines in my speech describe the demographic real-
ities of America’s future. Already, Texas, California, New Mex-
ico, Hawaii, and the District of Columbia are majority minority.
Twelve other states have populations that are more than a third
Latino, black, and/or Asian. Latino Americans now number forty-
two million and are the fastest-growing demographic group,
accounting for almost half of the nation’s population growth be-
tween 2004 and 2005; the Asian American population, though
far smaller, has experienced a similar surge and is expected to in-
crease by more than 200 percent over the next forty-five years.
Shortly after 2050, experts project, America will no longer be a
majority white country—with consequences for our economics,
our politics, and our culture that we cannot fully anticipate.
Still, when I hear commentators interpreting my speech to
mean that we have arrived at a “postracial politics” or that we
already live in a color-blind society, I have to offer a word of cau-
tion. To say that we are one people is not to suggest that race
no longer matters—that the fight for equality has been won, or
that the problems that minorities face in this country today are
largely self-inflicted. We know the statistics: On almost every
single socioeconomic indicator, from infant mortality to life ex-
pectancy to employment to home ownership, black and Latino
Americans in particular continue to lag far behind their white
counterparts. In corporate boardrooms across America, minori-
ties are grossly underrepresented; in the United States Senate,
 Race 233

there are only three Latinos and two Asian members (both from
Hawaii), and as I write today I am the chamber’s sole African
American. To suggest that our racial attitudes play no part in
these disparities is to turn a blind eye to both our history and our
experience—and to relieve ourselves of the responsibility to make
things right.
Moreover, while my own upbringing hardly typifies the Afri-
can American experience—and although, largely through luck
and circumstance, I now occupy a position that insulates me from
most of the bumps and bruises that the average black man must
endure—I can recite the usual litany of petty slights that during
my forty-five years have been directed my way: security guards
tailing me as I shop in department stores, white couples who toss
me their car keys as I stand outside a restaurant waiting for the
valet, police cars pulling me over for no apparent reason. I know
what it’s like to have people tell me I can’t do something because
of my color, and I know the bitter swill of swallowed-back anger.
I know as well that Michelle and I must be continually vigilant
against some of the debilitating story lines that our daughters
may absorb—from TV and music and friends and the streets—
about who the world thinks they are, and what the world imag-
ines they should be.
To think clearly about race, then, requires us to see the world
on a split screen—to maintain in our sights the kind of America
that we want while looking squarely at America as it is, to ac-
knowledge the sins of our past and the challenges of the present
without becoming trapped in cynicism or despair. I have wit-
nessed a profound shift in race relations in my lifetime. I have
felt it as surely as one feels a change in the temperature. When I
hear some in the black community deny those changes, I think it
not only dishonors those who struggled on our behalf but also
robs us of our agency to complete the work they began. But as
much as I insist that things have gotten better, I am mindful of
this truth as well: Better isn’t good enough.
Between
the World
and Me

Ta-N ehisi Coates

SPIEGEL & GRAU

NEW YORK
 BETWEEN T H E WORLD A N D M E 101

ten years old. But even then I knew that I must trouble
you, and this meant taking you into rooms where people
would insult your intelligence, where thieves would try to
enlist you in your own robbery and disguise their burning
and looting as Christian charity. But robbery is what this
is, what it always was.
At the onset of the Civil War, our stolen bodies were
worth four billion dollars, more than all of American in­
dustry, all ofAmerican railroads, workshops, and factories
combined, and the prime product rendered by our stolen
bodies-cotton-was America's primary export. The rich­
est men in America lived in the Mississippi River Valley,
and they made their riches off our stolen bodies. Our bod­
ies were held in bondage by the early presidents. Our bod­
ies were traded from the White House by James K. Polk.
Our bodies built the Capitol and the National Mall. The
first shot of the Civil War was fired in South Carolina,
where our bodies constituted the majority of human bod­
ies in the state. Here is the motive for the great war. It's not
a secret. But we can do better and find the bandit confess­
ing his crime. "Our position is thoroughly identified with
the institution of slavery;' declared Mississippi as it left the
Union, "the greatest material interest of the world."
Do you remember standing with me and your mother,
during one of our visits to Gettysburg, outside the home
of Abraham Brian? We were with a young man who'd
educated himself on the history of black people in Get­
tysburg. He explained that Brian Farm was the far end of
102 TA- N E H I S I COATES

the line that was charged by George Pickett on the final

day of Gettysburg. He told us that Brian was a black man,
that Gettysburg was home to a free black community, that
Brian and his family fled their home for fear oflosing their
bodies to the advancing army of enslavement, led by the
honored and holy Confederate general Robert E. Lee,
whose army was then stealing black people from them­
selves and selling them south. George Pickett and his
troops were repulsed by the Union Army. Standing there,
a century and a half later, I thought of one of Faulkner's
characters famously recalling how this failure tantalized
the minds of all"Southern" boys-" It's all in the balance,
it hasn't happened yet, it hasn't even begun. . . ." All of
Faulkner's Southern boys were white. But I, standing on
the farm of a black man who fled with his family to stay
free of the South, saw Pickett's soldiers charging through
history; in wild pursuit of their strange birthright-the
right to beat, rape, rob, and pillage the black body. That is
all of what was "in the balance," the nostalgic moment's
corrupt and unspeakable core.
But American reunion was built on a comfortable nar­
rative that ·made enslavement into benevolence, white
knights of body snatchers, and the mass slaughter of the
war into a kind of sport in which one could conclude that
both sides conducted their affairs with courage, honor, and
e!an. This lie of the Civil War is the lie of innocence, is the
Dream. Historians conjured the Dream. Hollywood forti­
fied the Dream. The Dream was gilded by novels and ad-
 BETWEEN T H E WORLD A N D M E 103

venture stories. John Carter flees the broken Confederacy

for Mars. We are not supposed to ask what, precisely, he
was running from. I, like every kid I knew, loved The Dukes
of Hazzard. But I would have done well to think more
about why two outlaws, driving a car named the General
Lee, must necessarily be portrayed as "just some good ole
boys, never meanin' no harm"-a mantra for the Dream­
ers if there ever was one. But what one "means" is neither
important nor relevant. It is not necessary that you believe
that the officer who choked Eric Garner set out that day
to destroy a body. All you need to understand is that the
officer carries with him the power of the American state
and the weight of an American legacy, and they necessitate
that of the bodies destroyed every year, some wild and
disproportionate number of them will be black.
Here is what I would like for you to know: In America,
it is traditional to destroy the black body-it is heritage.
Enslavement was not merely the antiseptic borrowing of
labor-it is not so easy to get a human being to commit
their body against its own elemental interest. And so en­
slavement must be casual wrath and random manglings,
the gashing of heads and brains blown out over the river as
the body seeks to escape. It must be rape so regular as to
be industrial. There is no uplifting way to say this. I have
no praise anthems, nor old Negro spirituals. The spirit and
soul are the body and brain, which are destructible-that
is precisely why they are so precious. And the soul did not
escape. The spirit did not steal away on gospel wings. The
104 TA- N E H I S I COATES

soul was the body that fed the tobacco, and the spirit was
the blood that watered the cotton, and these created the
first fruits of the American garden. And the fruits were
secured through the bashing of children with stovewood,
through hot iron peeling skin away like husk from corn.
It had to be blood. It had to be nails driven through
tongue and ears pruned away. "Some disobedience;· wrote
a Southern mistress. "Much idleness, sullenness, slovenli­
ness . . . . Used the rod:' It had to be the thrashing ofkitchen
hands for the crime of churning butrer at a leisurely clip. It
had to some woman "chear'd . . . with thirty lashes a Satur­
day last and as many more a Tuesday again:' It could only
be the employment of carriage whips, tongs, iron pokers,
handsaws, stones, paperweights, or whatever might be
handy to break the black body, the black family, the black
community, the black nation. The bodies were pulverized
into stock and marked with insurance. And the bodies
were an aspiration, lucrative as Indian land, a veranda, a
beautiful wife, or a summer home in the mountains. For
the men who needed to believe themselves white, the
bodies were the key to a social club, and the right to break
the bodies was the mark of civilization. "The two great
divisions of society are not the rich and poor, but white
and black;' said the great South Carolina senator John C.
Calhoun. "And all the former, the poor as well as the rich,
belong to the upper class, and are respected and treated as
equals." And there it is-the right to break the black body
as the meaning of their sacred equality. And that right has
 B E T W E E N T H E WORLD A N D M E 105

always given them meaning, has always meant that there

was someone down in the valley because a mountain is
not a mountain if there is nothing below:
You and I, my son, are that "below." That was true in
1776. It is true today. There is no them without you, and
without the right to break you they must necessarily fall
from the mountain, lose their divinity, and tumble out of
the Dream. And then they would have to determine how
to build their suburbs on something other than human
bones, how to angle their jails toward something other
than a human stockyard, how to erect a democracy inde­
pendent of cannibalism. But because they believe them­
selves to be white, they would rather countenance a man
choked to death on film under their laws. And they would
rather subscribe to the myth of Trayvon Martin, slight
teenager, hands full of candy and soft drinks, transforming
into a murderous juggernaut. And they would rather see
Prince Jories followed by a bad cop through three jurisdic­
tions and shot down for acting like a human. And they
would rather reach out, in all their sanity, and push my
four-year-old son as though he were merely an obstacle in
the path of their too-important day.
I was there, Samori. No. I was back in Baltimore sur­
rounded by them boys. I was on my parents' living room
floor, staring out at that distant world, impenetrable to me.
I was in all the anger of my years. I was where Eric Garner

.. Thavolia Glymph, Out ofthe House efBondage.

President Donald Trump’s full inaugural address remarks.

Chief Justice Roberts, President Carter, President Clinton, President Bush, President
Obama, fellow Americans, and people of the world, thank you. We the citizens of America
are now joined in a great national effort to rebuild our country and restore its promise for all
of our people. Together we will determine the course of America, and the world, for many,
many years to come. We will face challenges. We will confront hardships, but we will get the
job done.

Every four years, we gather on these steps to carry out the orderly and peaceful transfer of
power, and we are grateful to President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama for their
gracious aid throughout this transition. They have been magnificent. Thank you.

Today’s ceremony, however, has very special meaning, because today we are not merely
transferring power from one administration to another, or from one party to another, but we
are transferring power from Washington, D.C., and giving it back to you, the people.

For too long, a small group in our nation’s capital has reaped the rewards of government,
while the people have borne the cost. Washington flourished, but the people did not share in
its wealth. Politicians prospered, but the jobs left and the factories closed. The establishment
protected itself, but not the citizens of our country. Their victories have not been your
victories. Their triumphs have not been your triumphs, and while they celebrated in our
nation’s capital, there was little to celebrate for struggling families all across our land. That
all changes, starting right here and right now, because this moment is your moment–it
belongs to you. It belongs to everyone gathered here today, and everyone watching, all
across America. This is your day. This is your celebration, and this, the United States of
America, is your country.

What truly matters is not which party controls our government, but whether our government
is controlled by the people. January 20th, 2017 will be remembered as the day the people
became the rulers of this nation again. The forgotten men and women of our country, will be
forgotten no longer. Everyone is listening to you now. You came by the tens of millions to
become part of a historic movement, the likes of which the world has never seen before. At
the center of this movement is a crucial conviction, that a nation exists to serve its citizens.
Americans want great schools for their children, safe neighborhoods for their families, and
good jobs for themselves. These are just and reasonable demands of righteous people and a
righteous public, but for too many of our citizens a different reality exists. Mothers and
children trapped in poverty in our inner cities, rusted out factories, scattered like tombstones
across the across the landscape of our nation, an education system flush with cash, but which
leaves our young and beautiful students deprived of all knowledge, and the crime, and the
gangs, and the drugs that have stolen too many lives and robbed our country of so much
unrealized potential. This American carnage stops right here and stops right now.

We are one nation and their pain is our pain. Their dreams are our dreams and their success
will be our success. We share one heart, one home, and one glorious destiny. The oath of
office, I take today, is an oath of allegiance to all Americans. For many decades, we’ve
enriched foreign industry at the expense of American industry, subsidized the armies of
other countries, while allowing for the very sad depletion of our military. We’ve defended
other nation’s borders while refusing to defend our own. And spent trillions and trillions of
dollars overseas, while America’s infrastructure has fallen into disrepair and decay. We’ve
made other countries rich while the wealth, strength and confidence of our country has
dissipated over the horizon. One by one, the factories shuddered and left our shores, with
not even a thought about the millions and millions of American workers that were left
behind. The wealth of our middle class has been ripped from their homes and then
redistributed all across the world.

But that is the past, and now we are looking only to the future. We assembled here today our
issuing a new decree to be heard in every city, in every foreign capital, and in every hall of
power, from this day forward: a new vision will govern our land, from this day forward, it’s
going to be only America first. America first.

Every decision on trade, on taxes, on immigration, on foreign affairs will be made to benefit
American workers and American families. We must protect our borders from the ravages of
other countries making our products, stealing our companies and destroying our jobs.
Protection will lead to great prosperity and strength. I will fight for you with every breath in
my body, and I will never, ever let you down. America will start winning again, winning like
never before. We will bring back our jobs. We will bring back our borders. We will bring back
our wealth, and we will bring back our dreams. We will build new roads and highways and
bridges and airports and tunnels, and railways, all across our wonderful nation. We will get
our people off of welfare and back to work, rebuilding our country with American hands and
American labor.

We will follow two simple rules: buy American, and hire American. We will seek friendship
and goodwill with the nations of the world, but we do so with the understanding that it is the
right of all nations to put their own interests first. We do not seek to impose our way of life
on anyone, but rather to let it shine as an example. We will shine for everyone to follow. We
will reinforce old alliances and form new ones, and you unite the civilized world against
radical Islamic terrorism, which we will eradicate completely from the face of the Earth.
At the bedrock of our politics will be a total allegiance to the United States of America, and
through our loyalty to our country, we will rediscover our loyalty to each other. When you
open your heart to patriotism, there is no room for prejudice. The Bible tells us, how good
and pleasant it is when God’s people live together in unity. We must speak our minds openly,
debate our disagreements, but always pursue solidarity. When America is united, America is
totally unstoppable. There should be no fear. We are protected, and we will always be
protected. We will be protected by the great men and women of our military and law
enforcement. And most importantly, we will be protected by God.

Finally, we must think big and dream even bigger. In America, we understand that a nation
is only living as long as it is striving. We will no longer accept politicians who are all talk and
no action, constantly complaining but never doing anything about it. The time for empty talk
is over. Now arrives the hour of action. Do not allow anyone to tell you that it cannot be done.
No challenge can match the heart and fight and spirit of America. We will not fail. Our
country will thrive and prosper again.

We stand at the birth of a new millennium, ready to unlock the mysteries of space, to free the
Earth from the miseries of disease and to harness the industries and technologies of
tomorrow. A new national pride will stir our souls, lift our sights and heal our divisions. It’s
time to remember that old wisdom our soldiers will never forget, that whether we are black,
or brown, or white, we all bleed the same red blood of patriots. We all enjoy the same glorious
freedoms, and we all salute the same, great American flag. And whether a child is born in the
urban sprawl of Detroit or the windswept plains of Nebraska, they look up at the at the same
night sky, they fill their heart with the same dreams and they are infused with the breath of
life by the same almighty creator.

So to all Americans, in every city near and far, small and large, from mountain to mountain,
from ocean to ocean, hear these words. You will never be ignored again. Your voice, your
hopes, and your dreams will define our American destiny. And your courage and goodness
and love, will forever guide us along the way. Together, we will make America strong again.
We will make America wealthy again. We will make America proud again We will make
America safe again, And yes, together, we will make we will make America great again.
Thank you. God bless you. And God bless America. Thank you. God bless America.