CALIFORNIA FLEEING

"In the midst of this gathering ferment , news reached us from Mazatlan of the declaration of war between the United States and Mexico, and I deemed it fully time to leave . Colonel Fremont was at that juncture approaching from Oregon with a force, if combined with Americans resident there, sufficient to conquer the whole country, and I would have liked exceedingly to join his forces , but to have proceeded toward him would have subjected me to mistrust , and consequent capture and imprisonment . If I looked south, the same difficulties menaced me, and the west conducted me to the Pacific Ocean . "I had but little time to deliberate . My people was at war with the country I was living in; I had become security for the authorities for the good behavior of several of my fellow countrymen , and I was under recognizances for my own conduct. The least misadventure would compromise me, and I was impatient to get away. My only retreat was eastward; so, considering all things fair in times of war, I , together with five trusty Americans, collected eighteen hundred stray horses we found we found roaming on the Californian ranchos, and started with our utmost speed from Pueblo de Angeles. This was a fair capture and our morals justified it, for it was wartime. We knew we should be pursued, and we lost no time making toward home . We kept our herd jogging for five days and nights , only resting once a day to eat , and afford the animals time to crop a mouthful of grass. We killed a fat colt occasionally which supplied us with meat , and very delicious meat too--rather costly, but the cheapest and the handiest we could obtain. After five days chase our pursuers relaxed their speed, and we ourselves drove more leisurely. We again found the advantage I have often spoken of before of having a drove of horses before us, for, as the animals we bestrode gave out, we could shift to a fresh one, while our pursuers were confined to one steed. "When we arrived at my fort on the Arkansas, we had over a thousand head of horses, all in good condition. There was a general rejoicing among the little community at my safe arrival, the Indians also coming to bid me welcome. I found my wife married again, having been deceived by a false communication. Her present husband has brought her a missive, purporting to be of my inditing, wherein I expressed indifference toward her person, disinclination to return home, and tendering her a discharge of all connubial obligation. She accepted the document as authentic, and solaced her abandonment by espousing her husband's messenger. My return acquainted her with the truth of the matter. She manifested extreme regret at having suffered herself to be imposed upon so readily , and, as a remedy for the evil, offered herself back again ; but I declined, preferring once more to enjoy the sweets of single blessedness ." P. 474-475, THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF JAMES P. BECKWOURTH (1856, 1981)

GRANDDADDYS LEGACY

A deep conversation with granddaddy at age 12 was a defining moment of my life. Anthony Bailey was "an Ethiopian, not a nigger," he said. He called Mama "black gal, because that's what she was." He talked about often having "to fight honkies and pollocks at his job the Allis-Chalmers plant in Milwaukee." He lived a fast life: sharp clothes, new cars, pretty girls, horse races, and drinking Old Crow "dirty bird." But he dearly loved his only child, his daughter, Margie Dean, "Mama." And us too! He gave us the down-payment for our family home in 1963, that our family occupied for 40 years, in Rock Hill, Missouri at 334 Eldridge. Granddaddy was quite a man, a Navy veteran, a man's man.

COSMOLOGY

Cosmology is nature, is science, is geometry, is biology, is philosophy, is God . https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/cosmology

BLACK MAN IN "A SOCIAL HISTORY OF MISSOURI"

I would venture that the black man leaning against the post, observing a procession of white politicians, in Thomas Hart Benton's "A Social History of Missouri," is more probably the martyred Homer G. Phillips, Esq. Homer Phillips' name is more famous than Jordan Chambers' name, gracing the black hospital that he adroitly got funded by means of a 1922 municipal bond issue; the subject of bitter political battles that he finally won, before being gunned down, in 1931, while leaning against a bus stop, reading a newspaper, in a strikingly similar pose to that depicted in the painting. https://www.news-leader.com/story/news/local/ozarks/now/2018/04/09/mystery-solved-black-man-missouri-capitol-mural-may-thomas-hart-benton-mural-missouri-capitol-identi/498819002/?fbclid=IwAR2yCv8l-18OVvnGxANKL2kUoZPqy4HQDNfPSTYdd6Oq3AhDgCVWP3YkXA8

PARADISE LOST. EXCERPT

Larry Delano Coleman 5 hrs · "Here, in close recess, with flowers, garlands, and sweet smelling herbs, Espoused Eve , decked her first nuptial bed; and heavenly quires the hymenaean sung, What day the genial Angel to our sire Brought her in naked beauty more adorned, more lovely, than Pandora, whom the Gods Endowed with all their gifts, and O! too like in sad event, when to the unwiser son Of Japhet brought by Hermes, she ensnared Mankind with her fair looks, to be avenged On him who had stole Jove's authentic fire. Thus, at their shady grove arrived, both stood, Both turned, and under open sky adored The God that made both sky, air, earth , and heaven, Which they beheld, the moon's resplendent globe, And starry pole: Thou also madest the night, Maker Omnipotent, and thou the day , Which we, in our appointed work employed, Have finished, happy in our mutual help And mutual love, the crown of all our bliss Ordained by thee; and this delicious place For us too large, where thy abundance wants Partakers, and uncropt falls to the ground, But thou has promised from us two a race to fill the earth, who shall with us extol Thy goodness infinite, both when we wake, And when we seek, as now, thy gift of sleep. This said unanimous , and other rites observing none, but adoration pure Which God likes best, into their inmost bower Handed they went; and eased the putting off These troublesome disguises which we wear, Straight side by side were laid, nor turned, I ween, Adam from his fair spouse , nor Eve the rites Mysterious of connubial love refused: Whatever hypocrites austerely talk Of purity, and place, and innocence, Defaming as impure what God declares Pure, and commands to some, leaves free to all. Our Maker bids encrease; who bids abstain But our Destroyer, foe to God and Man? Hail wedded Love, mysterious law, true source Of human offspring, sole propriety in Paradise of all things common else." P.44, PARADISE LOST by John Milton (1664, 2015) 

TEACHING AFRICAN AMERICAN HISTORY

TEACHING AFRICAN AMERICAN HISTORY PROPERLY TRUTHFULLY African American history did not begin in America , it began in Africa, where Africans were the first people on earth , millions of years ago. In Africa, these first people learned basic things like speech, home building, uses of fire, cooking, planting, fishing, hunting, weaving, arrowhead making, bow and arrow making , herding, and all other civilizing skills that were later culturally taught, instilled, in their kindred people, who had migrated out of Africa , to populate the rest of earth in waves millions of years ago. The point of this is to show that "African American" history began in Africa, not in America. That is also how it must be taught , as African, first, American, second. The truth is anathema in a land of lies. But the truth is love to those who love. Proper home training is to instill the truth and to love the truth in oneself and in one's offspring. Teach them the truth at home, as you feed them, love them, discipline them, encourage them, train them, inspire them. Then, no matter what else they are taught (or not taught) at school, church, mosque, temple, outside of the home that can be corrected to assure that they grow up properly. 

PENUMBRAS

PENUMBRAS Whatever gender , language, race, color, religion, nation, education or variation of the foregoing , if one lives upon the earth (where else would one live?), one is subject to all that governs, regulates, earth . Therefore there exists a penumbral umbrella of being, of all existence, falling down, rising up , blending in us, through us, for us, all, who live. This penumbra , this blest space of partial illumination that we occupy, will lift like all eclipses lift, fade , go away back to the anterior recesses that preceded them and us. Amen.

MEN AND WOMEN

MEN AND WOMEN ARE PRIMES Men and women are prime to each other under the definition of prime that is explicated in Euclid's Elements, book 7, proposition 1. It states: "Two unequal numbers being set out , and the less being continually subtracted in turn from the greater, if the number which is left never measures the one before it until an unit is left, the original numbers will be prime to one another." Men and women are unequal units. Lesser never measures the greater before it encounters the unit of 1. One is irreducible except by itself. As irreducible, 1 is unmeasurable . Thus, a "unit" is "one" is defined as "that by virtue of which each of the things that exists is called one. A "number" is a multitude composed of units. Both definitions are from "Definitions" at the front of Book 7. https://mathcs.clarku.edu/~djoyce/elements/bookVII/propVII1.html?fbclid=IwAR2PJg5b7YH8AEyetmkKZ9ltcawbddpkOAsPdf4PwIn1t6L2Pq0DmYbfycM

POLICE BRUTALITY LAWFUL

POLICE BRUTALITY IS USUALLY LAWFUL Rarely successfully prosecuted is "police brutality," because it is lawful American public policy approved by the United States Supreme Court; which shields police and prosecutors from any liability by a number of legal pretexts for murders of black men and boys by evidentiary burdens, like "fear for their lives," etc. This dates back to 1789, 1867, 1968, 1989. Though not genocide, it is homicide tending toward decimation. But God...

THE MUSIC DIED

THE DAY THE MUSIC DIED The difference and the distance between "I heard it through the grapevine," and "Psychedelic Shack" is more than cultural and anthropological ; more than tonal and lyrical. It was sociopolitical. When those bass drums, baselines of Marvin Gaye's ritualized rhythms and vocals assailed the ambient consciousnesses of black America in 1968, it was reveille! A wake-up call! It was revelation. Its subliminal communications were unmistakable. "Get up ! Rise up !" It was saying between the lyrics of estranged love between lovers of the day. It was like slaves' codes of days gone by: Speaking with and to those with ears to hear, with hearts to understand, what the Lord saith! Almost overnight, in 1969, we were musically offered "Psychedelic Shack" (psychedelic shackles) that heralded the entry of mind-altering drugs and the normalization of escapism, to black communities via radio, tape and stereo, that pulled in the opposite direction of least resistance. Along with that genre of nerve racking music, flamboyant fashion, laissez-faire lifestyle, drug abuse on multiple levels, came even more subtly the death of the movement's momentum. As soon as 1970, the same Marvin Gaye was worriedly singing of an "Inner City Blues;" was asking "What's Going On?" I was wondering as well! What happened to the music of the '60s? I was not alone in my query. A novelist named Joseph C. Smith wrote a sapient social-biography of our people's music entitled, THE DAY THE MUSIC DIED (1981). I devoured this book ! It was affirming suspicions that I held about the black freedom movements' manipulation by music mavens. Change the beat, change the threatened conduct, nationally, internationally. This change was not wrought by cultural accretion but by political and economic means, including Motown leaving Detroit for Los Angeles; vamping on Black Panthers' outposts in city after city; Nixon's "law and order." With movement leaders dead , in jail, or in flight; with illegal drugs now normative behavior, with black laissez faire individualism having displaced collective strivings, with the music now raucously raunchy, no longer polished and lascivious , we found ourselves to be similar to rudderless ships, lost at sea. We remain lost in many respects. That is one reason why I wrote this song.

ONE-DROP RULE

THE ONE-DROP RULE The "one-drop rule" has barred official recognition of a mulatto class within 'African Americans,' unlike elsewhere. "African American's" multi-colored breadth having been deemed to be legally sufficient to include all collateral genres.

BLACK HISTORY READING

For black history month 2019, I would strongly commend to you the reading of the Holy Bible cover-to-cover. There is truth, wisdom, riches, knowledge, history, vocabulary, redemption waiting therein. It may take a year or more to complete, reading here and there, as time permits. But there is a blessing in the reading of the word of God. Try it! You may also wish to read the Glorious Quran, which is another great writing!

GREAT RIVER NILE

"The great river of Egypt is called 'Sihor'..., which means 'black,' and refers poetically, perhaps , as much to the inhabitants of Egypt as to its famous Nile. 'The seeds of Sihor,' (Isa. xxiii.3), 'Sihor which is before Egypt,' (Josh. xiii.3), 'Sihor of Egypt,' (1 Chr. xiii.5), and 'the waters of Sihor,' (Jer.ii.18), are passages that seem to point to color, and too decidedly so to have reference only to the color of water; which, indeed, is not black. Rev. Dr. J. Lempriere calls Nilus, a king of Thebes, who gave his name to the river Nile, which before was called 'Aegyptus', ...This Theban king was a black man, and the Hebrew name of the river, 'Shichor', may well signify 'the Nile of the blacks.' In some other passages of the Scriptures (Isa. xxvii.12; Josh. xv.4; 2 Kings xxiv.7), the Nile is called 'the river of Egypt '...; literally 'the Nile of the Mizraimites.' Now to deny that the Egyptians were Cushites, involves the denial that Mizraim was of the Cushite family; and that, in turn , denies that Ham, the father of Mizraim, was a Cushite, leaving the Negro without any ancestral connection with the Noachan household. Thus, as usual, error may be traced to absurdity." P. 63, "Color of the Egyptians," THE CUSHITE, OR, THE DESCENDANTS OF HAM: AS FOUND IN THE SACRED SCRIPTURES AND IN THE WRITINGS OF ANCIENT HISTORIANS AND POETS FROM NOAH TO THE CHRISTIAN ERA, by Rufus Lewis Perry, D.D., Ph.D. (1893).

MELTING POT

OUR "MELTING POT" OF IDEALS Egyptian Greek Roman Iroquois . These four form the foundation of American government's aspiration. Each one account for its strengths. Egyptian in its ideals and symbols. Greek in its forms of democracy. Roman in its unique republic form. Iroquois in its separation of powers. Like government its language is also polyglot. Derived from English, the earth supreme polyglot tongue, American English accretes words and phrases incessantly. As such its dictionaries are always in annual revision, some comprising more than 500,000, and more: 750,000! The average American's use of maybe 2,000-5,000 words is also representative of the extent of their understanding the larger paradigm of their government and language . American sapient foundational and linguistic diversity explains why its core credo has been so hard to crack philosophically by minds that have been less read, less knowing that those of its founders, who were learned at least, despite being largely slave holding or hypocrites. Those disposed to remove to undo the cloak of cabalistic sovereignty that rules America, would be well advised to know the complexity of its gumbo, its melting pot of ideals.

WOODROW WILSON, ARCH-RACIST

I was unaware of this meeting between William Monroe Trotter and supporters with racistly rancid Woodrow Wilson . Neither man ranks among my favorites. Even so, I have long wondered whether the economic surges among black people in the South, especially, where they came to own 1/3 of its farmland in 1915, was the true reason for Wilson's subversive acts like: imposing a federal income tax, firing, not hiring, segregating black federal government workers, invading Haiti, letting the Klan walk down Pennsylvania Ave, watching "Birth of a Nation" in the White House, gleefully, entering WWI with American armed forces under oppressive white officers, the Federal Reserve System. https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/11/wilson-legacy-racism/417549/?fbclid=IwAR2nCWKy0NJw1GLdvc6TrfK67_ihsaWSx99zXRmvJsDmZGPURL98GJQ7RIA

UNDERSTANDING HISTORY

To "understand" history, some knowledge of prehistory, in its many rich varieties, is needed. For history is prehistory's fruit.

KC CENTRAL IN THE '60S

KANSAS CITY CENTRAL IN THE '60s! "Boom! Boom-boom! Boom! Boom! Boom-boom!" rumbled the pulsing, cacophony of foreboding big bass drums of Kansas City Central High School's basketball rooters back in the 1960s, in St. Louis Missouri. The bass timbre was then followed, repeatedly by an incantation , a holy chant: "Hey-hey-hey, KC! You look so good to me!" Again, then, the drums sound: invoking, evoking leal battle spirits of our ancient history: "Boom! Boom-boom! Boom boom! Boom-boom!" Ooooweeee! I was 14 or 15. The year. 1965 or 66. That drumbeat. That heartbeat. That summons bewitched my soul! Who were these big bad mooter-scutters from out of Kansas City? We thought we had the monopoly on style, on cool, hip and what's happening in St. Louis, naturally, being bigger, older, and blacker, we thought! KC was just where storms came from, somewhere out west . Spell-binding spirits were floating about, true enough! But we were not at a pep rally. We were at a Missouri state high school championship basketball game. The question was could they ball? Could they ball? Lord Jesus! They won the game before the tip-off! In the warmups, everyone on the team dunked! Even the 5'8" guard! They had two blood brothers with Ebonic names who dunked two balls on one leap in succession! Don't ask me the score! Kansas City blew them away. Don't ask me who they played! Somebody from southern Missouri. They lost big! All I remember was the magic of the moment and the mystery of KC.

ROGER BROOKE TANEY

While reading the classic black historical encomium EMANCIPATION :THE MAKING OF THE BLACK LAWYER, 1844-1944, by J. Clay Smith (1993), pp. 100-102, I read how the admission of Dr. John S. Rock (and attorney) to the US Supreme Court was facilitated by the death of Chief Justice Roger Taney in 1864. Abolitionist Salmon P. Chase replaced Taney as Chief Justice. He admitted John Swett Rock to the Court on February 1, 1865, the same day that President Lincoln signed a joint resolution of Congress approving the 13th Amendment abolishing slavery. Taney was appointed by Andrew Jackson as Chief Justice after the death of John Marshall. Taney was married to Francis Scott Key's sister and had served as Attorney General, Treasury Secretary and other Democratic posts under Andrew Jackson; the court 28 years as Chief Justice, 2nd to Marshall. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_B._Taney?fbclid=IwAR0YGTVY4sr1WhowYE0G_M79ILjQrgFIy_2fgNw3C8PIDsA1hByDLFw5aWQ

BLACK LAWYERS' HISTORY

BLACK LAWYERS' HISTORY IN MASSACHUSETTS AND MISSOURI Black lawyers were already actively practicing law in Boston (1845) and in Missouri (1871), even before the first blacks had graduated Harvard Law School (1869) or University of Missouri Law School (1968), despite the propinquity of slavery, which ended in Massachusetts in 1783 and in Missouri in 1865. Source: EMANCIPATION: THE MAKING OF THE BLACK LAWYER, 1844-1944, by J. Clay Smith , Jr. SJD, (1993), pp. 94-112, 331.

BABY SISTER WILL TELL!

BABY SISTERS WILL TELL! Baby sister sure would tell it! Back home from DC for Christmas in 1970, I had fraternally "grounded with my brothers," before going home to greet my folks. I crept down into the basement bedroom where we six boys slept. Got into bed. Went to sweet sleep. Along comes baby sister, Pam, age 4. "Larry! Larry! Larry!" she gleefully cried and quickly kissed me. Then upstairs she ran with the news, "Mommy! Mommy! Mommy! Larry is here! And he smells like burnt leaves!" Baby sister will sure tell it! 

HISTORY IS SEGMENTED

HISTORY IS SEGMENTED As Africans were enslaved by Americans from 1789-1865, do not forget the colonists were enslaved by the British from 1607-1781, as were the British by the French from 1066-1215.So, history is segmented. Everyone has been oppressed by others.

BLACK BOOKSTORES

BLACK BOOKSTORE OWNERS Black booksellers have a really hard go. I was one for awhile, although not full time. I sold books out of the trunk of my car , at book fairs and events. My sales were mainly direct and only occasionally through the mail. I sold through my The Nile Company , as an adjunct to my black historical newsletter , "The Nile Review." At one time, I had seriously contemplated opening a bookstore in Kansas City, Missouri. But fortunately, the late great jazz musician, Sonny Kenner , in his quiet way, dissuaded me from that folly in the 1980s. He had said "The music sales would probably carry your book sales." Say what again? He then went on to tell me that he had been a KC bookstore owner in the 1960s, but had to give it up. He could not make enough money to support his family so, music was it! But book lovers, like me, naturally assume that others like books too to the same degree . We have read and been inspired by tales of Timbuktu , Mali, where book sales were leading commercial ventures among Africans, before enslavers came. (Of course this is only partly true. The books were in Arabic who were the main slave traders of the black, before the Europeans came.) I sold books in high school through the Students for Black Awareness and Action organization, (SBAA), with my friends to raise money for our activities. My love of books has been insatiable for a very long time! Of course, I have visited and done business with Julian Books in San Francisco, with Schomburg Books in New York, with McKinney's Books in Washington, D. C. , and others in St. Louis and elsewhere. But this day I lift up the name of Hodari Ali , who was the greatest black bookseller personally known to me. He began to write to me in high school, when I was Editor in Chief of the HILLTOP, the weekly student newspaper of Howard University in 1972-1973. He was in Los Angeles and was an enthusiastic admirer of mine, from a distance, then. He soon came to Howard and later became Editor in Chief, himself of the HILLTOP . I was in law school by then, and later graduated and transplanted back to Missouri , my home state, albeit in Kansas City, not in St. Louis. I came to learn that the late great Hodari Ali of Los Angeles, Howard University; of Washington, DC's Pyramid Bookstore had also been a regional bookseller of black books, up and down the East Coast. I had admired him. I visited his bookstore in D.C., on a corner near Howard, to purchase some books and was lucky to be waited upon by him. Hodari was now taciturn , laconic, no longer the outgoing enthusiastic young man whom I remembered. Any business will do that to you, especially if the business is the sales of books to black folks; many think that they already know all that they need to know, just by being black. Little do they know that being "black" is a construct like "white;" that before they were black they were many other things, say ancient writers including gods!

SEPERATELY

Separately, it is possible to deduce that matter does not exist, nor humanity, when physics is separated from philosophy,when mathematics is separated from nature; but if these "neters" --these truths--are bound, combined--"let us make man"--magical manifestations, singularly, collectively, spiritually, intellectually, appear: yielding time, space, energy, matter, light, dark, God..

MISSOURI , SLAVE STATE

Missouri is WITHIN the South, a slave state. It was outside of the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863; its southern border is the defined by "Mason Dixon Line". Its slaveholders and rebels fought a "Border-War" against Kansas' "Jayhawks", from 1854-1859, whose heroes were John Brown, James Montgomery. They fought after the the "Kansas-Nebraska Act" of 1854 had allowed voting by popular sovereignty to decide "slave" or "free" state admission status.

DEFEATING WHITE SUPREMACY

DEFEATING WHITE SUPREMACY We can defeat white supremacists ' untruthfulness, duplicity, hypocrisy, by remaining or by becoming, what they never were before and are not now, viz: truthful, faithful, rigorous, fruitful, individually and collectively. These sentiments find expressions in 3rd century, African philosopher, Plotinus book, THE ENNEADS. He wrote on page 197 (1991): "It is a general principle that to be modified, an object must be opposed in faculty and in quality to the forces that enter and act upon it. "Thus when heat is present, the change comes by something that chills, where damp by some drying agency: we say a subject is modified when from warm it becomes cold, from dry wet." By the same principle applies to white supremacists, who being flesh and spirit can be modified by those who exercise opposing force.

DOUGLASS' SUNDAY SCHOOL

"Henry and John were quite intelligent, and in a little while after I went there, I succeeded in creating in them a strong desire to learn how to read. This desire soon sprung up in others also. They very soon mustered up some old spelling books, and nothing would do but I must keep a Sabbath school. I agreed to do so, and accordingly devoted my Sundays to teaching these my loved fellow slaves how to read . Neither of them knew letters when I went there. Some of the slaves of the neighborhood found what was going on, and also availed themselves. It was understood, among all who came, that there must be as little display about it as possible. It was necessary to keep our religious masters at St. Michael 's unacquainted with the fact that, instead of wrestling, boxing, and drinking whiskey, we were trying to learn how to read the will of God; for they had much rather see us engaged in those degrading sports, than to see us behaving like intellectual, moral, and accountable beings.... "I held my Sabbath school at the house of a free Colored man, whose name I deem it imprudent to mention; for should it be known, it might embarrass him greatly , though the crime of holding the school was committed ten years ago. I had at one time over forty scholars, and those of the right sort, ardently desiring to learn. They were of all ages, though mostly men and women. I look back to those days with an amount of pleasure not to be expressed. They were great days to my soul. The work of instructing my dear fellow-slaves was the sweetest engagement with which I was ever blessed. We loved each other, and to leave them at the close of the Sabbath was a severe cross indeed...They came because they wished to learn. Their minds had been starved by their cruel masters. They had been shut up in mental darkness. I taught them, because it was the delight of my soul to be doing something that looked like bettering the condition of my race. I kept up my school nearly the whole year I lived with Mr. Freeland; and beside my Sabbath school, I devoted three evenings in the week, during the winter, to teach the slaves at home. And I have the happiness to know, that several of those who came to Sabbath school learned how to read; and that one, at least, is now free through my agency." P.70-72, THE NARRATIVE OF THE LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS (1845, 1994)

TIME AND MONEY

TIME MORE VALUABLE THAN MONEY Time is more valuable than money. How you spend your time matters more to you, than how you spend your money, therefore. Boycotting abuses, misuses of your time, while putting your time to better uses for yourself , is a more effective form of real protest than just boycotting dumb expenditures of your money. We lawyers err when we say "Time is money;" for, in fact, time is far more valuable than any amount of money. Run out of money, you can get more. Run out of time: death. Advertisers seem to be always angling for your money. But they really want your time. They spend billions in the attempt to attract briefly your attention on television, in publishing, on billboards, radio, internet, in church, at the movies; wherever you are, they are angling for your time, under a money guise. If they can get your time, they can get your money. So keep your time, and you will keep your money also. Slaves had no money. Their value was in the free use of their time to benefit, to enrich, the slave owners. Similarly, prisoners have no money. Their value is the social deprivation of the use of their time for the gain of others. The prison population that has exploded since the 1960s' social, political, civil rights battles, is an example. "Political prisoners" are disabled veterans or votaries of such social battles without power. In another context, misdirecting the values of credulous vulnerable men, women, children, who are purposely made to believe falsely that their money matters more than their time, are also thereby made to misbehave: thuggishly, roguishly, criminally, in pursuit of this fabled, mythical moneyed fantasy; material lie, hubristic hypocrisy, delusional apparition, that leads to nothing, but a further waste of time in jail; to utter destruction of families' hopes. But in jail there is an abundance of time to do something constructive, something redeeming, something of value with your time for yourself, for your family, community, legacy. The once-lost lives of Malcolm X, Claude Brown, Eldridge Cleaver, more, who received instruction, inspiration, redemption, in prison, again demonstrates the plain value of time over money. One needs money to make money. One needs but time to make good use of time. Time is more valuable than money.

WITHIN THE PAST

LIVING WITHIN THE PAST EACH DAY Ruby bridges is younger than me. I am 68. She was the little girl with the pigtails who solitarily integrated public schools in New Orleans. The fact shows how close we are to the past. It is not a distant dominion. It is nearby. We live in , live with, the past, each day. It never goes away! Speaking of living in, living with the past, an old yellow postal envelope on my dresser, stood beside an opened letter from July 9, 2012, both beside a DVD "Seeds of Success: The Legacy of George Washington Carver." It was sent to me by a friend, who wrote in her letter: "The jacket talks about 'a highlight of the program is a former Tuskegee University student who was acquainted with Dr. Carver and shares his special and unique perspective. That's dad!" My friend's father knew Dr. Carver from Tuskegee, where he studied. I have met my friend's father in Missouri, where Dr. Carver is from. I may have watched the DVD years ago, when it was sent to me by my friend, but today, I will watch again!

WARS

WARS WITHIN WARS Be sure to remember, or now to learn and to know --that the vast veneration accorded to America's World War veterans by some media personalities means or implies only "white veterans" i.e. , "the greatest generation," of Tom Brokaw fame. Even as recently as World War II black active duty servicemen were made to ride in baggage cars while prisoners of war (Germans, Italians, all white) rode first class. The same disrespect was shown in mess hall. So deeply embedded is the disease of racism in the social tissues of some white people, they would go so far as to lynch servicemen for putting on airs unbecoming blacks! Despite it, most blacks took it on the chin, rationalized their futility, and usually looked the other way. Except, of course, there are always those few who will except to, will not be accepting of, such repeated humiliations. in Houston Texas, in 1917, at Fort Logan, when things grew to become intolerable, in that town, that black soldiers retaliated by killing those racist cops who were killing them. In 1942, in Brisbane, Australia, as John O. Killens has written in the novel, AND THEN WE HEARD THE THUNDER, they fought back too. Indeed in Brisbane , and in other places, "down under" near MacArthur's headquarters, the Australians objected to white Americans' demeaning arrogance, as much as the white Americans objected to 100,000 African Americans' emergence as social "equals" abroad with white Australian women. So throughout the 1940s riots were occurring, but were not reported by media. These riots involved Australians fighting white Americans and Americans fighting each other in midst of war! "Over sexed, overpaid, overbearing " was that the view Australians held of white Americans; whose bases PBX gave them unlimited access to "chocolates and nylons", true blue Australian (or any) female turn-ons. The male Australians lacked access to these luxuries and lost thereby the social interest of their women. It was similar to how the whites viewed America's black troops. Here, too, the blacks fought back! They did the same thing to the white American servicemen by force of arms, who were, as always, jealous of the social attraction black troops held for white Australian females, as whites had done to them! Wars within wars are American facts ; male-female; slave-free; black-white ; rich -poor; ignorant-knowledgeable; atheist-religious.

FUSILLADE VOTING

VOTING BY U.S.C.T. FUSILLADE The 14th Amendment bestowed involuntary citizenship upon African Americans, just as the 13th Amendment has ended the involuntary servitude of African Americans, except for prisoners who have been "duly convicted" of crime. The term, "duly convicted," is still in 2019 subject to great legal disputation and controversy in American common law. African Americans never "voted" on either 13-14-15 (federal voting) Amendments. Rather, they "voted" by fusillade from 200,000, U. S. Colored Troops' bullets, bombs, bayonets in the Civil War! Congress passed and certain states later ratified what our "Freedom War" forbears' victory decreed.. But the federal courts dissented!

LADY

Formerly "lady" bespoke quiet dignity, grace, charm, mental spiritual acuity. Now that "lady" has been displaced by "woman," in the post-women's liberation lexicon, the old notion of "lady" has been abased to the point that properly-raised females, who yet act as, and deign to deem themselves to be, "ladies" of old, are hardly recognizable under the garish vestments of women.