Letters to My Children.

Reviewed by

Gerald B. Jordan University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, and The Philadelphia Inquirer 

From time to time pollsters, campaign strategists, candidates, and pundits emerge from their conventional wisdom in search of that rarest of creatures - the unified black opinion. And it's no coincidence that intensity spikes every four years, leading up to presidential elections.

African Americans insist that no such unified view exists. Black America has for years decried any attempt to impose a unified face upon its community, let alone unified expression of thought. The very expression - Black Community - connotes singularity of locale, thought, and expression. Perhaps the lure is the irresistible use of the term community, although jargon shouldn't rule the day.

There is, nevertheless, something unfailingly comforting and charming in the unity of expression by three distinct voices of African America. One, whose voice has been silenced, but whose words live through his collection of columns, is the late Robert C. Maynard, who was owner and publisher of the Oakland Tribune prior to his death, from prostrate cancer, in 1993. His Letters to My Children, put together by his daughter Dori J. Maynard, also a reporter, is an eloquent compendium of thought. It is a legacy not only to his daughter and her two brothers, but to us all.

The second is a collection of New York Newsday columns written by Sheryl McCarthy, whose poignant questions strike home every time. "Why Are the Heroes Always White?" asks the title of her book. Indeed, why? Is there a conspiracy, as is always debated on Saturday mornings at barber and beauty shops in African American neighborhoods? Is there a mere oversight? Not even the most racially moderate swallow that. The truth lies somewhere in between those extremes.

For an all-out blast at established norms, though, John E. Slade's collection of editorial art in But IAta Too a Black Cartoonist! . . . Really! cuts to the heart. Whereas Maynard offers gentle persuasion and McCarthy serves up a more contemporary, in-your-face version of N.Y. opinion, Slade's pen-on-paper is a cold slap, if not a nine-inch-high lemon meringue pie smack in the kisser.

Despite their divergent origins and styles (notably the collection of editorial cartoons) and intended audiences, the three do converge at fundamental values. They are solidly middle-class, perhaps appreciably so if you're given to handwringing over the plight of the Black community. And they are relentlessly hopeful; any defeat expressed is temporary and far from resignation.

Make no mistake, though, none of these collected works shows someone who has his or her head in the sand.

Maynard's style bespeaks a gentle spirit (and his daughter Dori has affected the same style of storytelling, at least for this collection of columns), but his points are arrow-straight and his observations unflinchingly clear. This is probably attributable to his era as much as it is to Maynard's upbringing in his Brooklyn home, the baby in a family of six children born to parents who came here from Barbados and whose religion was as strict as any. Maynard grew up in the shadow of history cast by Jackie Robinson, and in an April 12, 1987, column, Maynard gives full measure of that impact:

In that first dramatic summer of 1947, . . . a family in which sports was never important suddenly became bewitched by the phenomenon of Jackie Robinson.

Now, exactly 40 springtimes later, I think I can see better what my parents saw in Jackie Robinson. . . . My parents saw opportunity in the Jackie Robinson story. They seized on it as the tool by which to motivate us to excel. . . . They reminded us constantly of the need to harness discipline to talent. . . .

The postwar era brought a new kind of automobile in a multiple of colors, instead of the traditional basic black. . . . Miracle drugs such as penicillin became commonplace, and what the war taught us about the separation of blood plasma helped save hundreds of thousands of lives.

On the social front, young black lawyers, back from the war, were determined to make America safe for democracy. So they launched a legal attack in 1947 that eventually led to the crumbling of the Jim Crow legal system in the South.

This excerpt from Maynard's column "The Barriers Robinson Broke" makes clear that the hope of America fulfilling its creed shined its brightest when Robinson took the field. But it is truly a dream deferred, lost in the chaos of today's debate of Affirmative Action and - some would like to argue that this is separate and unrelated - the dismantling of the coalition that successfully litigated key court decisions and secured landmark Civil Rights legislation. Maynard gives voice to the hope he felt in his youth and the frustration articulated by his children's generation.

Sheryl McCarthy grew up in the segregated South. Yet in Birmingham, which was a substantial Southern city even in its segregated days, she gained a strong sense of self that no doubt fueled her success in New York. Where Maynard could take the measure of his generation through the style and grace of Jackie Robinson, McCarthy is left to deal with the hotly debated book The Bell Curve. The flap over the book refocused national attention on the debate of race like few issues do.

McCarthy writes:

The Bell Curve has caught fire because it states the quietly held belief of many people. The belief that blacks are, by nature, intellectually inferior to whites is the reason well-meaning whites can call for equal opportunity, but flee in horror at the prospect of blacks moving into their neighborhoods or the possibility of their children going to school with black children. . . .

Murray and Herrnstein make their argument for black intellectual inferiority so smoothly, and with such professions of goodwill, that they are difficult for nonscholars to attack. . . . But consider this. Suppose it is true that there is a difference in IQ between blacks as a group and whites as a group, and that this difference is at least partly explained by heredity. One might be able to make a case that the Irish affinity for heavy drinking is in their blood and that Asians have an innate talent for music and mathematics. . . .

We know from experience that what makes a person successful in life has as much to do with personality, drive, luck and one's advantages as it does with how smart they are. Madonna and Reggie Jackson have higher IQs than former president John F. Kennedy.

In large measure, McCarthy recalls her theme in this assessment of The Bell Curve. And the answers are revealed in a flurry of questions - some only slightly rhetorical - that have been the subject of dinner table discussion among black families for generations. Why are white lies good and black lies evil? Why are black actors relegated overwhelmingly to "buddy" roles in movies and never get the (a) girl or (b) boy, depending upon your orientation, and are left to look like happy eunuchs? Why are white athletes said to have a "work ethic" and black athletes called "naturals"? Why are white serial killers "troubled" and black murderers "beasts"?

You get the picture.

But from the African American side of that view of America - the dinner chats, the barber shop brouhahas, talks on park benches every issue, every question, every debate always has been multiple in dimension. So it is no surprise that in 1990, when the country and arguably the world mourned the death of Jim Henson (although his Muppet characters still thrive), cartoonist John Siade drew a tearful Kermit the Frog on a dressing table next to a silk top hat with a band that remembered also Sammy Davis, Jr.

Did a black cartoonist have to remember Jim Henson? Not really. But did it make sense? You bet. To deny African American kids' affection for Kermit, Miss Piggy, and the rest of the Muppets would be to deny the squeals of delight on Christmas and birthdays when the gifts are opened. It is also fitting that a black editorial cartoonist (for The Louisiana Weekly) would honor the memory of Sammy Davis, Jr., whose own struggles through life were exemplary and the stuff of lesson for black youngsters.

Much like Maynard, in variety of expression, and McCarthy, in spirited exchange, Slade packs a lot into one frame. His overwhelming interests are expressed in his outrage over violence and crime, his skewering of politicians, and his sharp observations of the passing scene. One decidedly sobering cartoon evokes the frustration shared by citizens and police officers over the proliferation of handguns. Slade draws one panel showing a youth who is brandishing a pistol. The caption reads: "A boy and his gun are soon parted." The second panel shows two doors - one to the morgue, the second to the police department evidence room.

But Slade is just as likely to weigh in on Russian elections. And it is precisely this range of interest and dynamic perspective that resonates in the lives of African Americans. Yes, Virginia, there are black conservatives, the overwhelming majority of whom have views more deeply held than the TV talk show charlatans who peddle their opinions to the lowest bidder. And black liberals, too? Yes.

The voices of black America are as varied as the hues of African Americans in this land. And, though their themes are strikingly similar - the strength of families, the need to face each day battle-tested, the restorative power of humor - Maynard, McCarthy, and Slade give evidence to the rich variety of expression in what is often misconstrued as a monolithic community.