Image provided by: University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries, Lincoln, NE
About The daily Nebraskan. ([Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-current | View Entire Issue (March 10, 1972)
doily (fi)(I)lb(fk)(n) friday, march 10, 1972 lincoln. nebraska vol. 95, no. 83 Third World representatives no justice in America NJi ' -v- "It's time to ask how we are going to take back the government," Florynce Kennedy said ss DeDe Ford and Frank Halpine listen. by H. J. Cummins A California lawyer, a black feminist lawyer, a black ex-convict, two Indians and two gay women agreed Thursday that there is no justice in America. DeDe Ford, who described himself as an "ex-felon and ex-dope fiend," said a white man once told him justice is just what it sounds like "just us" white folks-no niggers, Mexicans, Chicanos, queers. . ." A member of the Lincoln Indian Center, Lee Kills Enemy, said only people with money get "justice." "Money talks-if you have money you're a person. I don't want to be a person, I want to be a god-damned Indian," Kills Enemy said. California lawyer Vincent Hallinan said "you can't have justice in the system as it exists now." He said the latest movement is one to "repress the lawyers." He has served six months in prison for contempt of court, he said. And his son, who's a lawyer, was convicted of "felonious assault" for interfering with a policeman hitting a demonstrator-while telling the demonstrator to "keep cool." Hallinan said he may be elected to a judgeship in California, in which case, he said, "you're going to see some of the most astonishing decisions ever to come out of a court." He said the first laws he would cripple would be those against marijuana and homosexuality. Florynce Kennedy said the clue right now for oppressed people is to win positions of power for themselves in government and the courts. The black feminist lawyer said she doesn't think "government is too dirty a place for me-in fact it's cleaner than the streets, and it's air conditioned. "The people on this panel, excluding myself, are perfect choices for an alternate slate," she said, and "it's time to ask how we are going to take back the government." Linda Shear, a lesbian activist from Chicago, said the gay movement is handicapped by a stigma which other causes don't suffer. "Homosexuality is seen as a sickness-that it is catching-or nobody wants to work with gays because they're afraid others will think they are gay," she said. Shear said gay women "have not even reached the stage of tokenism." A-go Sheridan, an Indian in Lincoln, said he couldn't understand the "justrce" in Gordon, Neb. An Oglala Sioux Indian, Raymond Yellow Thunder, was found dead there in a panel truck Feb. 20. Three white men are charged with manslaughter and a white woman and a white man are charged with false imprisonment for Yellow Thunder's death. Indians dispute the offical statement that said Yellow Thunder was killed by a skull fracture, charging he was castrated and tortured by the five white people, who, they say, should face stiffer charges. Sheridan said, "If all they give me will be false imprisonment-I'm going to kill a lot of white people." Kennedy, noting that she does not advocate violence to earn reform, said she still wants it clearly known that she doesn't consider violence "outside the means necessary to change this system. "A positive death is better than a meaningless life," she said. "And it's better to die for a cause than from lung cancer smoking Ku Klux Klan-grown cigarettes." A member of the audience who questioned the separatism advocated by many activists, was told by Shear that "one of the rights of oppressed minorities, besides integration, is segregation." Kills Enemy said, "I don't want to be stuck in a melting pot and called a white man." Hallinan repeated a Wednesday night statement that injustice in the country stems from capitalism, which leaves the oppressed moneyless, thus powerless. If a capitalist manufacturer had one employe and paid him $4 a day to build one thing, he'd have to sell the product for more than $4 to make a profit. So, in order to make that profit, he'd have to pay the laborer so little that the laborer will never have a chance to buy what he makes, Hallinan said. Prison panel suggests reforms A five-member panel, including an ex-convict and a prison warden, found itself in general agreement Thursday on the direction American penal reform should be taking. The session was part of this week's World In Revolution Conference on Justice in America. An estimated 200 people attended. DeDe Ford, an ex-convict who spent 13 yean in various California prisons, said he was surprised that other panel members were so in tune to the inadequacies of the penal systems. Previously, Oman Municipal Court Judge Elizabeth Pittman had called for a closer look at probation as an alternative to inprisonment. "We should carefully consider allowing prisoners the chance to rehabilitate themselves." she said. World in Revolution. . . 200 people attend a panel on prison reform. There's a growing movement to let inmates enjoy easier access to the judicial system, and more concern for their constitutional rights, Pittman said. Pittman made several other suggestions: penitentiary staffs should include more minority personnel; vocational education should be expanded; men's institutions should be dose to women's institutions so more normal social interaction can take place; married inmates should be allowed to see spouses for the purpose of having sexual intercourse. Charles L. Wolfe, Jr., warden of the Nebraska Penal Complex, said correctional institutions should be geared toward working the inmate back into the community, although public opinion sometimes prevents this. He said prison reform should be stepping in the direction of work release or educational-release, where inmates are put back into the community for a job or schooling. Men coming out of a penitentiary are "walking to the beat of a different drummer," Wolfe said. "Moving from a totally structured life-style to one of almost complete freedom takes adjustment." At Nebraska, he said, programs are" pointed toward this change. "Institutions have warehoused people for hundreds of years," Wolfe said, "and the only thing they've proved is that they're excellent warehouses." The public can unlock solutions to prison reform problems, Wolfe said. State Sen. Roland Luedtke, chairman of the Legislature's Judiciary Commitee, said the Unicameral has awakened to the problems in our penal system and is moving to correct them. A bill instituting a comprehensive study of Nebraska's needs in this area received 45 affirmative votes Thursday morning and will be sent to the governor's office. He cited a successful move by Scottsbluff State Sen. Terry Carpenter this session to add $200,000 to the state's budget Turn to Pags 3 l V AY
