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Historical Summer 2015 article. Dates, prices, services and contacts describe the source period; current availability has not been established.
Editor’s Note:
The following submission from a very longtime neighbor, written in response to the April-May issue’s article by Cecelia Nadal, demonstrates the very differing perspectives on police-black relations.
Some of the details here did not appear in the national press and we cannot judge their credulity.
This does illustrate how perspective is affected by background and personal history.
A Response to “Diversity Watch”
As a bona fide white liberal who was married to a black man, raised two bi-racial children (one of whom spent eight years in the St Louis Metropolitan Police Department), and had a teaching career spanning forty years in Title I schools, I was heartened to read Cecelia Nadal’s piece in the latest Times about the two-edged sword of our presumption of guilt.
However, I take issue with her use of the arrest of Henry Louis Gates in 2009 as an example of police racial bias.
She incorrectly stated some facts.
First, Prof Gates was not arrested for attempted burglary.
He was arrested for “disorderly conduct” which I assume is Massachusetts’s version of “disturbing the peace.” Secondly, it was not his house.
The house is owned by Harvard and rented by the professor.
This is a minor detail, as it was his legal residence.
Then by implying that Gates is lucky to be alive, Ms Nadal employs the very stereotype of the trigger-happy cop which she warns about in the beginning of her piece.
There is absolutely no evidence that Gates was in danger or mistreated.
On the contrary, the officer reapplied the handcuffs to the front when he learned Gates used a cane.
Finally, author Charles Ogletree is not an independent source‚Ä”he is a close personal friend of Prof Gates and his legal advocate. Sgt Crowley was answering a dispatched call for an attempted burglary in a neighborhood where
there had been several break-ins recently. One of those was at this very house‚Ä”the damaged front door was the reason Prof Gates’ key was not working in the first place. Instead of thanking the police for their quick response, Gates became angry and “played the race card.” When Crowley asked to speak to him outside, Gates immediately responded with “Why, because I’m a black man in America?” Maybe, because there could have been a burglar hiding in the house and they were safer on the porch? Maybe because the police are trained to question people where there are fewer items (knives, pokers, lamps) which can be turned into weapons? At first, Gates refused to give any identification. Neither police officer said that he ever offered his drivers’ license. What he finally submitted was his Harvard ID which had a photo but NO ADDRESS. Apparently Sgt Crowley missed the memo that a Harvard ID bestows sainthood on the bearer and the only proper response is to genuflect deeply and back out of the room. No, this officer had the temerity to ask for further ID.
This resulted in Prof Gates calling him “a racist cop” and making a phone call to someone asking for the name of the Cambridge chief of police.
He was thus implicitly threatening Crowley’s livelihood.
I will admit that Crowley probably then lured the professor out onto the front porch into the view of other officers and the small crowd of gathered civilians so that his rant would be public. Crowley was trying to protect his job. You see, an arrest report is the main way a police officer has of telling his or her side of the story. Without writing a ticket or making an arrest, the officer cannot refute the citizen’s later claim that the officer’s interaction with him was baseless and motivated by bias.
In addition, taking him out in front of a dozen witnesses belies the notion that he planned to do Gates any harm.
The charges were, I believe, ridiculous.
They were quickly dropped. You have a constitutionally protected right to yell at the police. Officers are part of the government which the First Amendment gives all Americans the right to criticize.
The constitution does not require that you use a polite tone of voice or well-reasoned arguments.
However, I expect a higher level of political discourse from a Harvard professor than “I’ll talk to your mama on the porch.” Henry Louis Gates is a preeminent authority on slavery and race.
He researches and writes about race.
He teaches about race.
He gives public speeches about race.
He has a television program on PBS about race.
I am reminded of the old adage that says, “To a man with a hammer, every problem is a nail.” Professor Gates made this encounter with the police about race.
I would submit that President Obama did not help matters with his knee-jerk reaction. By his own admission, he did not have all the facts, but he immediately characterized the police as “acting stupidly.” Does anyone blame Sgt. Crowley for bringing his union lawyer with him to the “beer summit?” In this case the “power and privilege” were all on the side of the black professor who had so many friends in high places – the black mayor, the black governor and even the black president. Who was the racist in Cambridge?
If you would like to read what Sgt Crowley and the black officer who was also there had to say, their arrest reports are available on thesmokinggun.com website.
Originally published in The Times of Skinker-DeBaliviere, Summer 2015.
Read this article in the original newspaper issue.
Archival transcription note: Letter unsigned in original. Editor expressly says some details cannot be judged for credibility; retain caution and do not present as independent legal findings. Source prints mojibake in two dash positions; literal source retained.
Original source: SD_Times2015_06.pdf, printed page(s) 4; PDF page(s) 4.
