A Growing Chasm in America

By Ann Schaffer

While most Americans are feeling the devastating effects of the recession, African Americans and Latinos are suffering disproportionately on almost every measure.

Where are our leaders? Our nation has a moral and pragmatic imperative to accord basic protections and opportunities to all individuals, and ensure that freedom from “fear” and “want” that President Roosevelt identified so powerfully in 1941. When all individuals have the opportunity to change their circumstances, we increase the likelihood that they will, in turn, have a stake in America and feel motivated to contribute to civic society. Yet this issue is absent from our current national discourse and our legislative agenda.

In May, 1965, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. received AJC’s prestigious American Civil Liberties Award. He spoke of the pressing social problems of the day, acknowledging that they could not be solved by African Americans alone. He said that the “civil rights forces—both black and white—have contributed not only to revealing the contradictions of this society but, acting as a catalyst, have also set in motion forces to effect creative change. If this be so, it is also clear that the progress we have made has depended on the support we have received from vocal and well-organized allies.”

Dr. King understood, with a pragmatism that is seldom noted, that social justice is linked to social peace, concluding: “It is my fervent hope that in the long and stormy road ahead this coalition will be strengthened. For in this great force lies the consensus of American power, capable not only of removing injustice and fear but of establishing freedom and social peace.”

The numbers tell the stark story: 25 percent of all students are dropping out and nearly 40 percent of them are African American and Latino students. Studies show that among this segment of the population there is a much greater likelihood of incarceration -- 3 in every 10 African American men -- and a far higher mortality rate than a person who has more than a high school education. According to the Center for American Progress, the unemployment rate for African Americans has risen 7.2 percent to 15.8 percent since the start of the recession, and effectively doubling for Latinos from 5.8 percent to 12.9 percent. Poverty rates are double that of white Americans and Asian Americans, at 24.7 percent for African Americans and 23.2 percent of Latinos. Similarly, in 2008, 18.9 percent of African Americans and 32.1 percent of Latinos had no health insurance, compared to 10.8 percent of whites. It is not that white Americans are getting richer; it is that African Americans and Latinos are getting disproportionately poorer.

This downward spiral is a growing challenge to our nation’s stability and success. It demands that the agents of power – public and private -- come together to develop and implement courageous solutions. We must, together, begin to build “one nation…indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”

As we think about the legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr., we also mark the yarzheit of Abraham Joshua Heschel. The iconic photograph of the two men marching together in 1965 from Selma to Montgomery for voting rights is a reminder of the power of partnerships to achieve great goals.       

A fitting tribute to the work of Dr. King and a lasting contribution to our national wellbeing would be a new national commitment to reverse the growing chasm of economic disparity in America.

Ann Schaffer is director of AJC’s Belfer Center for American Puralism.

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