University of Virginia Library

Perverted Power

To read Mr. Phillips is to sense
not only that (1) he considers
"forced integration" a dastardly
perversion of federal power,
tantamount to say, the Presidential
prejudging of Charles Manson, but
(2) Mr. Phillips has no sense at all
of the multiple injustices of not
"forcing integration."

The issue, stated purely, is not
whether the government ought to
"force integration" but whether
public monies (created partially
from taxes paid by poor blacks and
poor whites) ought to pay for
benefits from which they are
effectively excluded. Elemental
fairness alone dictates that they
should not.

But the issue Mr. Phillips raises
is even larger, I think, than merely
integration.

It is the matter suggested by a
bitter statement made to me by an
old and radical college friend:
"There are subsidies for everyone in
this damn government," he said,
"except poor people." There are
federal aid programs, that is, for
small business, big business,
agriculture, home buyers, veterans
in schools, and all the rest —
subsidies from what John Morton
Blum calls a "middle class
government," mainly for middle
class people who start small
businesses, buy small homes, etc.,
but who, alas, are not poor.