Paper's staffers protest editorial take on slavery

Some staffers at Jacksonville's Times-Union decry comments that they say minimized slavery

By WILLIAM YARDLEY

© St. Petersburg Times, published January 25, 2000

Seventy staffers at Jacksonville's largest newspaper have protested an editorial in the paper that declared slavery had "existed briefly in America" and that "slavery is not unique and its effects are not permanent."

The Jan. 10 Florida Times-Union editorial, running under the headline "The Lingering issue," questioned the need to continue affirmative action in Florida.

It suggested that enslavement of blacks no longer justifies affirmative action and noted that blacks are not unique because "virtually every American probably is a descendant of slaves."

It said Jews descended from slaves in Egypt, Anglo-Americans are descendants of slaves in ancient Rome, Hispanics were enslaved by the Moors and "other Asians may have been enslaved by the Japanese."

The critical letter sent by reporters and editors did not protest the paper's editorial stand on affirmative action. Instead, it accused the editorial board of being "careless with the truth," saying the "enduring shadow of slavery, legalized segregation, existed in Jacksonville until the 1960s."

"This poorly thought-through editorial only served to inflame racial discord," the letter said. "And its willful indifference to the matters at hand only strengthens many readers' perception that The Times-Union denies racism's existence."

Delivered to editor Pat Yack and publisher Carl Cannon, the letter said the editorial "injured the newspaper's relationship to the community" and "proved corrosive to newsroom morale."

A local association of black journalists responded to the editorial by rejecting the paper's standing offer to donate $1,000 toward an upcoming conference of the southeast region of the National Association of Black Journalists.

Yack, who does not supervise the editorial board, said in a telephone interview that the newsroom complaints were an "internal issue" and that the editorial had not generated much response outside the newsroom. "I have not gotten one call or one letter, nor has anyone come up to me in public and said anything about it," he said.

Cannon did not return calls Friday and Monday.

The editor of editorials, Lloyd Brown, said the word "briefly" was used to put the 246-year period in American history within a larger 5,000-year sweep of global history in which slavery existed in Egypt, Spain, ancient Rome and Asia.

"I don't want to sound like Bill Clinton, but it depends on what is the meaning of "briefly,' " Brown said. "Now some people want to put it in the context of the United States and, if they do, I won't quarrel with that. We did not intend to downplay the terrible aspects of slavery in America." The editorial came two months after Gov. Jeb Bush announced a plan to overhaul state affirmative action policies.

Few Times-Union staffers will discuss the issue on the record, but one columnist did.

"I think that column reflected the denial that's endemic of a lot of major institutions in Jacksonville when it comes to racial issues," said Tonyaa Weathersbee, who writes a weekly column that appears opposite the editorial page.

Weathersbee supports affirmative action but said she has not written about the editorial because the newspaper has a policy against columnists debating editorial writers.

The editorial brought criticism from some black people in Jacksonville -- as well as St. Petersburg Times television critic Eric Deggans, who wrote a letter to the editor -- but there has been no widespread criticism outside of the newspaper.

"There are not a lot of African-Americans who read the paper," said Duval County School Board member Gwendolyn Gibson, who does not think the newspaper represents African-American perspectives. "The apathy coming out of the paper has created more apathy."

Harry Reagan, a spokesman for Duval County Sheriff Nat Glover, perhaps the city's most powerful black official, quipped sarcastically, "You mean an enlightened newspaper such as the Times-Union would say such a thing?"

The Times-Union has a circulation of more than 172,000 and is published by Morris Communications.

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