-By Warner Todd Huston
For the purportedly quintessential civil rights activist, Jesse Jackson sure says an awful lot of racist comments. In a racist attack on Jews, he once called New York City “Hymie Town”, and now he is at it again in remarks made at Boise State University.
Long time activist Jesse Jackson was invited to speak about Martin Luther King, Jr. at the University on the 19th and during the address he claimed that black football players were not welcome on the University’s teams in the 1950s and 60s. He claimed that one of King’s legacies was such that black players were welcomed after King’s civil rights campaigns.
Referring to the two teams that played in the January 1st Fiesta Bowl — Boise State and the University of Oklahoma — Jackson claimed that past teams looked very “different” previous to King’s efforts.
Unfortunately for Jackson, his remarks were ill informed at least where it concerns Boise State. Alan Virta the university archivist, reports that Boise State has had black athletes since as far back as the 1940s. Further he says that the University had no policy that might prevent minority players.
Virta cited Aurelius Buckner, a player on the six-man football team and who was also the high scorer on the school’s basketball team in the winter of 1944 and 1945.
On Monday Virta told his local reporters, “A number of people took umbrage at what Jesse Jackson said. A number of offices at campus got e-mails saying, ‘This isn’t right.'”
Todd Shallat, the director of the Center for Idaho History and Politics at BSU, complained that Jackson’s unresearched remarks hurt the region. “Simplistic assumptions about Boise and Idaho race relations continue to shape how outsiders view us today.”
Whether it hurts Boise or not, what we have here is a racist stereotype forced onto history by Jesse Jackson. He had not taken the time to research the truth of his offensive statement, he just assumed that it must be a fact. His obvious assumption is that every state and every white citizen in them was a racist prior to the 1960s. He just assumed that no blacks would have been allowed to play sports before the civil rights movement succeeded in their efforts to make civil rights a national issue.
This is just more proof that Jesse Jackson operates by rote or by propagandist assumptions and has no real facts or truth on his side. Jackson is an ever present shake-down artist and an embarrassment to the cause of civil rights, equal treatment for all and egalitarianism.
Warner Todd Huston’s thoughtful commentary, sometimes irreverent often historically based, is featured on many websites such as newsbusters.org, townhall.com, men’snewsdaily.com and americandaily.com among many, many others. Additionally, he has been a guest on several radio programs to discuss his opinion editorials and current events. He has also written for several history magazines and appears in the new book “Americans on Politics, Policy and Pop Culture” which can be purchased on amazon.com. He is also the owner and operator of publiusforum.com. Feel free to contact him with any comments or questions : EMAIL Warner Todd Huston