Report of the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders
Washington DC: U. S. Government Printing Office, 1968. Presumed First Edition, First printing. Wraps. Format is approximately 8 inches by 10 inches. xv, [1], 425, [7] pages. Wraps. Illustrated Front cover. Illustrations. Charts. Chapter notes. Appendices. Index. Minor cover wear and small fore-edge crease. Most of the report is in a two column format. Members of the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders, appointed by President Johnson, included Senator Edward W. Brooke, Roy Wilkins of the NAACP, Governor Otto Kerner of Illinois, Senator Fred R. Harris and Mayor John Lindsay of New York City. The National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders, known as the Kerner Commission after its chair, Governor Otto Kerner Jr. of Illinois, was an 11-member Presidential Commission established by President Lyndon B. Johnson in Executive Order 11365 to investigate the causes of the long, hot summer of 1967 in the United States and to provide recommendations for the future. The report was released in 1968, after seven months of investigation. For causing the riots, it blamed lack of economic opportunity, failed social service programs, police brutality, racism, and the white-oriented media. The 426-page report was published by the Government Printing Office and by other firms since it was 'in the public domain'. The official Government Printing Office edition is by far the scarcest, and due to its large format, widely sought after. In his remarks upon signing the order establishing the commission, Johnson asked for answers to three basic questions about the riots: "What happened? Why did it happen? What can be done to prevent it from happening again and again?" Civil disorder, also known as civil disturbance, civil unrest, or social unrest, are situations when law enforcement struggle to maintain public order or tranquility. Any number of things may cause civil disorder, whether it is a single cause or a combination of causes; however, most are born from political grievances, economic disparities, social discord, but historically have been the result of long-standing oppression by a group of people towards another. Civil disorder arising from political grievances can include a range of events, from a simple protest to a mass civil disobedience. These events can be spontaneous, but can also be planned. These events can turn violent when agitators and law enforcers overreact. Civil disorder has in history arisen from economic disputes, political reasons (such as in opposition to oppressive or tyrannical government forces), religious opposition, racial oppression and social discord among various cases throughout history. President Johnson appointed the commission on July 28, 1967, while rioting was still underway in Detroit, Michigan. Mounting civil unrest since 1965 had spawned riots in the black and Latino neighborhoods of major U.S. cities, including Los Angeles (Watts riots of 1965), Chicago (Division Street Riots of 1966, the first Puerto Rican riot in U.S. history), and Newark (1967 Newark riots). The commission's final report, the Report of the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders or Kerner Report, was issued on February 29, 1968, after seven months of investigation. Its finding was that the riots resulted from black frustration at the lack of economic opportunity. Martin Luther King Jr. pronounced the report a "physician's warning of approaching death, with a prescription for life." The report berated federal and state governments for failed housing, education and social-service policies. The report also aimed some of its sharpest criticism at the media. "The press has too long basked in a white world looking out of it, if at all, with white men's eyes and white perspective." The report's best known passage warned: "Our nation is moving toward two societies, one black, one white—separate and unequal." The report was a strong indictment of white America: "What white Americans have never fully understood — but what the Negro can never forget — is that white society is deeply implicated in the ghetto. White institutions created it, white institutions maintain it, and white society condones it." Its results suggested that one main cause of urban violence was white racism and suggested that white America bore much of the responsibility for black rioting and rebellion. It called to create new jobs, construct new housing, and put a stop to de facto segregation in order to wipe out the destructive ghetto environment. In order to do so, the report recommended for government programs to provide needed services, to hire more diverse and sensitive police forces and, most notably, to invest billions in housing programs aimed at breaking up residential segregation. Condition: Good.
Keywords: Civil Rights, Civil Disorders, Black Studies, Kerner Commission, Riots, Racism, Militancy, Lyndon B. Johnson, African-Americans, Police, African-Americans, Law Enforcement, Economic Opportunity, Race Relations
[Book #82700]
Price: $150.00