To those of you who wonder who am I referring to as “he,” allow me to clarify whom I mean.
He is Allegheny County chief executive, King Richard Fitzgerald, who openly removed the former Director of Shuman Center William “Jack” Simmons. The belief is that King Richard Fitzgerald also orchestrated the removal of another Black man, Allegheny County Councilman William “Bill” Robinson from the responsible position of budget chairman of Allegheny County Council.
The removal of two respected and competent Black men compels me and should you also to ask that troubling lingering question, “Has the Democratic Party lost all respect for their Black voting bloc?” It has been my belief for a multitude of years that the Democratic Party has absolutely no regard for that Black-voting bloc that has been more faithful to them than any bloc of voters in the last 77 years. Black voters have been so loyal to the Democratic Party that we have voted against our own best interest.
Allow me to provide you with a few examples, Attorney Byrd R. Brown ran for congress against William Moorhead and the party convinced the Black Democrats that they should support Moorhead over Byrd Brown because Moorhead was a liberal. A number of years later Atty. Brown ran for mayor of the city of Pittsburgh and he was the most qualified person to run for that position in the history of Pittsburgh, but too many of us bought into their argument that he lacked political experience. No person gets experience until they get elected. Do you remember the local Democratic Party supported Hillary Clinton over Barack Obama, and do you remember how many Blacks agreed with old Massa.
A number of Blacks have bought into that flawed belief that when it comes to Black Americans there is a difference in the two major political parties. Democrats are good to Blacks and the Republicans don’t care about Blacks. I could recite the deplorable conditions of Blacks in other cities that have been dominated by the Democratic Party over for the last 50 or more years, but I’d rather reflect on Allegheny County. In the history of Allegheny County outside of Pittsburgh there has never been a Black person elected to the Pa. House of Representatives. In the history of Pittsburgh only eight Blacks have been elected to the Pa. House of Representatives. Only one Black person has ever been elected to the position of president of Pittsburgh City Council. There has never been one Black in western Pa. elected to the Pa. State Senate or U.S. Congress. The Republicans did nominate a Black man for the U.S. Congress, his name was Algia Gary. Have we forgotten in 1996 the Democratic candidate for Allegheny County Commissioner made the insulting statement, “I don’t need Black votes.” Neither the candidate nor the Democratic Party apologized or retracted the insulting statement; they just knew we would take it lying down. However we shocked the Democratic Party by waging a campaign asking the Black voters to fight back by voting for the Republican candidates, Bob Cramner and Larry Dunn, and they responded by electing the first Republican commissioners in Allegheny County in over 60 years.
However eight years later Black voters returned to the Democrat reservation, and here we are in the year of 2013 not only being taken for granted, but allowing ourselves to be totally disrespected again.
I see a parallel between 1996 and 2013, the Democratic Party candidate in the 1996 election totally disrespected the Black voters and the party officials said absolutely nothing.
In 2013 William “Jack” Simmons and William “Bill” Robinson were thrown out of their respective positions and the Democratic Party duplicated their identical attitude they did in 1996 they have said absolutely nothing.
For Blacks throughout Allegheny County to sing the praises of the deserving Nelson Mandela is hypocritical, because we are not a people of action, but people of conversation and that is definitely not good enough.
The holiday season is upon us let’s remember Kingsley Association.
(Louis “Hop” Kendrick is a weekly contributor.)
