4

groups had to secure economic and political power.
#3 We have had to endure physical and
verbal abuse. Take hand me down housing -
raggedy pawn shop furniture - third and
fourth hand books - debilitated automobile
for transportation - spend exhorbant bus, train
and subway fares to get to our jobs which
never met with dignity when we got to
them and yet we are still told we have
to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps.
[crossed out:] Hell, I doubt [ ? ?] from
Spiro Agnew or J. Edgar Hoover could have
withstood one hour of the long series of
abuse. That we as a people have taken,
before they would have had a blow torch
down the throats of the men on the power thrones.
#4 But we have survived. We wear our
battle scars proudly and continue to move and
mobelize our people to obtain the right to a
decent life where our culture, our beauty, our
soul can be reflected in the kind of
ways necessary to make our communities
whole and financially stable.
Moving in this direction we must
begin taking advantage of the various methods
available to us. We should not single out any one
method or way to make ourselves free. But
we need to understand the mind of this
nation which is controlled by less than
1% of its population. We have to be clear
in our minds when we call down the power
structure exactly what we mean and
what power we can grasp to change it.