Dylan Coburn Glenn, a special assistant to the President for economic policy

Celebrating Black History

Secretary Ann M. Veneman opened the celebration of Black History Month at USDA headquarters in Washington DC in early February. The opening ceremony was organized by Diana Charles, a management analyst in the Office of Civil Rights who chaired USDA's Black History Month Committee.

At that opening ceremony Veneman said, "I believe this observance is especially important in these challenging times. For as we stand united as one nation, with one voice, in a new struggle to secure our freedom, we must never forget the courage and sacrifice of those Americans for whom freedom and equality were hard-fought propositions, and at other times so elusive a dream."

Echoing those thoughts Dylan Coburn Glenn, a special assistant to the President for economic policy, emphasized the need to embrace the past while focusing on the future. Here are excerpts of his keynote speech:

"It's altogether appropriate that we are here to celebrate Black History Month. African Americans, as a race, are the only Americans whose roots in this country are totally defined by race and ethnicity. When you think about it, our forefathers endured more than a century of slavery followed by a full century of mandated second-class citizenship and legalized and forced segregation.

"This legal mandate, enforced primarily in Southern states, ended four years before I was born, but it has left an undeniable and indelible mark on all of us, as we assume our rights as whole and complete American citizens. And so, again, it is fitting that we remember our tragic past and that we honor those historic figures that led us and our people through those difficult years and strived to bring us freedom, equality and justice.

"Martin Luther King, of course, stands as one of the greatest leaders now, recognized by all Americans as a 20th century icon whose birthday we now celebrate as a national holiday. I was proud to have the opportunity to accompany our First Lady, Laura Bush, down to Atlanta, as she went on behalf of President George W. Bush to celebrate King Day. And she spoke, I recall, movingly about Dr. King, and his deeds and his words, not as a black leader, but more importantly as a true American leader, who was a true American hero.

"That illustrates what I really want to visit with you a bit about today, and that is, yes, our past is a significant part of our lives, and it's important for us to remember. But I would argue it's more important for us now to spend our time looking at the future, our future not as African Americans or Spanish Americans or Hispanic Americans or whatever hyphenated American, but as Americans who happen to be one color or the other, Americans who happen to be black.

"The theme of the Black History Month program is `The Color Line Revisited,' and it poses the question: `Is Racism Dead?' Well, I think that all of us here recognize that racism is not dead in our great nation, but we also hasten to acknowledge the fact that there's been tremendous progress made and tremendous things have been achieved.

"A good friend of mine is a woman who served in the first Bush administration, and she used to tell me that the wisest person she ever knew was her mother who only had an eighth grade education. My friend--who had a Ph.D., who was a very sophisticated woman, served as the dean of the business school at the McIntyre School at U.Va., was the first black and first woman to ever become an officer or a board member of a Fortune 200 company--said her mother was the wisest person she'd ever known because she never taught her that it was a liability to be black or to be a female, and so it never was.

"I was always struck by that comment. As black Americans, we can no longer handicap ourselves and our children. Racism, undeniably, still exists, but our challenge, as my father used to say, is to 'make race the other guy's problem, not ours'." •

--Patricia Klintberg