BY PETE SEIDMAN
PHILADELPHIA - One thousand people marched through the Grays Ferry neighborhood April 14 protesting a racist assault by some 20-50 white thugs on the family of Annette Williams.

Part of the march route went through areas that racists are trying to preserve as segregated enclaves, where Blacks passing through have been attacked for years. Some neighborhood bigots boasted that they would outmobilize the demonstrators by three or four times. A few hundred racists were in the streets. They stood along the march route with their backs turned towards the disciplined demonstrators, who refused to be provoked. Most of the protesters were from the nearby Black sections of Grays Ferry, with a significant number of supporters from around the city. One group had driven all the way from Detroit to show solidarity.

The marchers demanded the city arrest all those involved in the February 23 attack. City officials did not respond to the assault until Charles Reeves, director of the Grays Ferry West Community Action Committee, with the initial backing of Nation of Islam Minister Rodney Muhammad, called the April 14 march.

The city administration, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), and area churches launched a major campaign pressing the Nation of Islam and Reeves' organization to call off the march. They claimed it would encourage more racist violence. At the same time, the march put pressure on these forces to take unaccustomed action. The cops had initially refused to go after the racist mob, but later began to make arrests (now numbering nine).

Grays Ferry members of the clergy from both Black and white churches organized an April 2 prayer meeting and candlelight procession attended by Mayor Rendell and Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua. Nearly 1,000 people attended this event, where organizers violence-baited the proposed April 14 demonstration and presented their gathering as a peaceful alternative.

Philadelphia NAACP president Jerome Mondesire had brokered a meeting March 16 where city officials offered Reeves substantial funding if he would call off the demonstration.

When this failed, Rendell approached the Minister Louis Farrakhan and offered to join him at a city-sponsored alternative indoor prayer meeting April 14 in exchange for the Nation of Islam's agreement to pull out of the demonstration.

Farrakhan accepted the mayor's offer. The two scheduled the prayer service to occur at the same time as the demonstration in a different part of town.

In his speech, Farrakhan offered a three-part solution to the situation in Grays Ferry. He called for justice for the Williams family; a civilian review board for the police department; and the promotion of more Black cops within the department.

Pete Seidman is a member of Local 125 of the Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees.  
 
 
Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home