Ask not for whom they apologize

By D. G. Martin
Posted Monday, April 9, 2007

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Chapel Hill, NC - Which of our mistakes will future generations have to apologize for?

This question haunts me. It came back again last week when both houses of our General Assembly considered legislation to “express regret” for the institution of slavery.

Senator Tony Rand introduced a bill in which the legislature expresses “profound contrition for the official acts that sanctioned and perpetuated the denial of basic human rights and dignity to fellow humans… urges schools, colleges, and universities, religious and civic institutions, businesses and professional associations to do all within their power to acknowledge the transgressions of North Carolina's journey from a colony to a leading State, to learn the lessons of history in order to avoid repeating mistakes of the past, and to promote racial reconciliation” and “…calls on all North Carolinians to recommit their State, their communities, and themselves…to work daily to treat all persons with abiding respect for their humanity and to eliminate racial prejudices, injustices, and discrimination from our society.”

Representative Alma Adams and others introduced a similar bill in the House. Under its provisions, the legislature “formally apologizes for the injustice, cruelty, and brutality of slavery, cites its historical role in perpetuating slavery and racism, and expresses its profound regret for the practice of involuntary servitude in this State and for the many hardships experienced, past and present, on account of slavery.”

The Senate, with a minor amendment, passed Rand’s bill. When the House acts, the two versions will make their way to a conference committee to work out the differences in language. Then, the agreed upon expression of apology and regret will be passed by both houses.

I wonder again what things we are doing, or not doing, that our grandchildren will have to apologize for—on our behalf.

If our ancestors had such a blind spot with respect to slavery and our parents and grandparents had a similar one for segregation and its evils, what are our blind spots? What are we not seeing about today’s conditions?

An education system and a health care system that leave too many children behind? A God-given earth pillaged to give us momentary pleasure? Lost generations of youth abandoned to the streets and the gangs, destined for prison?

Or the prisons themselves, so often without the resources or the will to be any more than a holding pen to keep lawbreakers temporarily away from the rest of us?

Two recent books set in North Carolina have made me worry more about prisons. Last year, John Hart’s novel, “King of Lies,” made the national best-seller list. Set in the courthouse and jail in Salisbury, this novel takes its readers into North Carolina prisons through the experience of a troubled young lawyer who represents criminal defendants. One of these defendants is a young, attractive, repeat offender. He commits suicide rather than face again the repeated rapes he suffered his first time in prison. Hart, writing in the lawyer’s voice, says, “Since then I’ve skirted the prison system with something like morbid fascination, safe behind my briefcase, yet close enough never to forget what I saw in that young man’s eyes.”

Joseph Bathanti’s award winning novel, “Coventry,” gives us a look inside our prisons though the experience of a prison guard, Cal Gaddy. Cal develops a tolerance of the exploitation, sex, and drugs in the prison where he works. The strain of keeping things under control in such an environment pushes Cal to the limit.

The North Carolina Department of Correction is one of North Carolina’s largest businesses. It employs about 20,000 people, has a budget of over $1 billion, and is responsible for 37,000 inmates.

Some legislators and Department of Correction officials have fought for improvements in our prison system. To some degree they have been successful. But they have not gotten widespread or enthusiastic support from most of us, who just cannot get excited about the welfare of criminals.

“They deserve whatever they get,” some people say. And, too many of us silently agree.

Like John Hart’s lawyer character, we stay “safe behind my briefcase,” and do nothing—which is why, some day, years from now, the North Carolina General Assembly may have to apologize for us.

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D.G. Martin is the host of UNC-TV’s North Carolina Bookwatch, which airs Sundays at 5:00 p.m.

Upcoming NC Bookwatch programs on UNC-TV at 5pm, Sundays

April 15
Art Chansky
Blue Blood: Duke-Carolina: Inside the Most Storied Rivalry in College Hoops

April 22
Mark Ethridge
Grievances

April 29
Paul Leonard: Inside Habitat for Humanity
Music of a Thousand Hammers

May 6
Angela Davis Gardner
Plum Wine

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Art Chansky—Blue Blood:

Duke-Carolina: Inside the Most Storied Rivalry in College Hoops

For fifty years, the rivalry between Duke and Carolina has featured famous brawls, endless controversy, long-nurtured hatred—and some of the best basketball ever played in the history of the sport. The Duke-Carolina rivalry has fostered more than thirty former players from the two schools playing or coaching in the NBA; it has cultivated a maniacal subculture of fans who camp out for weeks just to get tickets to the seasonal matchups; it has enchanted a nation of spectators to watch games between the archrivals, garnering some of the highest regular-season TV ratings in history. Art Chansky’s Blue Blood: Duke-Carolina: Inside the Most Storied Rivalry in College Hoops is a chronicle of the Duke-Carolina fight as it has evolved over the last fifty years— celebrating the history of this rivalry, the traditions, the heritage, and, most importantly—the spectacular basketball.

In this episode of North Carolina Bookwatch, veteran journalist and author Art Chansky details the colorful, revered, and respected rivalry. Chansky has seen every Duke-Carolina game since 1968 and now gives audiences the never-before-told story behind the story of a sporting challenge that has polarized the nation.