Community Views
Editor's Notebook
Look At Individuals
As Part Of The Whole
Taking Your Life
Into Your Hands
MELVIN "BUTCH" HOLLOWELL SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS
ALAN HITSKY ASSOCIATE EDITOR
When I arrived on
the campus of the
University of Vir-
ginia as a first-year
law student in the
fall of 1981, the first
thing that struck
me, besides the
awesome beauty of
Charlottesville, was
the old slave quarters.
There it sits, well-preserved,
right by the entrance to the
"Lawn" on central campus. UVA's
founder, Thomas Jefferson, used
slave labor to build the school in
the likeness of Athens' Acropolis.
Virginia did not admit black
students until the late 1960s,
some 10 years after Brown v.
Board ofEducation. And when I
(
as an institution, and I look back
on my tenure there with genuine
affection. I met my wife there,
made lasting friendships, and re-
ceived one of the best legal edu-
cations available in America. I
would do it all over again and
have become active in UVA re-
cruiting efforts.
I have no analytical trouble in
separating the wonderful edu-
cational value of the school from
its racist history.
In the broader context of race
relations, I am convinced that in
order for society to meaningful-
ly progress, we need to do a bet-
ter job of separating out and
dealing with people as individu-
als and not as groups.
This may come across as
is a strong feeling that more in-
vestment in the urban core is
warranted, particularly in light
of our shared history in the civil
rights struggle and the strong
buying power in the black com-
munity. But truth be told, in the
wake of white flight there has also
been some black flight. Just look
at the demographics of Southfield,
Oak Park, and even West Bloom-
field for that matter.
Many of Detroit's party stores
are owned by Arabs and
Chaldeans. But why should I re-
sent that? Clearly these stores
need to employ people from the
community and provide quality
goods at a fair price. These stores
were purchased with hard-earned
money; and if I want to open up
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4e,
was a student there in the early
1980s, it was still under a feder-
al court desegregation order.
There were no black faculty
members at the law school and
very few black students. As pres-
ident of the Black Law Students
Association, I led a yearlong
campaign to increase diversity
on the faculty and in the student
body.
Today, UVA Law has five
tenured black professors and
graduates more black lawyers
than any other law school in the
nation except Howard Universi-
ty, a traditionally black school.
Despite Virginia's legacy of
racial backwardness, I am proud
of how far -UVA has progressed
Melvin Hollowell is a
shareholder at Butzel Long
and a former candidate for
Congress from Detroit.
goody-two-shoes pablum or noth-
ing more than a wooden truism.
But lately it seems that we are
having enormous difficulty in
coming to grips with this essen-
tial tenet of decency — to the de-
light of the bigots of the world and
to the despair of those of goodwill.
The hatemongers want blacks
faulting Jews for leaving the city.
They thrive on black resentment
toward Arabs and Chaldeans for
owning so many of Detroit's par-
ty stores. And they are pleased
when whites blame blacks for
their sons and daughters not be-
ing admitted to the University of
Michigan because of quotas.
The bigots count on these
stereotypes taking root so that
we'll be too busy fighting each oth-
er to look at the facts.
And here are the facts. Many
Jews have left the city. And there
my own establishment, I need to
save money, borrow it, or get oth-
ers to put up the money with me.
As for the debate on affirma-
tive action, here's a quota for you:
In 1994, there were 500,000
young black men in college; but
there were 800,000 young black
men in prison. If anything, the
doors to educational opportunity
should be widened, not shut. And
the irony is that without an ed-
ucation there is almost no way to
avoid the criminal justice system.
We all have ingrained racial
and ethnic prejudices (even
though we may not want to ad-
mit it). But just as I have tried to
separate UVA's past from its pre-
sent, we must try to exert the
moral effort to see the good in peo-
ple as individuals and to treat
them accordingly. El
I'm a little ner-
vous about writ-
ing this column.
The way
things have been
going in our soci-
ety, I could be
taking my life in
my hands.
last
Just
month, a man was followed and
murdered so that two teens
could joy-ride in his four-wheel-
drive vehicle. A pregnant
woman was killed and her fetus
taken so that another woman
could claim the baby. Yitzhak
Rabin was murdered in the fer-
vent belief that he was an ene-
my of the State of Israel.
In Troy, Mich., last summer,
police began warning motorists
and residents about confronta-
tion. In an 11-day period, Troy
officers recorded three incidents
of violence after pedestrians
challenged speeding motorists
in normally quiet neighbor-
hoods.
In one incident, a resident
yelled at a speeding driver to slow
down. The driver stopped his
Porsche and got out, yelled ob-
scenities at the resident, shoved
him in the chest, threatened to
kill his wife, then drove off
In the good old days, this
wouldn't happen. In the good
old days, people lived closer to
their jobs, and to each other,
and looked out for each other.
They wouldn't speed down the
streets, and wouldn't kill each
other.
Sure, and if we would just
pray in school, and preach fam-
ily values, and take everyone off
welfare, and stop abortions, and
go to synagogue on Shabbat,
everything would be great, just
like in the good old days.
I doubt if the driver of the
Porsche is on welfare, and I
doubt that Yigal Amir, the slay-
er of Yitzhak Rabin, drove one,
either.
In fact, I don't think assas-
sinations in general are a new
phenomenon. Nor is hatred or
religious bigotry.
One of my greatest disap-
pointments in the aftermath of
the Rabin assassination was the
attitudes of some defending the
assassin. Or understanding. Or
condoning.
And yet, out of that incident
came a new awareness, a new
look at the commitment some
have made to Zionism, the Jew-
ish people's historic connection
to the Land of Israel, not just
the State of Israel. That there
is a difference magnifies the dif-
ferences we have as a Jewish
community.
Most Jews see no difference
between the actions of Yigal
Amir and the actions of Baruch
Goldstein, the settler who mur-
dered 29 Arabs praying in a
mosque at the Cave of Mach-
pelah in Hebron a few years
ago. But some Jews see major
differences between the two
events.
For some, both Yigal Amir
and Baruch Goldstein are he-
roes, defenders of the historic
claim of the Jewish people to the
entire Land of Israel, the bibli-
cal borders of Israel. For these
Jews, giving any land for peace
is tantamount to a betrayal of
the Jewish people and an act of
heresy against Judaism and the
Torah.
For them, despite soothing
words to the contrary, murder
is justified.
In the late 1980s, Rabbi Irv-
ing (Yitz) Greenberg wrote an
essay predicting the splitting of
the American Jewish commu-
nity along religious lines by the
year 2000. An Orthodox rabbi
who has headed CLAL, the
Center for Learning and Lead-
ership, Rabbi Greenberg has
worked tirelessly to bring to-
gether Judaism's religious fac-
tions. Unfortunately, his
predictions of an open schism
may be coming true five years
sooner than projected.
Linking Rabbi Greenberg's
essay and the Rabin murder is
dangerous. It could lead one to
the false conclusion that obser-
vant Jews quietly justify the
prime minister's murder, or at
least understand the rationale,
and non-observant Jews are on
the opposite side. Such a false-
hood is extremely dangerous to
all Jews, and at the heart of our
problem.
As long as Jews of any per-
suasion stereotype themselves
and other Jews — or any oth-
er group — we risk bestowing
blame for the actions of one on
the entire group. If any people
throughout history should be
aware of the dangers of that no-
tion, it should be the Jewish
people.
Baruch Goldstein is no hero.
Neither is Yigal Amir. That ei-
ther should use bullets instead
of ballots to convince the world
of the righteousness of their
cause is a travesty against
everything they were taught to
believe in.
That some would _ defend
their actions is shameful, as is
castigation of the groups with
which they are identified.
Now that I've written these
words, will someone object by
stopping his car and shaking his
fist at me, or calling the office
and yelling obscenities? Those
actions are like the bullet. A rea-
soned letter-to-the-editor is sim-
ilar to the ballot.
How will you vote?