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for the first time I'm beginning to question the survival and growth of sound developments in the struggle for justice. And I really am beginning to worry about the extent to which there can be solid and serious regression.
And I must tell you something else. I don't understand it. I don't understand what's being gained by this administration's sytematic, persistent attack on our civil rights goals and objectives and past successes. I really don't. I mean, I don't see how it's benefiting anyone. For example, let me tell you how naive I am. I thought, after the last presidential election and the fact that Presidents are limited to two terms now, that the indicators of conservative regression in the area of at least race relations would be put on back burners or taken off the stove, that there would be no particular need or advantage in playing that part of the game. And I thought, you know, Mr. Reagan's charm and smiles and his statement that he was once liberal and once belonged to unions and that he is not racist-- which, by the way, I never accused him of being racist or anything, because I think that's an irrelevant term. I thought that all of those would come to the fore in terms of not pursuing the racial retreat and regression, which seemed to have characterized the first term. But within a month or two after the election-- I think even before the inauguration-- the Justice Department was foremost in saying they were against quotas, et cetera. Pendleton was sort of the Quisling role of talking about the civil rights commission's new role, you know. And I said, my
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