I am so pleased and proud that the first annual edition of the "State of Black America" (Encounter Books), published by my organization, CURE, Center for Urban Renewal and Education, in conjunction with the Claremont Institute has just been released.
CURE was founded to provide a platform for an alternative vision of what "Black America" is about and what the real challenges are of our citizens of color.
Heretofore, the left has dominated the discussion concerning Black Americans. The left has dominated the discussion to such an extent that too many Americans of all backgrounds believe that the view from the left captures all chapter and verse of who Black Americans are and what ideas and policies will best serve them.
Too few understand and appreciate that even the term "Black America" is no more an accurate depiction of the realities of individual Black Americans than the term "white America" captures the realities of individual white Americans.
The politicization of race, and the formal incorporation of racial and ethnic labels in American government and law, is itself a victory of the left.
Reducing any human being to a racial and ethnic label, even under the guise of helping, results in the treatment of a disease amounting to a continuation of the disease itself.
Now, with the publication of CURE's first annual edition of "The State of Black America," conservatives push back and move to recapture the high ground in the policy discussion regarding Black Americans, who they are and what they need.
This collection of essays and analyses, compiled and edited by Dr. William B. Allen, resident scholar at CURE, professor emeritus of political philosophy at Michigan State University and emeritus dean of James Madison College at Michigan State University, starts with ideas and moves on to data that strike at the heart of left-wing conventional wisdom about Black Americans and their role in and relation to our nation's history.
There are few of any political orientation who do not agree that problems of race continue to plague us.
Where left and right part company is defining what those problems are and how best to address them.
Most fundamentally, concerning our nation, the difference of opinion is whether our nation is a vessel in need of repair, or whether the vessel itself is fundamentally flawed and needs to be replaced.
And left and right part company on the question about the extent to which the vessel, the nation, is even relevant and whether today the issues lie with individuals taking responsibility for their own lives.
In CURE's "State of Black America," leading scholars from academia and policy institutes take on these hard questions regarding our nation's history and examine with rigor the struggles from a nation founded on the ideals of freedom that permitted slavery to the Civil War and the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments to the Constitution -- dealing with equal protection and forbidding of slavery -- to the welfare state and today's attacks on our culture and policing.
The annual surveys from organizations of the left, like the National Urban League's "State of Black America," seek more government in every area of the lives of Black Americans as the answer to what will improve their lives.
As conservatives, we see the secret and success of America in its founding as a free nation under God and see the ongoing task as perfecting this ideal rather than departing from it.
Fix our national institutions to conform to our ideals of freedom, and appreciate that eternal truths -- the responsibility of every individual for their personal choices and the sanctity of life, family and property -- transcend race and ethnicity.
This is the important bottom line of CURE's first annual "State of Black America." Get the full story and details; it is recommended reading.
Star Parker is president of the Center for Urban Renewal and Education and host of the weekly television show "Cure America with Star Parker." To find out more about Star Parker and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.
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