The culture war on the LGBTQ community is lost because it is a battle from a long ago past. It's been settled. But new right-wing culture warriors can still cause a lot of damage."You're living in the past." So said the genuinely kind Mayor of Yonkers, New York, Angelo Martinelli, to angry opponents of United States v Yonkers, the massive, landmark housing desegregation case of the 1980s. A federal judge, backed by the Supreme Court, ruled that for 40 years Yonkers had deliberately built low-income housing in only one part of the city, which engendered poor-quality schools, health care, and transportation for most minority residents.
So, let's Make America Great Again?
A hero can be anyone, acting anywhere at any time. Often they can be surrounded by villains. and most especially involved are the innocent bystanders, silent witnesses who can be most affected by a crisis. Such was the case in my hometown of Yonkers New York in the 1980s. A life- and city- threatening crisis that lasted incredibly until complete settlement in 2007.
In United States v Yonkers, argued first in 1980, the federal government found that the fourth-largest city in New York state had deliberately and systematically for 40 years built public low-income housing in only one part of the city, the Southwest section (where I grew up). The 1980 census uncovered the fact that the residents of the rest of the city were overwhelmingly white, living in single unit houses. The federal court proved its case and demanded a resolution from the city: Begin building low-income and moderate-income scattered site housing in all parts of the city. Opponents of the court order fought vehemently in opposition. There were death threats against city council members and two mayors who agreed that the city had to comply.
One hero, and a very unlikely one, emerged in Mayor Angelo Martinelli. He was a good person, (I learned from a little business I did at his printing company) genuinely and universally respected and the longest serving mayor in the city's history at that point. But he was a middle-of-the-road Republican, in principle opposed to any government enforcing social policy. He originally opposed the court order. Nevertheless he soon faced reality. He saw the stakes for his city, on which the federal judge had imposed severe penalties and sanctions for non-compliance.
For his courage, he was voted out of office. The new mayor, Nicholas Wasicsko, was in a similar dilemma. He won office by promising to continue the fight ruling through appeals in federal court. Just days before he was inaugurated, the city's final appeal was rejected. The new mayor in his inaugural speech was forced to renege on his campaign promise. The city and the politicians erupted anew.
All of this drama was portrayed in the HBO 2015 mini-series Show Me a Hero. The series captures all of the political and legal drama but also considers the other heroes, those families fighting every day in the city's dangerous and self-perpetuating substandard housing projects.
The Yonkers case was not unusual for many reasons. Similar disputes happen to this day in America. But what made the case extremely significant was that it did not take place in any segregated southern city, but rather in the supposedly liberal Northeast. The Yonkers case proved that injustice and racism still thrive in America.
The final hero in the story is Judge Leonard Sand, who ruled with an iron gavel, never giving in to the city's endless delays, obstreperous manner, and intransigence. He wrote in his memoirs:
"A true test of one’s commitment to constitutional principles is the extent to which recognition is given to the rights of those in our midst who are the least affluent, least powerful and least welcome.”
His words are germane to this book and to the ongoing American experiment in democracy.
