| December 10, 1975In our continuing series of Great | | | | York Mayor Abraham Beame as America's largest |
| Recants, that pronounced recently by former Ohio | | | | city neared bankruptcy. He now says, "The very |
| Governor John J. Gilligan has to rank near the top.The | | | | practices I advocated 10 and 20 years ago are |
| once-vocal champion of labor-liberal causes startled his | | | | responsible for our present difficulty. The borrowing of |
| fellow Democrats at a recent National Issues | | | | money to pay debt was a mistake. It is a bitter |
| Convention in Louisville, Kentucky, by blasting a trio of | | | | lesson."On federal control - by U.N. Ambassador Daniel |
| popular programs - a national health proposal, federal | | | | P. Moynihan, then assistant secretary of labor under |
| involvement in environmental protection, and federal | | | | President John F. Kennedy. He now says, "American |
| housing and community development. | | | | liberals are guilty of over-protecting the good name of |
| "Heretical as it may sound to some, I am very | | | | the poor, of over-selling underfinanced programs and |
| reluctant to see the federal government launch a | | | | of avoiding evidence of poor results. In particular (we |
| nation-wide health insurance program simply on the | | | | liberals) have paid too little heed to the limited |
| grounds that in the decade since Medicare and | | | | capacities of government bureaus to bring about social |
| Medicaid have appeared, we have poured millions into | | | | change."On new math - by the California State Board |
| the health care delivery system without improving | | | | of Education which a decade ago started the |
| materially either the level of health or its availability for | | | | education fad. The board now says, "Not everyone |
| most American families," said Gilligan.He went on to | | | | needs conceptual theory. The ability to balance a |
| suggest that most of these federal programs could be | | | | checkbook or add up a grocery list is basic."On |
| better handled on a state or regional level. Inasmuch as | | | | permissive behavior - by Dr. Benjamin Spock, baby |
| this position is exactly that of Presidential Hopeful | | | | care specialist and Vietnam War objector. He now |
| Ronald Reagan, the convention delegates were | | | | says, "We have reared a generation of brats. Parents |
| flabbergasted."I guess it is a departure from some of | | | | aren't firm enough with their children for fear of losing |
| my previous thinking," Gilligan said, "but there are many | | | | their love or incurring their resentment. This is a cruel |
| things I believed in ten years ago when I was in | | | | deprivation that we professionals have imposed on |
| Congress that now have proved not to work."The | | | | mothers and fathers. Of course, we did it with the best |
| aplomb with which dogmatic opinion leaders whirl 180 | | | | of intentions. We didn't realize until it was too late how |
| degrees when their assertions fail never ceases to | | | | our know-it-all attitude was undermining the self |
| amaze me.Yet we must acknowledge the intellectual | | | | assurance of parents." |
| courage such reversals require.If only those clearer | | | | Let us concede that those who espouse hard work, |
| thinkers who tell it like it is could be accorded the same | | | | self sufficiency, thrift, simple skills, craftsmanship and all |
| consideration as the self-appointed oracles!We delay | | | | the other old fashioned virtues may know what they |
| or destroy good causes at great expense and travail | | | | are talking about.As we search the list of beautiful |
| simply because those who advocate caution are | | | | social theories of the last few decades, what has |
| vilified.We are justified in questioning the remaining | | | | succeeded?Not the New Deal, nor the Square Deal, |
| pie-in-the-sky proposals still being thumped up by | | | | nor the New Frontier, nor the Great Society.Not public |
| activists with much rhetoric and little logic.Regular | | | | housing, rent subsidies, campus rioting, black power, |
| readers of this column will recall some of the other | | | | isolationism, foreign aid, sexual freedom, affirmative |
| Great Recants of recent years: | | | | action, welfare, hiring quotas, free tuition.Social Security, |
| | | | Medicare and unemployment compensation survive at |
| On school bussing - by Dr. James Coleman, | | | | great expense but stand in jeopardy.In view of the |
| sociologist for the University of Chicago who launched | | | | long and sorry record of error on the part of |
| the integration tool with a federal report in 1964. He | | | | yesterday's theorists, we would be better served by a |
| now says, "Only under certain specific circumstances | | | | new generation of pragmatists.Better to count small |
| does integration improve black classroom | | | | blessings than recant large mistakes.Lindsey Williams is |
| performance - when the number of blacks introduced | | | | a Sun columnist who can be contacted at:Website: |
| is not sufficiently large to alter the middle-class ethos | | | | with several hundred of Lin's articles written over 40 |
| of the classroom. When these limits are exceeded, the | | | | years, and his book "Boldly Onward," about the original |
| ghetto ethos prevails."On deficit spending - by New | | | | explorers of America. |