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The San Diego Monitor
California Once Tried to Ban Black People California had decided to ban slavery after a heated debate, but Burnett’s vision didn’t include black residents at all. “It could be no favor, and no kindness, to permit [free blacks] to settle in the State,” Burnett said, “while it would be a most serious injury to us….Had they been born here, and had acquired rights in consequence, I should not recommend any measures to expel them…the object is to keep them out.” Burnett wasn’t alone in his vision of a California that banned black people. Throughout the 1840s and 1850s, California citizens and legislators fought to ensure that free black people would be prohibited from immigrating to or living in California. And though their efforts eventually failed, they reflected the fear and racism faced by black people in the American West.
California held both opportunity and danger for people of color, many of whom were freed slaves. Born into slavery; Above, Elizabeth Flake Rowan had been freed when she entered California territory. After settling in what is now San Bernardino, Rowan helped build a fort, cared for the children and women of her community, and enjoyed the abundance of the young state. Though her daily life was relatively mundane—she lived with her husband, a barber, and raised three children while working as a laundress, she was perceived as a threat by Californians who wanted her and others like her excluded from the state altogether. California’s move to exclude black people from the state had roots in the new state’s conflict over whether to allow slavery or not. At the time, a national debate raged over how to decide if the United States’ newest territories should be open to slavery, and opinion split between pro-slavery advocates—mostly from Southern states—and “free soilers,” abolitionists who wished to introduce more slave-free states and territories into the Union. These debates heated up as the United States expanded westward, and in 1849 California threatened to change the equal number of free and slave states that held the United States Senate in a tentative balance. As part of the Compromise of 1850, a series of laws intended to keep the interests of slave owners and abolitionists in balance, California entered the, continued on 4
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Last year, George Clinton said that he would retire from touring or Wells or the pulps, is with white and predominantly male in 2019 but not before doing a final “One Nation Under a writers. We need new perspectives. That’s part of the process Groove” tour with Parliament-Funkadelic. Now, Clinton has of estrangement and familiarisation that great SF engages in.” announced that tour. In 2015, Thompson took part in the discussions that established READ: George Clinton Calls Flying Lotus, Thundercat & Kendrick the African Speculative Fiction Society. It is now a body of 170 published African writers, editors and publishers who nominate Lamar “The New Generation Of Funk Musicians” and vote for the Nommos. Ryman, who administers the awards, The “One Nation Under a Groove Tour” will begin on May 30 and says the African Science Fiction and Fantasy reading group on end in August. Clinton revealed the tour dates in an interview Facebook has 3,500 members and is growing. “In the wake of with Rolling Stone. the success of Black Panther, and the success of Africans like “I would love to keep on doing this but I’ll be 78 in a few more Thompson and Okorafor, almost every publisher now wants to months,” Clinton said. “Even though I feel like I’m just getting be able to say they are open to speculative fiction by Africans. started, the reality is the group needs to go ahead and keep it That can only be a good thing.” going. We’ve got a new vibe in the band, and they’ve been carrying it for the last three years. I’ve been up there representing for people, but they’ve actually been turning the place out. And we’ve been selling out for the last five years, every night.”
But he qualifies his optimism: “If African writers are to end their dependency on being published in the west – and develop a big audience on the [African] continent – publishers here should consider hiring in African editors with experience in African Englishes and lives. Then their efforts really will build on the success of people like Tade to provide a platform for African stories told by Africans.”
The tour will feature openers Zapp, Fishbone, Dumpstaphunk, and Miss Velvet & The Blue Wolf. On February, Clinton and the Ryman points to “terrific novels by Africans” such as Freshwater rest of Parliament-Funkadelic will serve as the openers for the by Akwaeke Emezi, the story of a young Nigerian woman whose consciousness is fractured between different realities; The Raft Red Hot Chili Peppers during their tour in Australia. by Fred Strydom, a high-concept meditation on memory and the nature of reality; Azotus, a sub-Saharan dystopia by Shadreck Chikoti. READ MORE www.sdmonitornews.com
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The San Diego Monitor
Be Counted! SDMNEWS’S Motivation Information Peter H. Burnett, first governor of California. (Credit: Bettmann Archive/Getty Images) Union as a free state. But that was hardly the end of debates over black Californians and slavery—or the virulent racism faced by black people in the state. As California drew up its state constitution, it faced these issues head-on. Many delegates—even those who were against slavery—called for the new state to bar free black people from the state altogether. Miners, who constituted one of California’s most powerful constituencies, worried that groups of black miners would pool their wealth and wield more influence than white miners. In some areas, free blacks were driven out of town or subject to segregation. But a growing minority wanted them banned from the new state altogether. As historian Eugene H. Berwangernotes, the question of whether to allow free black men to live in California was the only issue that inspired significant debate at California’s constitutional convention. Inspired by Oregon’slaws forcing free blacks to leave the state, Morton M. McCarver—a Kentuckian who had spent time there—brought a resolution to exclude free blacks from California, too. Thedebate that followed revealed the depth of anti-black sentiment in the territory. “Depend on it, you will find the country flooded with a population of free Negroes,” said McCarver, calling that potential wave of immigration “the greatest calamity that could befall California.”
McCarver’s proposal was ultimately rejected, but it had a long afterlife even after California became a state. Its next proponent was California’s first governor, Tennessee-born Peter Burnett. He, too, had lived in Oregon, where he signed the state’s first laws excluding black people. After moving to California during the Gold Rush, he returned to politics, and resumed trying to ban black people from the American West. It was an issue of life and death for African-Americans—and even after the constitution forbade slavery, the question of rights for black Californians caused deep divisions in the state. Sometimes, it even boiled over into personal rivalries. In 1859, an argument over slavery even resulted in a duel when United States Senator David C. Broderick, an abolitionist, was killed by ex-Chief Justice of the State of California David S. Terry, a proslavery advocate. Throughout Burnett’s tenure in office and that of his successor, California legislators attempted to exclude free blacks again and again. In 1858, for example, Isaac Allen brought abill alleging that associating with white people “leads to foster the ignorant pride of the free Negro, so that he becomes insolent and defiant, and if in sufficient numbers, would become dangerous.” The bill died in committee. Only when Californians began to worry about Chinese laborers instead, notes Berwanger, did the issue fade. READ MORE www.sdmonitornews.com
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SDMNEWS Must Read MOTHERSHIP Mothership: Tales from Afrofuturism and Beyond sets a bold new course for anthologies by showcasing the work from some of the most talented writers inside and outside speculative fiction. The authors in this anthology have earned such literary honors as the Pulitzer Prize, the American Book Award, the Hugo, the Nebula, and the Bram Stoker, among others. They have garnered numerous accolades and have sold millions of books around the world. Many of their names are likely to be new to you; Mothership is your invitation to get acquainted with them and their writing. PLOT: Alabama escapee and lifelong Southerner Edward Austin Hall, a graduate of Tulane University, writes journalism, poetry, and fiction. His writings about comics and comics creators have appeared in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Code Z: Black Visual Culture Now, and The Dictionary of Literary Biography. His forthcoming first novel is titled Chimera Island. Bill Campbell is the author of Sunshine Patriots, My Booty Novel, and Pop Culture: Politics, Puns, "Poohbutt" from a Liberal Stay-at-Home Dad, and the anti-racism satire, Koontown Killing Kaper. Along with Edward Austin Hall, he coedited the groundbreaking anthology, Mothership: Tales from Afrofuturism and Beyond. His other anthologies include Stories for Chip: A Tribute to Samuel R. Delany, Future Fiction, APB: Artists against Police Brutality, and Sunspot Jungle. He's also the author of the spaceploitation comic Baaaad Muthaz. Campbell lives in Washington, DC, where he spends his time with his family and helms Rosarium Publishing. Mothership: Tales from Afrofuturism and Beyond edited by Bill Campbell and Edward Austin Hall REVIEWS "In this wildly varied collection designed to showcase multiculturism, diversity, and characters of color in genre fiction, editors Campbell (Koontown Killing Kaper) and Hall (Chimera Island) bring together 40 authors to create an experience that's both eye-opening and unpredictable‌a provocative, entertaining, and vital anthology that accomplishes its mission." – Publishers Weekly "Mothership may just be one of the most important sf anthologies of the decade."
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The San Diego Monitor
CALIFORNIA LOVE CENSUS GUIDE
WITH THE 2020 U.S. Census count beginning next April 1, there's no underscoring the importance of it for California and its 39 million-plus residents. Federal programs utilize Census data to help determine funding levels for such things as roads, school programs, public health insurance and child care. But residents who are foreign-born, renters, individuals living in homes without a broadband subscription, those living close to or below the poverty line, and children younger than 5 are considered by the U.S. Census to be hard to count.
U.S. Census to be hard to count. California has the greatest risk of being undercounted, according to the Urban Institute, with projected 2020 undercounts ranging from 0.95 percent to 1.98 percent. The Golden State is trying to reduce the undercounting risk before the 2020 counts begin. "A lot of Californians have a fear of the government and that's what makes them difficult to count," says Diana Crofts-Pelayo, communications chief for the California Complete Count Committee (CCCC). Next page
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The San Diego Monitor
"That's why state leaders have invested in doing everything possible to help Californians understand what the Census is, understanding the importance of the Census and how it benefits the community."
Census Challenges According to the California Complete Count: Counting 2010 and Planning for 2020 report, "California is the largest and hardest-to-count state. Ten of the country's 50 hardest to count counties are in California – including Los Angeles, which is the single hardest to count county in the country‌it is unclear exactly how many Californians were missed in the 2010 count, but the consequences were significant." California's population of more than 39 million as of July 2018 is a 6.2 percent increase from the 2010 Census. The CCCC says that the main challenge facing the 2020 Census is the undercounting of the hard-to-count population groups, where more than 75 percent of residents are considered the hardest to count in the U.S., according to the League of California Cities.
Because of this, the CCCC developed the California Hard-toCount (CA-HTC) Index Interactive Map, which is based on 14 demographic, housing and socioeconomic variables that correlate with an area being difficult to count with index numbers from 0 to 136. In Los Angeles County, which has an estimated population of 3.9 million, most areas have an index number between 69 and 136. "The saying is that Los Angeles is the hardest-to-count city in the hardest-to-count county in the hardest-to-count state in the entire nation," Crofts-Pelayo says. "The bigger the index number, the more difficult it is to count." In recent Census counts, U.S. residents had to fill out the questionnaire on paper and return it by mail. The 2020 Census will mark the first time they will have the option to submit their responses online. "By filling it (the questionnaire) out, you are giving a voice to the community history and family by letting them know that it counts in California as a whole," Crofts-Pelayo says. READ MORE WWW.SDMONITORNEWS.COM
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