Posted on 07/31/2007 8:10:34 PM PDT by stainlessbanner
A coffee mug used by Department of Public Safety Commissioner John A. Danaher III showing the Confederate flag in a Civil War battle has angered black leaders who said it was insensitive to display a symbol of hate, particularly when the state police have been under fire for complaints of racism.
The issue arose Wednesday night after the NAACP met with members of the Commission on African American Affairs to discuss how to address recent allegations of rampant racism within the state police and state Department of Correction. The African American Affairs Commission is a group of citizens appointed by the legislature to improve and promote the well-being of African Americans in the state.
After the meeting, Dawne Westbrook, the attorney for the NAACP, said she was contacted by a state trooper who was offended by the mug, which she saw Danaher drinking from when she met with him in his office over the racism issue and other problems within the department. Danaher has written a letter of apology to the trooper.
The mug incident fueled concerns about racism that were raised after state police Sgt. Andrew Crumbie filed a complaint in June with the Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities, saying derogatory words were used about his race by high-ranking state police officers. Crumbie, who is black, had been chief of staff to former Public Safety Commissioner Leonard Boyle, and then director of the state police forensic laboratory. He said he was removed for political and racial reasons. He also said the state police had a history of unfavorable treatment of minorities.
Then in July another black trooper came forward with offensive e-mails that were sent among troopers at the state police forensic laboratory. One was a still photograph of a black man lying on the street surrounded by watermelon rinds and chicken bones. The headline on the e-mail read "fatal overdose?" Another e-mail had a video attachment of a tow-headed white girl with a lisp sitting at a kitchen table in a yellow shirt and spewing racial slurs with the encouragement of two adults.
While Danaher has sent the letter of apology to Master Sgt. Theresa Freeman, and said he has taken the mug home, he said it depicts an artist's rendition of the third day of the battle of Gettysburg, with the beaten Confederate soldiers retreating.
Danaher said he has used the mug for seven years since his sons bought it for him as a gift when they visited Gettysburg.
"There are pictures of soldiers on horseback in retreat having lost," Danaher said. The flags were the "size of a postage stamp," he added.
He said his sons, who were 9 and 12 at the time, wanted to buy him a souvenir because he always bought them ones. He said he explained that to Freeman and she seemed satisfied with the answer.
"I wrote her a letter saying we discussed this and that I explained its origin," Danaher said, adding he also said that he took the mug home once he learned it had bothered her.
"I've removed it from my office and apologized for the misunderstanding," Danaher said. He said he fully understands the symbol of the flag. Danaher said he is continuing to meet with black troopers to discuss their concerns about racism.
But black leaders said Danaher should have been more sensitive about the symbol, particularly when he was meeting with a black trooper. Gov. M. Jodi Rell at the state police graduation last week said racism within the state police "will be rooted out and eliminated." She said "unequal treatment, harassment of any kind will not be tolerated."
But Wednesday night, several troopers, former troopers and correction officers met with the NAACP and then went to the African American Affairs Commission meeting. They requested a public hearing be held on the issue of racism in the state within the next several weeks, along with a meeting with Rell.
Black leaders said there needs to be more understanding about racially sensitive issues such as display of the Confederate flag.
"If this is true I find it very hard to believe someone of such a high position of power wouldn't recognize the significance of the symbol," Westbrook said. "It's been a symbol of racism and hate."
The Confederate flag has been controversial around the nation, particularly in the South, where it reminds some of the South's attempt to keep slavery legal during the Civil War.
"It's associated with hate groups nationwide," Westbrook said. "For someone in a position of leadership who heads public safety, what does it say about the issue of race relations and insensitivity?"
Westbrook said she does not know Danaher and has only heard good things about the him, since he was named commissioner in March. But she said that even if he is a history buff, and considered the mug a souvenir, "why would he want to memorialize that?"
Westbrook's comments came after Scot X. Esdaile, president of the Connecticut state conference of NAACP branches, urged the commission to join forces and hold a public hearing about the racism issue.
"If it's true that needs to be dealt with immediately," Esdaile said. "There is a deep history of pain and suffering under that flag and we need to have a zero tolerance."
Contact Tracy Gordon Fox at tfox@courant.com.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
Headline? Depart Muslim employees demand foot wash near coffee machine, restrooms too far away.
Yawn....
I have an old Sambos restaurant coffee mug I’m kinda partial to. Anyone know the NAACP’s position on it as I certainly would never not want to be in compliance with their rules governing breakfast habits
Someone call the cops. This is RACISM!!!
Without making such tempests in a teacup the professional victims & race whiners would be out of a job.
“The race hustlers are the most intolerant individuals of all. “
As much as the race hustlers seek opportunity to be offended, in the end isn’t it the white guilty liberal that legislates the thought-crimes laws and does the real damage?
Get over it. You bore me.
This is just plain dumb and shows the pits the NAACP has fallen into. What’s as bad is their defending of Michael Vicks.
Jeez, have a little class, get over it.
“rules governing breakfast habits”
Or reading habits as I sit and look at a copy of Little Black Sambo sitting on my bookshelf!
The NAACP and the race lobby will never rest until the Confederate flag is banned completely. If they say differently, they’re liars. They should be opposed, with lawyers and protest if neccessary, at every turn. If they bring in 1 lawyer over your flag, you need to bring in 2.
This reminds me of the idiot who was on Hannity who wanted a teacher fired because she taught her students the word “niggardly”.
Guess they’ll only be able to sell Yankee mugs at civil war parks now!.....Will it ever end?
Someome needs to go back and study history. There was far more pain and suffering under the American Flag, but no one advocates destroying or hiding it away, yet.
Also, today's Black Youth should be taught of the rich heritage their ancestors, even as slaves, had in fighting for and dying defending that flag. Even today, some Southern Blacks proudly wave the Battle Flag their ancestors fought under and defended.
That some bigots and hatemongers also flew it doesn't mean it belongs only to them. It is a symbol of Southern Heritage for both Black and White.
Nothing can change what history records. Besides, if they are serious about banning anything that stood for causing others pain and suffering or was used by bigots, why not the flag with the raised fist of the Black Panthers from the 1960s? Why not ban Louis Farakkan, his speeches and the movie they raved about that depicted Malcom X?
There has been plenty of hate from both sides. Isn't it past time to get over it and pull together to become one nation?
As was once said, in part: "I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood. I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification; one day right there in Alabama, little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers."
Must be working there way up to the Spanish teacher, now what is that word for black? Silly stuff, why don't they think of something serious, anyway I have one of those mugs, believe mine may have come from a veterans memorial.
Try reading the lyrics to some hip-hop songs and see what they say about cops and women; and how often they use the “N” word.
I’d say the NAACP has bigger problems to worry about than a painting of Gettysburg.
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