By Frederick A. Hurst

“POWER” AND THE SPRINGFIELD POLICE COMMISSION
Some people quiver when they hear the word “power” used in a political context, especially when it is used by a Black person. And it’s especially been that way since the sixties when the political meaning of the term was reinvented by organizations like the Black Panthers and individuals like the late Stokely Carmichael who wrote a defining book on the term “Black Power.” Stokely and those like him scared the hell out of White people and caused many reputable and lesser-reputable Black folks alike to cringe.
And yet there was nothing new to most White Americans about the use of power in the political context who had been using and misusing it to promote their own selfish interests since well before the American Constitution had been formed and long afterwards down to the present day where some have discovered even more deliberate and open ways to misuse political power to their own benefit, too often to the detriment of Black folks and almost just as often to the detriment of less sophisticated White folks who have often been too easily molded into attack dogs by powerful White politicians.
So, when I raise the word “power” in the context of the new Springfield Police Commission, nobody should be surprised. The Springfield Police Commission’s power was legitimized by the Springfield City Council many times over, by the courts and by the people of Springfield and, yet, it still remains feckless and powerless to operate effectively. It is no more powerful in effect today than it was before so many fought so hard to legitimize its power and to reduce the power of Springfield’s Mayor Sarno and Chief Clapprood, who have, literally, usurped Police Commission powers they don’t own. And the Police Commissioners – every one of them – appear to do nothing but whine about it.
(Witness the fake title of “Superintendent” given to Clapprood by Mayor Sarno in order to create the false perception that she has not been demoted to her true title of “chief” after the court affirmed the city council’s vote to reestablish a police commission with broad powers and demote her to Chief Clapprood. It was a bold and blatant scheme to use symbolism by Sarno and Clapprood to usurp the power of the new commission and the power of those people and institutions who legitimized it.)
I hesitate to use well-known old sayings about power to characterize the Springfield Police Commission but its members need to be reminded that “power” is not “given.” It is “taken.” Do you hear me Commissioner Robert “Cee” Jackson.” A man of your size, your community stature and your influence shouldn’t beg for power and nor should your lesser-endowed fellow commissioners. Power does not come by way of a handout! It is “taken!” Especially power that so many have already fought for. You and the other commissioners have been given the legitimacy by your peers and the courts and the council to fight the last and final battle to execute the powers of your office and the intentions of those who fought for you. In an effort to reduce my forceful nudge to the simplest of terms, I can only implore you to “Just do it!”
In the vernacular of the street, this mayor and his minions are “punking you out.” And they are doing it in public! Openly! In your face! I remember when you and Bud Williams and Jay Griffin and others were members of “Bang.” I recall when you all walked into Roger Williams’ office when he was the Director of the Springfield Action Commission and the leader of a new federal block grant jobs program called the Concentrated Employment Program (CEP), which was planned to empower people to control their own employment destiny. You didn’t trust Roger to do the right thing. You didn’t beg him. To the contrary, you pounded your fists on his desk and threatened to throw him out of the window and refused to leave his office until he committed to do the right thing by the community. And he did. And many community people prospered from your original efforts. The late Ray Jordan got his start from CEP just as did so many others, including every member of BANG. What happened to that proud spirit of “demand?” When did it yield to “begging?” and “How can we get it back?”
Frederick Douglass famously wrote that “Power yields to nothing but a demand.” He did many things that demonstrate his words. He sat often in Lincoln’s office pounding on his desk, demanding that Lincoln issue a declaration of independence for all slaves and, when the opportunity arose allowing Lincoln to issue his Emancipation Proclamation, nobody deserved more credit for it than Douglass for his relentless pressure on a President who reluctantly ended the slavery power of the rebellious Southern states.
Let’s face it. We’re not talking about something as weighty as a Civil War here, or a reluctant great president, or a courageous ex-slave who escaped to the North and fought for the liberation of his fellow enslaved Americans until the day he died. We’re talking about a legitimized group of empowered people (Police Commissioners) forcefully confronting a mere mortal mayor of a relatively small city in America who couldn’t hold a candle to either of these great men or to the many who came after them. They all fought. Some died. Many were wounded. But none whined. They demanded! In the words of the late John Lewis, they made “good trouble” and changed the world.
And, damn it! So can you, Cee Jackson, be a forceful figure in changing the local dynamic as the African American presence on our new, powerful police commission. And so couldn’t Bud Williams and Jay Griffin (who have raised begging and groveling to White power to new levels) vocally support you in their roles as prominent leaders from the past. Things don’t have to be the way they are. How can you all sit back and let this limited man called a mayor take your power apparently for a few pieces of silver.
For the benefit of Black Springfield and its future, speak up or bow out, and leave the future of Black Springfield to others who possess more courage and less timidity and greed and who care more about their community than their own immediate gain.

POST SCRIPT
All of the names I have mentioned are my contemporaries in the broadest sense of the word, a fact that gives me a special dispensation to speak my mind. We were raised together, played and partied together, went our different ways and returned as adults and fought together in one way or another in the quest for freedom and some local power for Black folks in little Springfield. And soon, we will die together because, whether we like it or not, our time on the stage of life is coming to an end and we won’t count anymore except for whatever legacy we leave behind. And that legacy will not be manifested in our names but, rather, in our “acts.” Cee, Bud, Jay and others from the remnants of my generation who have lost their way, remember what Mark wrote: “For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul.” We need you back in the real fight. And time is running out.

ATTORNEY GEORGE M. NASSAR: 1937-2022
George Nassar was my friend. I hadn’t seen or heard from him in many years. I met him when he was a powerful and highly regarded White Springfield attorney who was making a lot of money and could have easily blown me off when I came to him for help when I was told that I could not teach school in the Springfield Public Schools because of my civil rights activities. I had arrived back in Springfield in 1968 after the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. altered my career trajectory. I focused on young people and when riots broke out at Technical High School, I became involved as an informal advisor to the Black students. Eventually, befuddled school authorities reluctantly invited me in to speak to the Black students, who they had isolated in a gym. The students were seated on bleachers restive and angry and anxious to fight White students who they had been grappling with. I calmed them down but rumors spread that some Black female students had been trapped and beaten in another area of the school and all hell broke loose.
The fighting between Black and White students spread out into Elliot Street and cops came from all over the city and finally quelled the violence. The result was a Black student walk-out and boycott of all four of the high schools and the temporary establishment of “freedom schools” in Black churches. I was seen as the leader of it all but, the fact is, many prominent members of the Black community helped coordinate the boycott. At some point I was arrested on false charges which were dismissed at the pre-trial conference.
Sometime thereafter, I applied to teach school and was denied because of my role in the boycott and other events of the times. Determined to teach, I sought out George Nasser for help. He didn’t hesitate. He set up a meeting with then Springfield School Superintendent John Deady and threatened him in my presence by saying he would represent me for free in a lawsuit against John Deady, the city and the school system and John Deady, knowing Nassar’s reputation, folded and I was soon teaching at Kiley Jr. High School.
George Nassar was a good man who will be missed. ■