Controversial Nobel winner retires after race remarks
GARDEN CITY, N.Y. — James D. Watson, the co-discoverer of DNA who set off a recent furor with comments questioning the intelligence of blacks, announced his retirement last Thursday from the prestigious lab where he has worked for more than 40 years.
“Closer now to 80 than 79, the passing on of my remaining vestiges of leadership is more than overdue,” said Watson, who won a Nobel Prize in 1962 for co-discovering the double-helix structure of DNA. “The circumstances in which this transfer is occurring, however, are not those which I could ever have anticipated or desired.”
Watson, who stepped down from his post as chancellor of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, was in London last month to promote a new book when he was quoted in the Sunday Times Magazine of London as saying that he’s “inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa” because “all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours — whereas all the testing says not really.”
Watson added that while he hopes everyone is equal, “people who have to deal with black employees find this is not true.”
The Cold Spring Harbor lab, founded on the north shore of Long Island in 1890, has been home to seven Nobel Prize-winning scientists. Its board of directors suspended Watson after his remarks were made public. Chairman Eduardo Mestre said the board respected Watson’s decision to retire.
Army: Toss out WWII convictions of black soldiers in rioting death of POW
SEATTLE — Black soldiers court-martialed 63 years ago in the rioting death of an Italian prisoner of war at Fort Lawton were unfairly denied access to their attorneys and investigative records and should have their convictions overturned, the U.S. Army said last week.
The ruling by the Army’s Board of Corrections of Military Records applies to four soldiers who petitioned military investigators with the help of two congressmen, but could eventually cover two dozen more soldiers found guilty of rioting over alleged resentment of Italian prisoners’ living conditions on the post.
Samuel Snow, 84, one of the petitioners who served a year in prison, said he was “elated” by the decision.
“It just knocked me off of my feet,” Snow said from his home in Leesburg, Fla.
The decision could grant the soldiers honorable discharges, back pay and benefits.
In 1944, POW Guglielmo Olivotto was found hanging on wires in an obstacle course following a night of rioting on the post in what is now Seattle’s Discovery Park.
Forty-three black soldiers were tried in one of the largest courts-martial of World War II. Of those, 28 were found guilty of rioting and sentenced to as many as 25 years in prison.
Only two of the 28 soldiers are believed to be still alive, said Jack Hamann, who wrote a book on the case, “On American Soil: How Justice Became a Casualty of World War II.”
The other petitioners — Booker W. Townsell, of Milwaukee; Luther L. Larkin, of Searcy, Ark.; and William G. Jones, of Decatur, Ill. — are all deceased.
Larkin and Jones were also convicted of manslaughter. Their convictions will be thrown out, Hamann said.
“My first thought is, what a shame it is that the folks who this injustice was done to are not around to see this,” Hamann said. “And yet I’m so elated that their families will finally know that these men did not commit these crimes.”
Utah NAACP wants apology from Overstock founder after YouTube video
SALT LAKE CITY — The founder of Overstock.com rejected the NAACP’s demand for an apology after an Internet video surfaced of him saying that Utah minorities who don’t graduate from high school might as well be burned or thrown away.
Patrick Byrne’s comments were posted on YouTube. The video clip was from a debate last month in Provo, where he was speaking in favor of vouchers, public aid for families sending kids to private schools.
A statewide voucher program that would grant $500 to $3,000 per child based on family income is on the Utah ballot Nov. 6.
On the clip, Byrne says: “Right now, 40 percent of Utah minorities are not graduating from high school. You may as well burn those kids. That’s the end of their life. That’s the end of their ability to achieve in this society if they do not get a high school education. You might as, just throw the kids away.”
Byrne has made similar remarks in other debates. He said he had no intention of apologizing and claimed his comments were taken out of context.
“These folks have been selective in their editing,” Byrne said. “I very clearly said the system is throwing away 40 percent of the minority kids because they’re not graduating. I’m saying that I’m against throwing kids away.”
Jeanetta Williams, a voucher opponent and president of the NAACP’s Salt Lake branch, said she believes Byrne meant that minorities who don’t graduate should be burned or thrown away.
Williams noted that Byrne didn’t mention whites who don’t graduate. Utah is 83.5 percent white, 11 percent Hispanic and 1 percent black.
“It says he’s not sympathetic to the minority community and he means exactly what he said,” Williams said of Byrne’s lack of an apology.
Byrne has long been a voucher advocate and has donated several hundred thousand dollars to the voucher movement in Utah.
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People opposes vouchers, saying they could lead to segregated public schools and that tuition would still be out for reach for many minority families because vouchers wouldn’t cover the entire cost of private school.
