The New Politics of Racism in Suburban New Jersey, Pt. 4

By Rev. Jim Purcell, MPS, CPSP1 (Ret.)

Strictly in theory, the Middletown Township Committee has to vote as a body on things like who will be named to what position, if a body will be created or disbanded as an advisory group or any other kind of group affiliated with the municipal government, among other things.

In reality, though, GOP committee people do not express individual leadership skills and vote as a small herd. It is less the Round Table, so to speak, than it is the Borg, of Star Trek: The Next Generation fame.

I have already been asked why I do not include discussion of the democracy and 'one-member-one-vote' nature of the committee more heavily when discussing the governing body and its decisions relative to the controversy about the abolishment of the Middletown Human Rights Commission. This is because such 'democracy' by the committee is in theory and ceremony only. The real power behind such votes are not even the mayor, past or present, associated with the town through the course of time, but the Republican Machine that has controlled the community for the past 40 years.

In fairness, members of the Republican Party in Middletown Township who serve on the governing body do have opportunities in office to express their ideas, from what I can tell after years of covering the town. However, these expressions are more private at first, certainly not 'off the cuff' ever or without prior consultation with the town GOP's Political Machine. GOP office holders in Middletown row their oars in the same direction and no one plays as an individual in the political game -- and benefits from that organization.

Yet, this is not how a government organized under the Government of the United States is supposed to operate -- doing things the way they are done in Middletown laughs in the face of the American system of rule within its own borders, in my opinion.

Well, the core with this, of course, is that no political party is supposed to run any town or community in the United States of America -- yes, their candidates/officer-holders do but the darn political party is supposed to have nothing to say. This is where Middletown takes a 'hard right turn into crazy.' The idea that the electorate votes and sends cardboard cut-outs instead of bona fide representatives of the people's will to a governing body, which then gives license to any measure brought by the town's GOP Political Machine, which is led by several attorneys that are paid by the township for various services, is ridiculous and goes on every single day in Middletown.

Hailing a cab in Middletown?

This is not the first place I have stated that the leadership of the Middletown Republicans have historically been involved with overseeing governmental borrowing from a Newark law firm for several decades now. This must be legal, or else law enforcement would have been involved in this years ago, but it nonetheless smells as bad as Johnny On The Spot after a day at the circus.

The Middletown Committee is not, historically, a group of independent-minded people looking to do local government as much as they are a collection of the hopeful and ambitious seeking to be helped in careers and futures by the Middletown GOP, which is the most influential community politically in the county -- and one of the most influential in the state. In addition, so many state legislators and officials hail from Middletown it seems being closely aligned to the Middletown GOP can often lead to advancement in the ranks of politics or professions (particularly law or engineering).

Where does all this arrive where it involves bias? Not just of race but certainly that too. Its collected excesses have made Middletown one of the last all-White gated communities in New Jersey, if not the Industrial North East, intent on not allowing diversity or thoughts other than those in the 'group speak' of a small ring of influential, anonymous attorneys who are the real force behind the community's governance; not the committee people -- not the elected representatives of the people.

However, Middletown stoics, intent on never giving sway to the laws that govern the rest of the land, or the diversity that is so present nearly everywhere else in the Garden State, cannot win forever and, one fine day, this government will have to join the rest of the world.

Does all this make the elected and non-elected politicians of Middletown racist? Well, after much consideration, the community is 93 percent White -- and that is the proof in the pudding, isn't it? If race were not one of the single-most important issues to the powers that be there, how would the town have otherwise acquired a Native American population that is many times over the number of traditional minority residents in town? No, working-class Blacks and Hispanics are definitely be kept away from the town as per plan.

There is an old saying in the Black Community that, in many places, someone could get in trouble for a "DWB" as easy as a "DWI." And, I asked what DWB was and was told: It's 'driving while Black.' It happens in places where there usually aren't a lot of Black residents and it is a means of keeping Blacks intimidated.

I found it so hard to believe such things happened in my late teens. A lot has changed since then, and then again a lot of things about this world have remained the same since then -- just ask anyone you meet on the streets in Middletown.