PRISONS: Uprising in Attica

(2 of 3)

Clearly, the causes of the riot went deeper than the dinnertime incident, and some were reflected in the prisoners' not unreasonable demands. Among other things, they had initially asked for better pay for prison labor, permission to hold political meetings, the right to "religious freedom," an end to mail censorship, better educational facilities, orderly grievance procedures and better food (including less pork in the diet, a provision put forward by Black Muslims). As the deadlock continued, the prisoners' main concern seemed to be for their own safety. They demanded not only "complete amnesty" but, for a time, even "speedy and safe transportation out of confinement to a non-imperialist country."

At first, the prisoners conducted their negotiations with New York Commissioner of Correctional Services Russell Oswald, who was carefully frisked before being allowed into the captured cell blocks. Early in the negotiations, a lawyer sympathetic to the prisoners secured from a federal judge a highly unusual injunction prohibiting any physical or administrative retaliation by prison authorities for the uprising. Even though Oswald signed an agreement that no rebel would be punished, the increasingly desperate convicts refused to accept his promise—and even rejected as worthless the court injunction, the terms of which they had dictated. Then, in an effort to avoid bloodshed, officials permitted a diverse array of outside observers, specifically requested by the prisoners, to "oversee" the negotiations. The group included Radical Lawyer William Kunstler, New York Times Columnist Tom Wicker (see THE PRESS), the Rev. Wyatt Tee Walker, a Baptist minister from Harlem and Black Panther Party Chairman Bobby Seale.

Much of the antagonism between prisoners and Attica authorities was clearly racial. A statement by the inmates complained of "the unmitigated oppression wrought by the racist administrative network of this prison." Although 85% of the inmates are black or Puerto Rican, there is not a single black guard. The cultural clash between the blacks, who are mostly from the New York metropolitan area, and the small-town or rural white guards is obvious and sharp. One critic of the prison charged that the abuse of black inmates has included throwing them into cells containing nothing but two buckets, one for food, the other for use as a toilet. After the buckets were taken away to be emptied, prisoners had no way of knowing which had been used for what purpose. Claimed one inmate last week: "The only way to get along here is to be white or a homo. The guards favor them." Added another: "I've been in jails for ten years and this is the worst—it is a death house."