from The Providence Journal

by M. Charles Bakst
September 28, 1999

At a Thursday luncheon, Rhode Island Boy Scouts will honor Fleet National Bank/Rhode Island with a Whitney M. Young Jr. Service Award for corporate citizenship.

Fleet is a good citizen. But it would be a better one -- and set a fine example -- if it rejected the award to protest Scout policy against gays as members or leaders. Such a move would be more in line with Fleet's nondiscriminatory policies and the legacy of Young, who was National Urban League executive director and dreamed of ``justice and equality for all.''

Young championed blacks. But his words could apply to today's gay cause. At the March on Washington, he declared, ``We must support the strong, we must give courage to the timid, we must remind the indifferent, and warn the opposed. Civil rights, which are God-given and constitutionally guaranteed, are not negotiable in 1963.''

In view of the furor that has raged recently in Rhode Island and around the nation about the Scouts and gays, I asked bank chairman Dean Holt why Fleet is accepting the award. He said Scouts over the years have done much good. ``This is a new issue and I think we'd rather try and work to have their policy changed as opposed to just cutting off support. We have a nondiscriminatory policy at the bank with regard to everything and we would like the Boy Scouts to come to that position.''

Holt is a board member of United Way, which has been a major Scout supporter. He said United Way is discussing the Scouts' policy and would like to speak with the Rhode Island and national organizations about it. ``That's the most we can do at this point,'' he said.

Bank P.R. aide Cate Roberts said Fleet this year will give United Way $350,000. The bank gave the Scouts $10,000 directly in connection with a June dinner and has bought a table for $500 for Thursday's lunch at the Westin.

The Providence Journal Co., which donated to the Scouts in the past and was the recipient of a Young Award a couple of years ago, declined to buy a lunch table. Publisher Howard Sutton said the company did so because ``the Scouts' stance regarding gays is clearly discriminatory.'' He said The Journal does not anticipate supporting Scout fundraisers ``while that policy remains in place.''

Kate Monteiro, a key Rhode Island gay-lesbian leader, said Fleet should reject the award and not lend its prestige to the Scouts. It doesn't matter, she said, that the Scouts do good things: ``Segregated universities in the South certainly educated a lot of people and did a lot of wonderful things, but they were still segregated institutions and they were still wrong.''

Accepting the award for Fleet will be Robert Twomey, a senior bank VP and a Rhode Island Scout board member. I told him I thought the Scouts generally are terrific but that they should know not to discriminate. ``We're going to work to try and make them better,'' he vowed.

Twomey didn't know what he might say when he gets the award. I think he should politely hand it back and say he hopes this small gesture will be one of many around the nation that eventually will prompt change. He could cite this quotation from someone who'd gone to an outdoor music festival:

``As we filed into that vast arena, everybody was given a match, and at a certain point in the program all the lights were turned out and one hundred thousand people were in darkness. Each person was asked to strike his match. I am certain each one of us thought, `What can I do with this little match?' But we all went along with the request and struck our tiny matches. And because one hundred thousand matches were struck, the place became as light as brightest day. This we can do as individuals. Each can strike his match. We can't just sit and wait for somebody else. We must go ahead -- alone, if necessary, but together in the end.''

And then Twomey could cite the passage's author: Whitney Young, in his book, To Be Equal .

M. Charles Bakst, The Journal's political columnist, can be reached by E-mail at mbakst@projo.com

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