Take Back the Times: Vital Human Rights At Stake in Jena, La., Rangoon

The L.A. Times has an admirable editorial this morning on the troubles in the small town of Jena, La., where thousands of demonstrators marched yesterday to protest unequal justice for blacks compared to whites, and where there was a further incident this morning with nooses being found in a pickup truck driven by whites.

The L.A. Times was also correct this morning when it published the news story out of Jena on Page 1, while the national edition of the New York Times stuck it impropoerly way back in its Section one.

The fact is, the march of thousands of people from throughout the country in a civil rights protest in a Southern town, and the march, also yesterday, of 1,300 Buddhist monks through Rangoon, Burma, against one of the world's most horrific dictatorships, is news that is vital to humanity. Both marches deserve the most intensive coverage.

The LAT editorial tells us why. Describing in detail events of the last year which began when black high school students sat under a tree that had long been a gathering place for whites only. The next day, three nooses, a symbol of the lynchings that once outrageously marked Southern life, were found hanging from the same tree. This was the start of a series of incidents, including fights, between blacks and whites in the town of 3,000, with the authorities prosecuting black instigators, especially six young black men (the "Jena six") far more seriously than white instigators. Particularly egregious is the case of a 17-year-old black youth wrongfully charged as an adult, imprisoned for a long term, and kept there, despite a Louisiana appellate court ruling he should be freed. The incidents, thanks to bloggers and other new techniques of spreading the news, have become a cause celebre, leading to yesterday's protests by civil rights supporters from far and wide.

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Vital Human Rights At Stake in Jena, La., Rangoon