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My Grandfather's Son: A Memoir (Audio CD)
by Clarence Thomas
| Category:
Biography, Leadership, Life, Motivation |
| Market price: ¥ 388.00
MSL price:
¥ 358.00
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MSL rating:
 Good for Gifts |
| MSL Pointer Review:
Written in such a personal and down to earth style that this book provides a much-needed glimpse at the life of Justice Thomas, a remarkable man by all means. |
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AllReviews |
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Chris Jeub (MSL quote), USA
<2008-01-18 00:00>
I rarely stay up till wee-hours in the morning reading a book, but I did so last night. At 1:30 a.m., I finished reading the final words in Clarence Thomas' My Grandfather's Son: A Memoir. This is a must-read for those of us who remember the Anita Hill Hearings and the national trial of 1991 when a conservative black man was appointed to the Supreme Court. Those of you who remember the portrayal of the He-said/She-said dispute by the media will find the behind-the-scenes final chapters irresistible page-turners.
There were a number of things that struck me about the life of Clarence Thomas that I hadn't known. First, as the title points out, he was raised by his grandfather (his mother's father) as his relationship with his biological father "ended at conception." Before going to live with his grandfather, his life was as "southern black" as you can get, and his book recalls his daily chore of hauling the bucket of human waste out of the outhouse for the rest of the family. His childhood was extremely impoverished, his lifelong belongings fitting into a paper bag when he moved to his grandparent's home. It was under his grandfather's teaching (he and his brother called their grandfather "Daddy") that Clarence learned the strong work ethic that made him the conservative he is today.More...
Clarence Thomas was truly raised in "extreme poverty." I posted a few weeks ago of our family's financial situation, one that is labeled as "extremely impoverished." Our family is quite well off compared to that of Thomas' childhood. In fact, Wendy and I respond with scoff to the government's labeling our "poverty." And this is how Thomas' grandfather saw finances, and he, likewise, refused to go on welfare or government assistance. He was a self-employed man who taught Thomas that "anything was possible with a little bit of elbow grease." Thomas grew up with a sense that no opportunity was out of his reach, and that attitude led him through rigorous Catholic education, Yale Law School, political confirmations and eventually through one of the toughest character assassination attempts in the history of American politics. I completely resonate with Thomas' refusal to allow others to judge his opinions, his motives, and his character.
This was the second thing that struck me of Thomas' life: his fight against The Man. Those who read this book will find it surprising that Thomas was not always a conservative. His lifetime passion was with the civil rights movement, a genuine desire to help other disadvantaged blacks. He even explains his "radical" youth where he dressed in army fatigues and resembled the Black Panthers, never considering that his views resembled Republicans more than Democrats. Yet it became undeniable that his world view, so distinctly defined by his grandfather, came to realize that blacks were held to social slavery by the legal experimentation of liberal ideologies. In his quest to grant blacks freedom, he grew to embrace conservative principles of hard work, expanded opportunity for all, and limited government.
But The Man expected this Negro to be a liberal democrat, and for his denial of liberal ideologies that Thomas believed to be harmful to his people, he suffered incredible hostility. The Senate confirmation hearings was actually Thomas' fifth confirmation process, so he was used to a fair amount of politics. Thomas goes to great pains explaining how vicious his enemies were. Here was Thomas, a southern black man who rose from poverty and racism to fulfill the American dream, only to be vilified and lectured by a panel of white men who claimed Thomas knew little of discrimination. Such judgmentalism was hypocritical to the n'th degree. Thomas explains how the final days of his confirmation were atrocious:
What they didn't understand was that my opponents didn't care who I was. Even if they had wanted to know the truth about me, it would have made no sense to them, since I refused to stay in my place and play by their rules and was too complicated to fit into their simple-minded, stereotypical pigeonholes. In any case, I couldn't be defeated without first being caricatured and dehumanized. They couldn't deny that I had a loyal and loving family, so they found ways to use it against me; they couldn't deny that I'd been born into rural poverty, so they cast doubt on everything I'd done since leaving home, twisting and belittling my escape from the poverty and ignorance of my young years. Above all they couldn't allow my life to be seen as the story of an ordinary person who, like most people, had worked out his problems step by unsure step. That would have been too honest--and too human.
The third profundity of this book is the reality I had to come to grips with: I was swayed by a dominant media machine that stamped me with an opinion of a fellow human being, someone I knew nothing about. Anita Hill came forth with testimony, and two others from Thomas' work backed up her allegations. Thomas explains how Anita's testimony contradicted itself and phone records and calendar history exonerated him of guilt. The testimony of the two who backed up Anita also failed the test of the most reasonable scrutiny. Besides, hundreds of former employees (there were a history of 800 who served under Thomas' management) lined up to testify on behalf of Thomas' character and against Anita's. Thomas does an outstanding job telling it the way he recalls.
A few days before I finished Thomas' book, I was talking with a dear friend of mine about the Anita Hill hearings. When I recalled the hearings' injustice, he reminded me, "Yeah, but Anita Hill had witnesses to back her up...Something must have happened." I sort of agreed. The insinuation was that the accusation of guilt was enough. Thomas addresses this attitude as a cultural plague the Black Man has carried in his history. This wasn't a "cry racism" response to his confirmation hearing. Quite the contrary. He reminds his readers that "hypersensitive civil-rights leaders who saw racism around every corner fell silent when my liberal enemies sneered that I was unqualified to sit on the Court." The reality was that if I had doubts about Clarence Thomas, it was very likely because of the media's portrayal of him and, perhaps, because of real prejudgment deep down inside.
Finally, Thomas accurately labeled the entire ordeal in a most poetic and succinct way. I remember the final words of the hearings. Thomas doesn't make a big deal of the fact that C-Span provided live coverage rather than allowing the media monopoly cut and edit his strongest verbiage. Thomas' final words alone vindicated himself, for it turned the tables on what his enemies' attempt to sink his nomination to the Supreme Court:
"This is a circus. It is a national disgrace. And from my standpoint, as a black American, as far as I am concerned, it is a high-tech lynching for uppity blacks who in any way deign to think for themselves, to do for themselves, to have different ideas, and it is a message that, unless you kowtow to an old order, this is what will happen to you, you will be lynched, destroyed, caricatured by a committee of the U.S. Senate rather than hung from a tree."
I highly recommend My Grandfather's Son by Justice Clarence Thomas. The book is packed full of timeless lessons. |
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Bookreporter.com (MSL quote), USA
<2008-01-18 00:00>
Clarence Thomas is a complex man who rose from a life of poverty in the segregated Deep South to become an associate justice on the United States Supreme Court. In his candid memoir, Justice Thomas chronicles his journey and pays tribute to the one real hero in his life - his maternal grandfather.
On June 23, 1948, a sweltering night in Pinpoint, Georgia, "when the air is so wet that you can barely draw breath," Clarence Thomas is born to M.C. and Leola "Pigeon" Thomas. Delivered by a midwife in his Aunt Annie's house, Clarence is, in his mother's words, "too stubborn to cry." Two years later his parents are divorced and his father moves to Philadelphia, leaving the family behind.
In the summer of 1955, "without a word of explanation," Pigeon sends Clarence and his younger brother Myers to live with their grandparents. On the morning the boys move in, his grandfather, whom he calls Daddy, tells them, "The damn vacation is over." While almost all other family members belong to Baptist or other Protestant churches, Daddy is a Roman Catholic convert. Daddy makes sure the boys are educated in the structured and disciplined environment of St. Benedict the Moor Grammar School. At St. Benedict's Clarence is treated with respect by the nuns and pushed to do his best. At home he is expected to pull his load. After graduation, he attends St. Pius X, Savannah's only Catholic high school for blacks.
A few months shy of his 16th birthday, Clarence believes he has a calling to become a priest and transfers to Saint John Vianney seminary school. Clarence is one of the first African-American students admitted. After graduation, he and several other classmates head for Immaculate Conception seminary, near Kansas City, Missouri. During his time there, Clarence begins to doubt his vocation. He leaves the seminary, although he knows his decision will break the promise he made to Daddy not to quit. Shortly after returning home, Daddy asks him to leave, saying he will probably turn out like his `"no-good daddy or those other no-good Pinpoint Negroes.'" With nowhere else to turn, Clarence moves in with his mother. It is 1968 - a year of riots, assassinations and disillusion - the year that he becomes an "angry black man."
To prove his daddy wrong, Clarence enrolls in Holy Cross College in Boston to finish his education. There he meets other black students who feel disillusioned as he does, and he joins them in protest demonstrations. Clarence also becomes acquainted with Kathy Ambush, a student at a nearby Catholic school for women. He decides to pursue a law degree at Yale, and in 1971, he and Kathy are married.
When a friend tells him that John Danforth, a Yale Law School graduate serving as Missouri's Attorney General, is looking for other Yalies to work for him, once again Clarence moves to Missouri - this time to Jefferson City with Kathy. He works in the attorney general's office, where job satisfaction is high but the salary is not. A few years later he accepts a higher paid position with Monsanto Chemical Company in St. Louis, but he finds little job satisfaction there.
After being offered another job working for Danforth, who has become a U.S. Senator, he and Kathy pack up and head for Washington, D.C. His connection with Danforth, along with his reputation and keen mind, gets him noticed by influential Republicans who see him as a rising star. But on the home front all is not well. Eventually he and Kathy divorce. He leaves Kathy and their son Jamal and throws himself into his work, and at times, he loses himself in a bottle.
Clarence later meets Virginia Bess Lamp. In 1987 she becomes his second wife and his "pillar of love, strength, and support." Her support comes in handy when he is nominated by President George Bush to fill a vacancy on the United States Supreme Court. In 1991, after a bitter confirmation hearing that includes allegations of sexual harassment by Anita Hill, he is appointed the second black Supreme Court justice.
MY GRANDFATHER'S SON is Clarence Thomas's deeply personal and eloquent story of faith, hope and courage. But most of all it is a loving tribute to his grandfather - the man whose hard work, discipline and determination made it possible for a child born into a life of poverty and segregation to become a justice on the United States Supreme Court. |
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