Obama's Beer Summit and Race in America
Henry Louis Gates, James Crowley, Biden, and Obama met on the South Lawn at the White House
It was designed to create a teachable moment about race in America. But the much-ballyhooed "beer summit" at the White House last week seemed to go flatter than a week-old glass of lager. When the main antagonists—the black professor and the white cop—got together for 40 minutes on the South Lawn at President Obama's invitation, the media were kept in a roped-off pen 50 feet away, out of earshot. No questions were allowed, and Obama seemed eager to move on to other issues. He had told reporters earlier in the day that the "beer summit" was "a clever term, but this is not a summit, guys. This is three folks having a drink at the end of the day and hopefully giving people the opportunity to listen to each other."
President Obama and Vice President Joe Biden sat at a round, white picnic table sipping from mugs of beer and chomping on pretzels and peanuts with the two central figures in the drama, Harvard scholar Henry Gates Jr. and Cambridge, Mass., Police Sgt. James Crowley. Obama and Biden were in shirt sleeves; Gates and Crowley kept their suit jackets on. Crowley told a news conference later that there were no apologies and "no tension." "Two gentlemen agreed to disagree on a particular issue," he said, adding that he and Gates agreed to stay in touch by phone and meet again in the future. Gates issued a statement extolling free speech and thanking Obama for bringing them together. "The national conversation over the past week about my arrest has been rowdy, not to say tumultuous and unruly," Gates said. "But we've learned that we can have our differences without demonizing one another. There's reason to hope that many people have emerged with greater sympathy for the daily perils of policing, on the one hand, and for the genuine fears about racial profiling, on the other hand."
The drama started July 16 when Gates was arrested for disorderly conduct after police came to his home to investigate a possible break-in. Obama intensified the controversy when he said the police had "acted stupidly." To smooth things over, he invited Gates and Crowley to share brews. But in the end, despite considerable media hype, the beer summit seemed awkward and inconclusive, echoing America's larger conversation about race.
- See pictures of the beer summit.
- See pictures of Obama behind the scenes.
- Read 10 Things You Didn't Know About Henry Gates.
Reader Comments
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gates
Factoid, Gates did show ID. He dissed the officer, however, if your home is not your castle, as protected by the constitution, what is it? Imagine Newt Gingerich in his home, same situation, would we be talking this way? Of course not, we would be talking constitutional issues.
Professor Gates Arrest
As a retired police officer, I am embarassed by this story. Sgt. Crowley did exactly what he was supposed to do, up to a point. He got to the house quickly during a reported break-in. He confronted the people responsible and one of them, professor Gastes, claimed it was his own home he was breaking into. Sgt. Crowley demanded identification. He would have looked awful stupid if he just accepted somebody's word they were breaking into their own home, without some identification. Professor Gates took exception to the demand, claiming it was racially motivated. He then proceeded to give Sgt Crowley a lecture on racism in law enforcement. Sgt. Crowley, at some point, figured he was getting BS from some burglar and arrested Professor Gates. I find it difficult to believe Crowley could not make Gates understand and produce ID, without making an arrest. I also find it hard to believes Gates reacted that way. Nobody has said anything, but I wonder if Gates had been drinking.
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