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The questions now - and the question is radical because the times are radical and because our situation is radical -- is whether politics is revelant to our contemporary crisis which cannot be resolved without political programs of depth and dimension never before attempted in America.

In the old politics -- the politics of deals and trades and patronage, the politics of place and priviilege and individual advancement -- is the old politics relevant to the issues of bread for the millions and housing and education for the poor?

Is politics relevant to the question of the redistribution of income and resources and restructing of the fundamental institutions of this society?

Is politics relevant to black reality?

Beyond all that, beyond the specific problems of black people, we must ask whether politics is relevant to white people.

Is it relevant to the emptiness and hysteria and the unresolved social and economic problems in the white community?

Can the old politics create white individuals who will not need racial scapegoats to solve their social and economic and sexual anxieties?

Watts and Newark and Detroit put these questions on the agenda of America life. In a very real sense, these rebellions were devastating critiques of the American Way of Politics.

In rebellion, the black people of America said that they were voting more and enjoying it less.

In rebellion, the black people of America said that politics in America has failed them, and that it is necessary now to create a new politics that can address itself to the real problems of this profoundly racist society.