Daily News Feed 10.29.2009/Vocab: stentorian

Morehouse clarifies controversial dress code policy
Under fire from critics inside and outside the institution, Morehouse College has clarified its new dress code policy. In an e-mail message to alumni, college president Robert M. Franklin defended the new policy as an outgrowth of a two-year effort and denied charges that the new rules — which prohibit gender nonconformity in clothing — resulted from homophobia. “Since the policy was released, a lot of attention has centered on the standard that prohibits men from wearing women’s clothing on campus,” Franklin wrote. (Continue Reading…)

Obama honors 1st African-American elected to US Senate
US President Barack Obama paid tribute on Wednesday to fellow political trailblazer Edward Brooke, who in 1966 became the first African-American elected to the Senate by popular vote. In the US Capitol rotunda, Obama presented Brooke, 90, with the Congressional gold medal, the highest civilian award given by the government’s legislative branch. “Today’s honor bears a unique significance: bestowed by this body of which he was an esteemed member; presented in this place where he moved the arc of history; surrounded by so many — myself included — who have followed the trail that he blazed,” said Obama as he stood next to the former senator from Massachusetts. Brooke, who served as a Republican from 1967 to 1979, was the first of just three blacks popularly elected to the Senate in the modern era, including Carol Mosely Braun (1993 to 1999) and Obama himself (2005-2008). (Continue Reading…)

Univ. of Md Black students demand apology for slavery
In light of a recent publication that strongly indicates that slaves helped to built the University of Maryland, College Park, without any type of acknowledgement, some Black students have called for President C. Dan Mote, to issue a formal apology for the institution’s use of slave labor. The university held a forum, “Release of a New Study on Slavery and UM Early History” Mon., Oct. 9 and remarks were made by Mote, noted historian Ira Berlin, the Rev. L. Jerome Fowler, a descendant of one of the Blacks who played a role in the early years of the university-Adam Plummer, university curator Elizabeth McAllister and Dottie Chicquelo, assistant director of the Office of Multi-Ethnic Student Education and president of the Black faculty and staff organization. (Continue Reading…)