Liz Cheney in Mother Jones magazine

On Foreign Policy: 1988: Nobody listens to divestment protests on apartheid

In a 1988 op-ed for her college newspaper, Liz Cheney had a stern message for anti-apartheid activists campaigning for freedom in South Africa: "frankly, nobody's listening." Cheney has not spoken publicly on Mandela since his death last week.

In the 1980s, when Cheney was attending Colorado College, a campus group called the Colorado College Community Against Apartheid led regular demonstrations to push the college to adopt a policy of divestment--an economic protest in which the college would agree not to invest in companies that had business interests in South Africa. The group, as did protesters on other campuses, constructed a "shanty town" on the quad, and it organized an on-stage demonstration at the school's 1987 graduation ceremony. That year's commencement speaker: Liz Cheney's mother, Lynne.

Ultimately, Cheney's argument won out on her campus. Colorado College was not one of the 167 American educational institutions to divest its financial resources from South Africa in the 1980s.

Source: Mother Jones magazine on 2014 Wyoming Senate race Dec 10, 2013

On Foreign Policy: 1988: Help South African blacks, but not by empty protests

In her 1988 op-ed in the Colorado College Catalyst student newspaper, Liz Cheney referred to the white South African regime as a "racist government" that had "oppressed South African blacks." But she argued against punitive economic action--and dismissed the entire divestment movement. "South Africa is indeed a moral cesspool," she wrote. But divestment, she argued, would amount to an empty gesture: "It is fulfilling to express our moral outrage, but no responsible person would do so at the expense of the thousands of black workers employed in US firms in South Africa."

"We can choose to make ourselves feel better by proclaiming our outrage and walking away or we can take the more difficult route of committing ourselves to bringing down the pillars of Apartheid by providing jobs, education and training for South African blacks," she wrote.

The African National Congress and their supporters around the world backed divestment as a means to bring about the end of the apartheid regime.

Source: Mother Jones magazine on 2014 Wyoming Senate race Dec 10, 2013

The above quotations are from Columns and news articles in Mother Jones magazine. Click here for other excerpts from Columns and news articles in Mother Jones magazine. Click here for other excerpts by Liz Cheney. Click here for a profile of Liz Cheney.
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