The Nation - News from July 24, 1985

Labor Secretary William E. Brock III, in a conciliatory speech before a black civil rights organization, endorsed affirmative action policies to encourage minority hiring and promised a priority effort to reduce the unemployment rate among blacks. Brock told delegates to the annual conference of the National Urban League in Washington that the Reagan Administration and the black community must build mutual trust to improve their relations. “Those words ‘we’ and ‘they’ will not be in the vocabulary at the Labor Department,” Brock said. “I can tell you what will be our key words--trust, listen, try, try again, determination, new ideas, open mind and open door.”