cover image Lying Down with the Lions: A Public Life from the Streets of Oakland to the Halls of Power

Lying Down with the Lions: A Public Life from the Streets of Oakland to the Halls of Power

Ronald V. Dellums. Beacon Press (MA), $25 (220pp) ISBN 978-0-8070-4318-9

Dellums's first calling was to be a social worker. He found his second after a client inspired him ""to get at the causes, rather than the symptoms, of individual dysfunction."" Thus began his three-decade career as a leading progressive politician and social worker for the nation--or ""black male bomb-thrower from Berkeley,"" as one congressman put it. In this overly earnest apologia, Dellums explains his many radical positions and how he stuck to them. He spends the most time on his greatest victories: helping promote the Congressional Black Caucus and pushing for U.S. sanctions against South Africa. He doesn't forget his failures, though, showing instead how they were in some ways successes. For example, the annual CBC alternative budget was ignored legislatively, but it earned ""the respect, if not the support, of key members of the House."" And if Dellums failed to kill the B-2 bomber program, he at least won ""a partial victory--limiting the production of the planes."" Such relentless optimism may seem to some like a political defense mechanism, but according to Dellums, it's a necessary trait for the progressive. For ""the challenge is not so much to prevail at the moment as it is to remain faithful to the ideas and to the struggle, and to refuse to yield to the powerful temptation of cynicism."" Although he frequently teeters on the brink of self-hagiography--the pitfall of all political memoirs--and his recounting (with the help of longtime aide Halterman) of political battles can be dry, Dellums shows that he's met this challenge well. Photos. (Feb.)