MISSOURI WATCH: A NATION DIVIDED: DID OUR MORAL COMPASS MOVE?

Whatever your personal conclusions might be on the murder trial of O. J. Simpson, there were enough events in this bizarre case to validate each and every one of them.

If you are white and hold mostly traditional views, the chances are better than four to one that you thought Simpson was guilty and deserved to be sentenced to a reasonably lengthy prison term.

If you are black and have tasted the bitter fruits of discrimination at sometime during your lifetime, the odds are also about four to one that you found Simpson not guilty beyond a reasonable doubt or even one legal step further: innocent of all charges.

Having visited with both groups following the jury's verdict, I have yet to find representatives of either who varied from the norm. I have found few whites who believe Simpson was not guilty and no blacks who found him anything but innocent. I seriously doubt if either group will change opinions after a reasonable period of time.

So, here we are, a nation divided once again, this time over a highly publicized trial that seemed almost addictive to millions of us ordinary folk who took pleasure in every dramatic turn of that long, long ordeal. The trial was something of an American phenomenon, since Simpson has often been a television-sports figure for the past three decades, a Hall-of-Fame inductee and even a minor movie actor. We have watched as he raced through an airport terminal carrying his sponsor's luggage, and we have even seen him as a traumatized victim in "Police Academy," which amazingly enough was a shlock flick about the recruit training school of the Los Angeles Police Department. How's that for a real touch of irony? Mark Fuhrman didn't even have a walk-on part.

Since Simpson is protected by the constitutional prohibition against double jeopardy, Case No. BA-0970211 in the Superior Court of Los Angeles is closed. Finished. Lance Ito, upon recuperation, will hear other cases and render other decisions, but nothing will match the past 14 months. Johnnie Cochran will go on with his practice, but his fees will be much higher than before and he will become the lawyer-of-choice of every black defendant in America. Who knows, maybe Kato Kaelin will eventually find a meaningful, structured life, although one should not hope for too much too soon.

Where does this case leave the rest of us? The Browns and Goldmans will no doubt pursue their personal agendas, but eventually they will become little more than dim memories. Whites who found Simpson guilty beyond a reasonable doubt are no more likely to change their minds than 0. J. is likely to find the "real" killer. Blacks who defended Simpson while ignoring the damning evidence will no doubt in the future conjure up the rush of delight and excitement they experienced when the verdict was announced.

While not usually an unduly pessimistic spectator of Life On This Planet, I hold a foreboding about the trial which I hope and pray is wrong. I have a feeling that whatever progress we have been able to make thus far toward the peace and tranquillity promised by our Founding Fathers has been sidetracked, perhaps even shoved backward. I voice this concern not over the views of nativists who have long embraced racism but over those who, either morally or practically, were supportive of efforts to improve the lot of all minorities.

This last group, whose number I believe constitute a majority among us, included men and women inclined to accept, sometimes very reluctantly, programs to advance minorities. They accepted these remedies because they truly believed the nation could not advance, either morally or economically, without tacit support. These are not Americans who get on a soap box to advance any cause, but rather they make up the great American Middle Class, the group that has always provided the country with a powerful kind of stability that has seldom, if ever, been shaken by events regardless of how traumatic.

These are the hard-working fathers and mothers who devote their lives to furthering the future of their children. They are, for the most part, selfless in this aim, and whether they succeed or fail, they make up the stabilizing force of our neighborhoods, our communities and our states. In a word, they are America, and without them, we could just as well be France or the Netherlands or Bosnia.

These are the citizens all the other citizens had better be worried about. If their moral compass has changed as a result of Case No. BA-0970211, then America has changed as well. And not for the better.

~Jack Stapleton of Kennett is the editor of Missouri News and Editorial Service.