March 20, 1998 - Ward Connerly, University of California regent, speaks at an event sponsored by the Center of the American Experiment and the Minnesota Association of Scholars. Connerly’s speech is entitled “Racial Preferences: Inequities in the Name of Equality,” which focuses on affirmative action in college admissions.
April 1, 1998 - Midday broadcast of Richard Boucher, U.S. consul general to Hong Kong, speaking at Minnesota Meeting. Address is entitled "Advancing U.S. Interests in Hong Kong and Asia: Beyond Transition and Crisis." Topics of speech include current status of Hong Kong under China rule and the Asian economic crisis.
April 6, 1998 - Midday presents a broadcast of Grand Forks Mayor Pat Owens speaking to St. Peter residents at First Lutheran Church. Owens empathizes with St. Peter’s tornado disaster by reflecting on the devastating flooding that impacted Grand Forks the prior year. Program then turns to Vincent Harding speech on Martin Luther King, presented as part of coverage on 30th anniversary of King’s assassination, and his legacy.
April 7, 1998 - On this Midday, a broadcast of Theodore Shaw, associate director and counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund speaking at Annual National Conference of Education Writers Association, held in San Francisco. Shaw states the anti-affirmative action movement has misrepresented Martin Luther King Jr.'s legacy.
April 16, 1998 - Marge Anderson, chief executive of the Mille Lacs Ojibwe Band, comments on treaty rights. She says her nation has waited a long time for the word "sovereign" to gain meaning.
April 17, 1998 - Midday presents Governor Arne Carlson's speaking to the Minnesota Business Partnership and higher education groups about his ideas to improve Minnesota's public schools. Carlson highlights the definition of the “American Dream.” Following broadcast of speech, MPR’s Gary Eichten gets reaction from Joe Nathan, director of the Center for School Change at the University of Minnesota.
April 17, 1998 - National polling expert Peter Hart speaks on character, polls, and President Clinton. Hart’s speech is entitled, "Politics 1998: Public and Private Character in America” and given at 1998 Frank Premack Memorial Lecture at the Minnesota Journalism Center.
April 20, 1998 - On this Midday, a broadcast of Governor Arne Carlson speaking on media accountability, and a need for self-examination of profession. Carlson’s speech was given at the Minnesota Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists.
April 22, 1998 - Mannie Jackson, the owner of the Harlem Globetrotters addresses the Minnesota Meeting. Jackson’s speech was titled "What Sports Should Be." Speech is followed by a question and answer period. Minnesota Meeting is a non-profit corporation which hosts a wide range of public speakers. It is managed by the Hubert H. Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota.
April 24, 1998 - Former South African President and Nobel laureate F.W. de Klerk, speaking at the University of St. Thomas about the past, present and future of South Africa. F.W. de Klerk released Nelson Mandela from prison, abolished the laws of apartheid and laid the groundwork for South Africa's first multi-racial elections held in 1994.