William Raspberry, Columnist, Dies at 76 William Raspberry, a Pulitzer Prize-winning syndicated columnist for The Washington Post who for 39 years in more than 200 newspapers brought a moderate voice to social issues, including race relations - sometimes to the ire of civil rights leaders - died on Tuesday at his home in Washington. He was 76. His wife, Sondra Raspberry, who confirmed the death, said Mr. Raspberry had prostate cancer, The Post reported. Mr. Raspberry wrote his column for The Post from 1966 to 2005. Initially under the title "Potomac Watch," and later under his own name, it steered clear of Washington's power brokers to focus on street violence, drug abuse, criminal justice, poverty, parenting, education and civil rights, often quoting ordinary people he interviewed and asserting his belief in individual responsibility in dealing with social issues. "Words matter," he wrote in a 1993 column about the raw lyrics of rap music. "And because I know words matter," he continued, "I wish my children, and kids younger than my children, would get back to innocent, hopeful lyrics. I wish their music was more about love and less graphically about intercourse. I wish their songs could be less angry and "victimized" and more about building a better world." His writing could spur controversy. In a column about violence in the streets of Washington in 1993, shortly after a shooting at an elementary school, Mr. Raspberry was criticized for calling for federal troops to restore order. "If we can deploy American soldiers in Mogadishu to protect the Somali people from violent "warlords," " he wrote, "is it beyond reason to deploy a few hundred troops here, at least until the streets are calm enough for ordinary law enforcement to take over?" Mr. Raspberry defied conventional labels. In 1974, Time magazine wrote that he had "emerged as the most respected black voice on any white U.S. newspaper." "Neither a Pollyanna nor a raging militant," Time continued, "he considers the merits rather than the ideology of any issue. Not surprisingly, his judgments regularly nettle the Pollyannas and militants. N.A.A.C.P. officials were nettled by a 1989 column in which Mr. Raspberry criticized civil rights leaders as dwelling on racism rather than pressing for practical solutions to the problems faced by blacks. "I don't underestimate either the persistence of racism or its effects, but it does seem to me that you spend too much time thinking about racism," he wrote. It is as though your whole aim is to get white people to acknowledge their racism and accept their guilt. Well, suppose they did: What would that change? "Well, quite a lot, as a matter of fact," replied Roger Wilkins, a former colleague of Mr. Raspberry's at The Post and later publisher of the N.A.A.C.P. journal, The Crisis, writing in Mother Jones magazine in 1989. The issue isn't guilt. It's responsibility. "Like it or not," Mr. Wilkins continued, "slavery, the damage from legalized oppression during the century that followed emancipation and the racism that still infects the entire nation follow a direct line to ghetto life today." To which Mr. Raspberry responded, "Just for the hell of it, why don't we pretend the racist dragon has been slain already - and take that next step right now?" Mr. Raspberry won the Pulitzer Prize for commentary in 1994. That year, the National Association of Black Journalists presented him with its Lifetime Achievement Award. "Raspberry's clarity of thought and his insistence on speaking the truth as he sees it - even when others disagree - have kept his column fresh, unpredictable and uncommonly wise," the citation said.