Benign neglect was a policy propose in the late 1960s by New York Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, who was at the time on Nixon's White House Staff as an urban affairs advisor. While serving in this capacity, he sent the President a memo suggesting that "the issue of race could benefit from a period of 'benign neglect'. The subject has been too much talked about....We may need a period in which Negro progress continues and racial rhetoric fades." This "benign neglect" policy was designed to ease tensions following the American Civil Rights Movement of the late 1960s. Moynihan was particularly troubled by the speeches of Vice-president Spiro Agnew. However, the policy was widely seen as an abandonment of urban (particularly black) neighborhoods, as the Senator’s statements and writings appeared to encourage, for instance, fire departments engaging in triage to avoid engaging in a supposedly futile war against arson.