The conversation surrounding reparations is underway and the U.S. government must take a leading role.
The conversation surrounding reparations is underway and the U.S. government must take a leading role.By Sheila Jackson Lee
For nearly three decades, my former colleague Rep. John Conyers of Michigan would introduce H.R. 40, legislation seeking to establish a commission to study and develop reparation proposals. Though many thought it a lost cause, he believed that a day would come when our nation would need to account for the brutal mistreatment of African Americans during chattel slavery, Jim Crow segregation, and the enduring structural racism endemic to our society. With the rise and normalization of white supremacist expression during the Trump administration, the discussion of H.R. 40 and the concept of restorative justice have gained more urgency, garnering the attention of mainstream commentators and illustrating the need for a national reckoning.
Slavery is America’s original sin, and this country has yet to atone for the atrocities visited upon generations of enslaved Africans and their descendants. Moreover, the mythology built around the Civil War has obscured our discussions of the impact of chattel slavery and made it difficult to have a national dialogue on how to fully account for its place in American history and public policy. H.R. 40 is intended to create the framework for a national discussion on the enduring impact of slavery and its complex legacy to begin that necessary process of atonement.
The designation of this legislation as H.R. 40 is intended to memorialize the promise made by Gen. William T. Sherman, in his 1865 Special Field Order No. 15, to redistribute 400,000 acres of formerly Confederate-owned coastal land in South Carolina and Florida, subdivided into 40-acre plots. In addition to the more well-known land redistribution, the order also established autonomous governance for the region and provided for protection by military authorities of the settlements. Though Southern sympathizer and former slaveholder President Andrew Johnson would later overturn the order, this plan represented the first systematic form of freedmen reparations.
With the withdrawal of Union troops from the South in 1877, the promise of Reconstruction proved short-lived, and over the next century and a half, the Black Codes would morph into Jim Crow segregation and federal redlining and the war on drugs and mass incarceration and racism in policing and underfunded schools — injuries not confined solely to the South. These historical injustices connect through a web of government policies that have ensured that the majority of African Americans have had to, in the words of President Obama, “work twice as hard as anyone else if you want to get by.” Black America’s unemployment rate is more than twice that of white America’s. Black families have just one-sixteenth of the wealth of white families. Nearly one million Black people — mostly young men — are incarcerated across the country. Though remote in time from the period of enslavement, these racial disparities in access to education, health care, housing, insurance, employment, and other social goods are directly attributable to the damaging legacy of slavery and racial discrimination.
Since its introduction, H.R. 40 has spurred some governmental acknowledgment of the crime of slavery, but most often the response has taken the form of an apology. Even the well-intentioned 
commitments to examine the historical and modern-day implications of slavery by the Clinton administration, however, fell short of the mark and failed to inspire substantive public discourse. For many, it was not until The Atlantic published Ta-Nehisi Coates’ “The Case for Reparations” that the mainstream public began to reckon with, or even consider, the concept of reparations.
Though the federal government has been slow to engage on the issue of reparations, individuals, corporations, and other public institutions have engaged the discussion out of both necessity and conscience. In 1994, a group of California plaintiffs brought suit against the federal government, and by 2002, nine lawsuits were filed around the country by the Restitution Study Group. Though litigation has yielded only mixed success in court, a serious foundation was laid for alternative forms of restitution. For example, in 2005, J.P. Morgan & Company tried to make amends for its role in the slave trade with an apology and a $5 million, five-year scholarship fund for Black undergraduates in Louisiana. In 2008, the Episcopal Church apologized for perpetuating American slavery through its interpretation of the Bible and certain dioceses have implemented restitution programs.
In 2003, Brown University created the Committee on Slavery and Justice to assess the university’s role in slavery and determine a response. Similarly, in 2016, Georgetown University apologized for its historical links to slavery and said it would give an admissions edge to descendants of slaves whose sale in the 19th century helped pay off the school’s debts. These are only a few examples of how private institutions have begun reckoning with their past records. I expect that a growing number of institutions will be forced to examine their histories of discrimination, if for no other reason than increasing public scrutiny will force their history to light.
Since my reintroduction of H.R. 40 at the beginning of this Congress, both the legislation and concept of reparations have become the focus of national debate. For many, it is apparent that the success of the Obama administration has unleashed a backlash of racism and intolerance that is an echo of America’s dark past that has yet to be exorcised from the national consciousness. Commentators have turned to H.R. 40 as a response to formally begin the process of analyzing, confronting, and atoning for these dark chapters of American history.
Even conservative voices, like that of New York Times columnist David Brooks, are starting to give the reparations cause the hearing it deserves, observing that: “Reparations are a drastic policy and hard to execute, but the very act of talking and designing them heals a wound and opens a new story.” Similarly, a majority of the Democratic presidential contenders have turned to H.R 40 as a tool for reconciliation, with 17 cosponsoring or claiming they would sign the bill into law if elected.
Though critics have argued that the idea of reparations is unworkable politically or financially, their focus on money misses the point of the H.R. 40 commission’s mandate. The goal of these historical investigations is to bring American society to a new reckoning with how our past affects the current conditions of African Americans and to make America a better place by helping the truly disadvantaged. Consequently, the reparations movement does not focus on payments to individuals, but to remedies that can be created in as many forms necessary to equitably address the many kinds of injuries sustained from chattel slavery and its continuing vestiges. To merely focus on finance is an empty gesture and betrays a lack of understanding of the depth of the unaddressed moral issues that continue to haunt this nation.
While it might be convenient to assume that we can address the current divisive racial and political climate in our nation through race-neutral means, experience shows that we have not escaped our history. Though the civil rights movement challenged many of the most racist practices and structures that subjugated the African-American community, it was not followed by a commitment to truth and reconciliation. For that reason, the legacy of racial inequality has persisted and left the nation vulnerable to a range of problems that continue to yield division, racial disparities, and injustice.
By passing H.R. 40, Congress can start a movement toward the national reckoning we need to bridge racial divides. Reparations are ultimately about respect and reconciliation — and the hope that one day, all Americans can walk together toward a more just future.
Sheila Jackson Lee is a member of the Congress representing Texas’ 18th congressional district.
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Do you know what the author means by this? I’m not doubting there are many not commonly known narratives about the Civil War – but I don’t know what mythology she is referring to.
This is from her official website. Emphasis added.
Thanks, DS, much appreciated.
If the country is going to go down this path, what about reparations for Native Americans?
Or, is that what the special allowance for casinos is supposedly for?
I recall reading that the wealth created by this has led to internal disputes regarding who is in the “tribe”.
Would the same type of thing happen regarding this proposal?
You are correct about the ‘de-tribing’. There have been a lot of ugly side-effects of the legalization of native casinos, something I have been against since it was first proposed. I am simultaneously horrified at how natives in general are still treated with a disdain and ingrained racism that wouldn’t be societally-tolerated with other races, and the ignorance of so many Americans in believing that the mistreatment of native-Americans was something that happened in the 1800’s with little awareness of its persistence to the present day.
I saw problems with that proposal since the day it was presented. (Let alone whether or not gambling is a legitimate business activity, itself.)
But, I don’t see the same level of lingering discrimination regarding Native Americans (or between any other group), as exists with African-Americans. Perhaps this has to do with visual obviousness of skin color differences, itself. Or, maybe it does have more to do with vestiges of slavery.
Lumping all “non-white” people into a “people of color” category seems more related to politics, to some degree.
Obviously there is not a way to ‘measure’ the level of lingering discrimination. This is totally a ‘feeling’ statement: I’d say the horrible treatment of black Americans has been ‘more-addressed’ by society, so although anti-black racism lingers among arseholes, it is ‘not OK’ to make racist comments in polite society and more has been done to deal with institutional inequities regarding black Americans. I feel that less has been done on these fronts regarding the horrible treatment of natives to America, and therefore ‘equivalent’ statements and inequities that would not be ‘OK’ regarding black Americans, still linger with natives of America.
Feel free to tear that observation apart – it’s just my sense from what I’ve observed.
I think I’ll “pass” on that.
Huh?
Comments deleted
Re-word them and re-post them. (I’d like to see what you said.)
I emailed you
Well, I saw Keith’s comment, and observed that it was both amusing, and not (in any way) an attack on the author. Didn’t even mention the author.
And, I say that as someone who would likely vote for the person that Keith is making fun of.
KO, email me too. While I’m not posting my email, you can get it from DG or DS or Highbeam, or any City Councilmember, and anyone in Old East Davis, or 100’s of other people you might know.
Not a big fan of deleted comments unless they are a personal attack on a non-public figure or a physical threat. But, I’ve asked that personal attacks against me be left up (in most cases – exceptions being threats or outright doxxing). If one thinks someone is insensitive, the best way to allow them to show their colors is to let them fly their flag.
For what it’s worth, I did (subsequently) think of a way that some might find it objectionable.
Then again, I’m a fan of Family Guy (funniest show on TV), Colbert, etc.
Man, cartoons have changed since I was young. Then again, are Warner Brothers’ still the best?
Huge fan of Family Guy myself, though I sometimes cringe at their references to Jews. I give them a slide though, because they are equal-opportunity offenders, and they offend everyone.
Alan M., I’ll post my comment again. If they don’t like it they can take it down again.
I posted a play on Biden’s recent gaffe, here’s my comment:
I tell you if you have a problem figuring out whether you’re for reparations, then you ain’t black
I cringe at their references regarding the disabled, more than anything else. Some of that is particularly dark (but I still laugh).
I think this says something about trying to suppress people’s thoughts, without success.
Just to be politically-correct, I’ll go ahead and say “shame on you”, to Keith. 😉
But really, it’s a joke regarding Biden.
KO – re: TYAB comment. OK, that’s edgy – and funny, and could be offensive depending on how you take it. I actually haven’t read up on the Biden gaffe, just reference to it. Thanks for re-posting – and thanks for leaving it up (? — won’t know until I press send)
Attacks on authors will always be deleted.
I can agree with you when someone writes an article solely for the Vanguard. But articles written by public national congressional politicians for mass distribution is a whole different animal.
Ditto. Imagine if Trump submitted an article to the DV.
I wish we could just give people money and expect that it will fix what is broken. That is pretty much the entire platform of the left and unfortunately they have no proof – even after giving away trillions – that it works, and a compelling case proving that it makes things worse.
This article is long on repeating the same story of historical injustice, but frankly completely lacking in any reasonable explanation for how taxing the current generation to pay a penalty to another subset of the current generation is going to fix any problems with that subset.
One of my last pre-lockdown travels was attending the annual Black History Day celebration at the Grange Hall in Guinda in the Capay Valley. For those that don’t know, a fair number of black people from the South settled in the hills above Guinda in the years after the Civil war, unable to buy land in the fertile Valley — but making due and eventually working-in or buying Valley land as time passed.
The hills where they settled and eked-out and existence, now known today as the “Guinda Hills”, were insensitively and amazingly still shown on official US Geological Survey maps published as late as the 1960’s as “N*gger Heaven” (anyone who’s lived in the Capay Valley for some decades can confirm this).
This year a Japanese man who had a major hand in achieving reparations for the interned Japanese Americans gave a fascinating speech on the history of this movement. At the end of the talk he recommend that the strategy he used to gain reparations could be applied by black Americans.
I wish I could remember his name – I have his contact info – somewhere! I believe his wife and he grew up in Woodland and Winters. They shared that the Japanese sections of both towns were burned to the ground when the internment camps were shut down, in an attempt to keep Japanese-Americans from returning, and also because in many cases whites had taken their land and businesses and didn’t want them to claim them back. There was a photo of a sign posted under the Winters City Limit sign in 1945 that said — I think it was close to “Japanese Not Welcome”.
I am not arguing for reparations for black Americans. I’m not sure giving several-generational descendants a pile of cash is a healing solution at this point, and the logistical and financial hurdles would be enormous. The interned Japanese were a much smaller group, and they were able to gain reparations while many of the individuals actually-interned were living.
But while no slaves from the 1800′ still live of course, there is no doubt of what DS posted from Shelia Jackson’s website that, “we have certain datum that permits us to examine how a subset of Americans – African Americans – have been affected by the callousness of involuntary servitude. We know that in almost every segment of society – education, healthcare, jobs and wealth – the inequities that persist in America are more acutely and disproportionately felt in Black America.”
Interesting, thoughtfully-written comment.
By the way, DG, if I ever find the Japanese-American man’s contact info I’ll see if he’d be willing to write an article for the DV by compiling his February 2020 talk into an article. Both I and his wife were encouraging him to write a book. Obviously, he’s no spring chicken, though they seemed in good health. I can’t find a detailed schedule for the event on line (it’s a pretty old-timey event), only reference to a talk on Japanese internment.
“I’m not sure giving several-generational descendants a pile of cash is a healing solution at this point,”
I am not sure why so many people equate the concept of reparations with giving anyone “a pile of cash”. There are many ways reparations could be structured. Some might involve cash, some educational & employment opportunities, some might involve loans or grants. There are many possibilities and I find it very polarizing to reduce the options to money alone.