On This Day - August 28

by Nomad

The date of August 28 has special significance to all Americans, but particularly to African Americans.

1833 - First Steps to Freedom

With the passage of the Slavery Abolition Act, slavery was abolished in the United Kingdom and most of its colonies on this date in 1833. Historians point out, however, that the new law was not quite what it seemed.

How Trump's "Alternative Facts" Fuel His Racist Policies for Urban America

by Nomad

Recent remarks from Trump have reopened accusations of his racism. Yet, looking back to his campaign, Trump's racism has always been on full display, particularly when it came to his views on the urban life.

Throughout his presidential campaign, Trump preferred to paint an ugly portrait of urban life where things were on the verge of collapse and crime was out of control.

In his narrative, things were falling apart in the black community.

“Our African-American communities are absolutely in the worst shape that they’ve ever been in before, ever, ever, ever. You take a look at the inner cities, you get no education, you get no jobs, you get shot walking down the street.”

Colin Kaepernick, Cliven Bundy and The Man who Refused to Salute

by Nomad

The Colin Kaepernick controversy has highlighted America's divide over paying respect to symbols and the right to dissent, as a form of free speech.
In this post, we look at the historical reasons why our views changed following the rise of fascism and perhaps why they are presently called into question again. 

"False Rogues, Boring from Within"

Back in March 1944, The California Law Review published an interesting article called "Conscience v. The State" by Chester Charlton McCown.

Despatches from Switzerland a few months ago told of the execution of some and the arrest of many more of these sectaries. They were accused of teaching children to pray for peace and for the return of their fathers and brothers from the battle front; of putting Germans in the dilemma of choosing between the Fuehrer and a heavenly leader; of interpreting their visions as warnings of impending doom upon the German people.

These "false rogues, boring from within," who were chiefly working people, exhibited admirable courage and tenacity of faith. When, recently, seven were executed, their wives begged them not to sign a recantation in order to obtain a possible pardon. Repression seems to have had no deterrent effect upon the spread of the movement.

McCown, as a Professor of New Testament Literature, inevitably saw parallels between this act of defiance in the face of a fascist state and the early Christian martyrs who refused to pay their not only their taxes but their absolute submission to Caesar. 

That ethic has remained a long part of the faith. The writer cited the formal protestant attitude to nationalistic symbolism:

They believe that they "must obey God rather than man." If a national majority should decide upon policies which they thought wrong and they should be ordered to take part in the resulting actions, many would refuse to comply, accepting without resistance whatever punishment resulted.

This is, incidentally, the basis for Kim Davis' and her position on religious liberty. 

Generally speaking, religious convictions (and, in more secularist form, the moral conscience of the citizen) have found safe haven in any nation that dares to call itself free.  

Barbara Jordan Remembered

by Nomad

Today, February 21, marks the birthday of Texas Congresswoman Barbara Charline Jordan, arguably one of the most influential black women in American political history.

Representative Jordan from Texas was the first in many categories: the first African American to serve in the Texas Senate since Reconstruction, the first black woman elected to Congress from the South. Additionally, in, July 1976, she became the first African American woman to deliver a keynote speech at a Democratic National Convention.

In fact, on an individual level, it's hard to find, in one person of this period who symbolized the breadth of American diversity. She was an African American, she was a woman and, although it was an aspect of her life she preferred to remain undisclosed, she was most likely a lesbian.

On that basis alone, she had a right to speak on behalf of many people. She once said of the first words of the preamble of the Constitution:

It is a very eloquent beginning. But when the document was completed on the seventeenth of September 1787 I was not included in that “We, the people.” I felt somehow for many years that George Washington and Alexander Hamilton just left me out by mistake. But through the process of amendment, interpretation and court decision I have finally been included in “We, the people.”:

How We Came to Accept Police Brutality as the Norm 2/2

by Nomad

In Part One of this two part series we discussed the origins of the present problem between the black community and law enforcement. Reagan's get-tough on crime was based on a theory that came with some direct warnings about the potential for discrimination. The president chose to ignore them.

Reagan's anti-crime crusade led to giving law enforcement more freedom to do their job. At least that was how it was portrayed in conservative circles at the time. That policy was called "pro-active policing." 

Problems with Pro-Active Policing
An  ultra-conservative American libertarian think tank, The Cato Institute, paints a very different picture of the policy today. A site run by that organization, which attempts to highlight police misconduct, describes pro-active policing as..

the use of nearly autonomous elite police units that are trained to be more aggressive than regular officers as a response to gang and drug related violence by targeting people they suspect of being criminals before they commit crimes. These units are encouraged to use whatever tactics they can get away with in order to get results, those results being a high arrest rate.

Like the later preemptive strike doctrine of the Bush era, it is easy to see in retrospect how easily pro-active policing could be abused. The danger of this practice was that notion that police should be responsible for preventing crime before it happens. How is that even possible? 

Well, one description might remind you of the sci-fi film "Minority Report"

In proactive policing, law enforcement uses data and analyzes patterns to understand the nature of a problem. Officers devise strategies and tactics to prevent or mitigate future harm. They evaluate results and revise practices to improve policing. Departments may combine an array of data with street intelligence and crime analysis to produce better assessments about what might happen next if they take various actions.

This high tech description however tends to gloss over the more controversial aspect, a highly visible street presence which is intended to intimidate criminals before they commit crimes.  The more intimidating, the better.

Ironically, what developed over time was a gang mentality of thugs within the police force.

These teams tend to be close-knit and insular, trained to use highly aggressive tactics with very little oversight, and taught to think and act like the gang members and drug dealers they investigate while under cover.

In other words, the balance between the lawless and the lawful was so blurred that it was difficult to see which element was the greater threat to the community. The police force- especially when made up of white officers- took all of the appearances (as well as the mentality) of an occupying military.  

In Memory of Owen Brooks: Mississippi's Civil Rights Veteran

by Nomad

Remembering one of the veterans of the civil rights movement who never stopped fighting for the Mississippi's black community.

Owen H. Brooks is probably not a name you've heard of. I know I hadn't before I saw his obit in a Mississippi newspaper the other day.

As a civil rights leader in Mississippi for over 40 years, Brooks was one of those rare types who possessed both the motivating idealism but also the stamina and long-term commitment to make a difference.

Brooks, the son of West Indian immigrants, was born in New York in 1929 and raised in Boston. He said that he had become politically active at the age of 13. No surprise, perhaps.
 It was a part of his upbringing.
His mother was reportedly a big supporter of Marcus Garvey, a black leader in the early years of the 20th century who promoted the return of the African diaspora to their ancestral lands.

Another childhood icon was African-American singer and actor Paul Robeson whose advocacy of anti-imperialism, affiliation with communism, and criticism of the United States government resulted in his being blacklisted during the Red Scare of the 1950s. (Brooks actually met Robeson on several occasions.)

Brooks graduated Northeastern University as an electronics engineer but gave up that comfortable career to join the civil rights movement. Attending the March on Washington in 1963, along with more than 200,000 Americans Owen was moved by the speeches of Martin Luther King and other civil rights leaders.

While in Boston, Brooks had been an active member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and helped with fundraising efforts in Boston Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), one of the most important organizations of the American Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s.   

He decided to put his idealism to the test and took a major step which would change his life. During early to mid-1960, all liberal eyes around the country were focused on Mississippi. In response to discriminatory state policies, thousands of idealistic civil rights workers flooded the state to defeat segregation. 

In 1965, Brook was one such "outside agitator."  

Why African Americans Should be Skeptical of Rand Paul’s New and Improved Republican Party

K
entucky Senator and rising star in the GOP, Rand Paul recently spoke at Howard University, a mostly black campus in Washington DC. He came to the campus to ask black Americans to give conservatism a second look. He appears to be banking on African Americans ignoring decades of controversial stands on racial issues. 

Now that it is clear that the Republican party can no longer win elections by appealing to white prejudices, Paul is trying to re-write history, his own, his father’s and the the Republican conservative movement. African American voters have every reason to be skeptical of Paul’s hollow overture.