The summer that began with George Floyd ended with Breonna Taylor
Why Black Americans’ relentless dedication to liberty and justice for truly all has been a hallmark of the American story.
Black Americans in the United States including activists, journalists, academics, and church and civic leaders have been warning our communities, elected officials, and the broader press throughout the country for decades that police brutality, police misconduct, and the impact of our criminal justice system is an unsustainable crisis that demands immediate action. Over generations, Black Americans have made the case that this crisis threatens the social contract, undermines the consent of the governed, creates an undue burden to prosperity, and every single American pays a price. The case could further made that this crisis is the leading cause of the state’s infringement of life, liberty and pursuit of happiness for Black Americans; rights that are unalienable, given to us by our Creator, and by which our elected representatives swear an Oath of Office to protect.
The modern era has provided the tools and technology to finally document this clearer than ever. Around 55 years ago, John Lewis and his contemporaries depended on photos and newsreels to highlight the brutality of police officers who used batons and dogs on anti-segregation protestors. Around 130 years ago, Ida B. Wells depended on eyewitness testimonies to report on the brutality of heinous lynching crimes which often went unprosecuted by law enforcement. Today, citizens use cell phone video to highlight the brutality of a police officer who places a knee on George Floyd’s neck for nearly 10 minutes or who fires on Jacob Blake 7 times in the back. Imagine what happened without today’s technology a century ago when police officers were on the front lines of enforcing Jim Crow, and two centuries ago when police officers were apprehending slaves who tried to flee. While clearly much has changed in the past two centuries, a theme that has remained constant about the injustices against Dred Scott, Emmitt Till and Ruby Bridges with the Charleston 9, Ahmaud Aubery, Breonna Taylor, and so many unnamed others, is anti-Black racism and disregard for the liberty of Black Americans. If not for the efforts of Black Americans to document and expose these violations of liberty and freedom, often by risking their own lives to do so, then the devastation and loss of life would be even greater. This is why it is necessary to affirm that Black Lives Matter.
Black Americans have led the effort to conduct research, create media, write books, build museums, collect data, raise revenue and create organizing campaigns in order to bring this to the nation’s attention, and to exercise the constitutional right to assemble and petition the government. We have run for elected office at all levels, and have marched, sang, and prayed to give further credence to this crisis. Black comedians perform stand up, yet the ugly truth upon which some of their jokes are based are never quite fully heard. Black rappers create music, but the confessions of their lifetime trauma are ignored and simply consumed for enjoyment. Black scholars and historians bring to life primary sources of information, but their work is too often interpreted as yesterday’s problem. Black citizens take to the streets in protest, but they are met with empty lip service from elected officials. Black athletes, who have a history of using their platforms to petition our government on civil rights, are told to stick to sports. Today, even a simple gesture of racial unity at a football game inspires boos from some fans. The capital and entertainment that Black labor and talent produces is fully valued by fans, but life and liberty for Black Americans to be free from unwarranted violence from our own government remains devalued by the state. Even worse, this call for protection of life is met with indifference and scorn. The decades of failure to sufficiently heed these warnings from Black Americans is what has led us to this moment. This summer, Americans of all racial backgrounds from each state, including those from rural, suburban, and urban communities stated without equivocation that this violation of liberty and denial of justice can go on no longer.
The heroic work and honorable sacrifice of police officers, including Black police officers, who conduct themselves with integrity and use their power responsibly deserves recognition, but it is too often overshadowed by ugliness in other parts of the ranks which damages the reputation of entire departments. It remains far too easy to find several news stories, in too many states and metropolitan areas, about other police officers who were fired or disciplined for making racist jokes, posting culturally incendiary memes on social media, or even caught on tape threatening Black people and making jokes about other racial and religious minority groups. This discipline, which is too often is a slap on the wrist, seems to only take place because it because it became known to the public. Many who are fired get hired by a police department a few towns over. Even worse, the FBI, a federal law enforcement agency which named its headquarters after a man who targeted MLK, has been warning the public and elected officials for years about white supremacists. They continue to infiltrate law enforcement and they remain the greatest domestic terrorism threat in our homeland. If we are serious about who we claim to be, and the principles of freedom, liberty, and justice for all, then this should be unacceptable. If one is serious about our annual praise of MLK every winter, then this should be unacceptable. And if one is serious about all our kind words for the late John Lewis this summer, then this should be unacceptable. But for too many, there is not seriousness, it is acceptable, and this is why it is necessary to affirm that Black Lives Matter.
The implications of ‘bad apples’, and the system that allows them to proliferate, are not just simply hurt feelings, they can be disproportionally deadly for Black Americans and devastating for communities. When a police officer is murdered by a citizen, then that person is often brought to justice and prosecuted to fullest extent of the law. However, the state almost never makes a determination, no matter the evidence of foul play, that the power of lethal force against a citizen has been abused and should be punished with criminal penalty. If a goal is more trust and respect of law enforcement, then there needs to be accountability for abuses of power, reckless conduct and the proliferation of white supremacists in law enforcement. While this criticism is hard for some to hear, in a free and open society our government officials, including elected officials and public employees such as police officers, are subject to public scrutiny. If the power of lethal force is left unchecked, then it will inevitably grow more dangerous, and the consequences can be profound.
Consider that just six months ago, Breonna Taylor was murdered by police in her home after 6 shots struck her in a botched and tragically flawed raid. The officers did everything they could to get medical attention for their injured colleague, yet they failed to see if there was an opportunity left to save Breonna’s life. Local officials have promised sweeping reforms, including a ban on no-knock warrants, and even settled a wrongful-death lawsuit for $12 million taxpayer dollars. Unfortunately, we now know that none of the officers or other officials involved will face any criminal penalty for Breonna’s murder. It would only surprise someone who one who has not been paying attention why so many Black Americans live in rage and resentment with law enforcement. The state excuses police brutality, police leadership too often condones it by investigating themselves, police unions engage in demagoguery, and elected officials fail to act on their promises.
If not for the efforts of Black suffragists, abolitionists, civil rights leaders, and everyday working Black people our representative Republic could look even more like an aristocracy, or an authoritarian state if the Confederates had their way. Black Americans have stood in some of the longest lines to vote and confronted life threating intimidation and violence to deny that right. When K-12 schools and colleges denied access to Black Americans, we founded Historically Black Colleges and Universities. Moreover, 13 Black parents, including a Pastor named Oliver Brown, won a historic Supreme Court case. We now know that would be only the beginning, not the end of the battle to integrate public schools. When major companies denied service or would only create products catered to the interests and needs of white customers, Black-owned businesses were founded to provide essential goods and services to communities. When banks denied mortgages and real estate boards discriminated, Black lawyers filed lawsuits and civil rights leaders started freedom movements against housing discrimination. When NASA was on the brink of putting a human being on the moon for the first time in history, a Black woman named Katherine Johnson not only calculated the successful flight path, she caught errors that would have doomed the mission if not corrected. Black Americans have also been disproportionately and unjustly pushed into the criminal justice system, from the Black codes of the late 19th century, to a draconian response to substance abuse and youth trauma in the late 20th century. In each era, Black parents, teachers, clergy members and so many community leaders work tirelessly to protect Black youth and provide educational and economic opportunity. Racism and white supremacy, the ugly truth about why these kinds of challenges ever existed in the first place, is why it is necessary to affirm that Black Lives Matter. If not for the exemplary demonstration of diligence, perseverance and painstaking dedication to liberty and justice for truly all led by Black Americans, then our union would have remained less perfect.
In service to country, many Black Americans performed with distinction in our military. During the American revolution, Black Patriots served in the Continental Army, only to be banned from military service afterwards. The freedom won by the colonists would not fully be offered to many Black Americans as the institution of slavery would endure for almost another century, and any compensation they received would be taken by slave owners. Black Loyalists who fought for the crown, believing the United Kingdom’s promises of freedom were more credible, were mostly kicked out of the country. And for those all those Black veterans and other Black Americans who remained, they would be recognized as three-fifths of a person per Article 1, Section 2, Clause 3 of the Constitution. During the Civil War, while Frederick Douglas and Sojourner Truth helped recruit Black soldiers to fight for the preservation of the union and the abolition of slavery, Black Americans would be subjected to the Black codes, others would be blocked from owning land, and the Reconstruction Amendments would be undermined by southern states. In the 1900s, Blacks served in two World Wars and others, only to return to civilian life to face Jim Crow. As previously stated before, much has changed in the last two and a half centuries. However, there are constants that hold true for the Black Patriots who returned to slavery, Black Civil War soldiers who were met with the Black Codes, and the famous Tuskegee Airmen during World War II who dealt with Jim Crow. The country they fought to defend is the same country that would actively deny Black Americans true liberty and freedom. Another constant is that it would depend on future generations to ensure that their service and sacrifice is fully recognized with integrity. Because in the moment, when it mattered the most, it did not matter much at all. In considering modern times, other Black Americans chose public service, by becoming police officers and elected officials. While some become culpable to this very crisis, others make good faith attempts to change the system and truly protect and serve all citizens, including Black people. Even still, it is not hard at all to find a testimonial from a Black police officer who is concerned for their own safety off duty because the forces of anti-Black racism could cause them to be profiled, wrongly accused, or even killed. Despite all this public and military service to country, while being robbed of liberty much of the way, the cries of Black Lives Matter are branded by some as unpatriotic, insufficiently benevolent, and asking for too much. This is why it is necessary to affirm that Black Lives Matter.
Black Americans’ noble contributions and sacrifice for the American experiment has all been done while coping with generations of trauma and managing self-preservation on a multitude of fronts. When hope and joy are needed most, Black churches stand as pillars of neighborhoods all over the country by providing community, safety, and spiritual therapy to this day. Even with the generations of attacks on the liberty of Black Christians at the hands of white supremacists at Mother Emmanuel AME in 2015, to the 16th Street Church Bombing in 1963, and dozens of other brutal massacres, the singing and praying never stopped. In our schools, Black educators, social workers, non-profit organizations, and other support staff work tirelessly to help manage the weight of all this trauma which can have a devastating impact on youth development. During a disastrous pandemic, where higher portions of Black Americans are essential workers, and COVID-19 cases and deaths, the fight for liberty and justice for truly all has not waivered. Thanks to Black doctors, and other public health experts, we are soberly reminded about how COVID-19 has acted as a kerosene on the fire of long existing racial disparities in public health. And still, even in times of national prosperity, higher portions of Black Americans remain in unproperly resourced communities and schools with high rates of poverty and high rates of crime. This only underscores the need to ensure that law enforcement and public safety are conducted justly, with good apples from a healthy tree and hardy soil, and that the modern-day consequences of segregation and slavery are more effectively addressed.
If history is any guide, nothing will stop Black Americans from exercising the constitutional right to march, assemble, and petition the government to achieve liberty and justice for truly all. The good of the human condition and the potential of the American experiment will eventually defeat the attempts code and condone anti-Black racism no matter how innovative they become, including hiding behind other Black people who are complicit themselves. As attempts to delegitimize these efforts and gaslight this truth continues, this resolve will only strengthen because demands for liberty and justice are undefeated. In our history, these calls and demands eventually won out over those who defended the institution of slavery, who fought integration and who opposed full suffrage. They will also win out over those who defend and condone a system of law enforcement and public safety which allows ‘bad apples’ to proliferate and violate the life and liberty of Black Americans. While the injustices and atrocities of the past may be far more severe and widespread, the culprit of anti-Black racism is still very much with us. As Black Americans have been warning for decades, it still claims far too much Black life while threatening the social contract, undermining the consent of the governed and creating an undue burden to prosperity.
When our current modern times become old fashioned history, future generations will look back on what may become known as the nation’s second civil rights movement of the 2010s and 2020s. Just as we look back on the 1950s and 1960s, our descendants may also look back on what will be considered outdated anachronisms of a by gone era and wonder how this could have ever been tolerated. While our history can be a gleaming example of how the moral arch can be long as Dr. King once said, American history has inevitably bent towards justice. We know this because the potential of the American experiment has no limits and because of what has already changed in American history for the better. There are few moments in our lives when we remember exactly where we were, what we were wearing, and most importantly, what we did. The kind of moments that will forever frame one’s understanding of the world we live in, define generations, and one that you will tell your children and other descendants about. The summer of 2020 may end up as one of the most consequential summers in American civil rights history, and this is our chance to determine what future history books will say about each of us.
