For my minor in Law & Society, our capstone course consists of a semester-long research project relating to modern social movements. As someone interested in critical race theory and race relations within the United States, I focused my project on one of the demands of the Black Lives Matter movement: Reparations. For this project, I first created and administered a Qualtrics survey to a diverse pool of participants to gauge general public opinion about implementing some sort of reparations for African American descendants of slavery. I also formulated a literature review that analyzed and cited prior instances of reparations as a result of human rights violations in the United States and globally as well as support for implementing reparations. I utilized information from my literature review and survey data to formulate letters to local, state, and federal elected officials urging them to pass a reparations bill. Below, please take a look at my literature review and overview video of my project.
Overview Video
Literature Review
In lieu of the resurgence and relevance of the Black Lives Matter movement, for my capstone project I am focusing on the issue of reparations for African American descendants of slavery. One of the major demands of the Black Lives Matter movement is that reparations are given to Black Americans as a way to remedy some of the major issues that Black Americans face in the United States. This is an important topic to me because I have learned about all of the lasting effects of the systemic injustices that African Americans have faced for several generations that still affect us even in the 21st century. Through my classes, books, academic journals, and events surrounding the topic of black history and reparations, I have come to the conclusion that the best way to ameliorate some of the racial stratification in the United States is to give descendants of African American enslaved people reparations. To better understand what format of reparations that would be best for African Americans, I administered a Qualtrics survey to 102 people. The people that took my survey ranged from 18-80 years old and 75% were women, 24% were men, and 1% were non-binary. 46.1% of my respondents were White, 38.2% were Black, 14.7% were Asian, and 4.9% described themselves as ‘other’. Through analyzing that data, I have found that 80.1% of respondents believed that the racial inequality that Black Americans face in the U.S. is a lasting result of slavery and 48.1% believe that giving reparations would help improve racial inequality, at least a little bit. 92% of the respondents believed that there should be reparations for Black Americans and that of the different forms of reparations, such as restitution, rehabilitation, monetary compensation, satisfaction, and guarantees of non-repetition, monetary compensation was the most favorable with restitution and rehabilitation highly favored as well. On average, respondents said that if monetary reparations were in the form of a one-time payment, each adult African American descendant of slavery should receive $41,000, but most respondents favored reparations coming in multiple times such as annually or monthly. With that said, I have focused on looking at literature that discusses the history of reparations as well as logistics of dissemination, equity, possible drawbacks, and general support for reparations. Some of these sources take the format of newspaper articles, congressional House Resolutions, books, and academic journals. This review will be separated into four separate parts. First, I will discuss why reparations are necessary utilizing specific cases where reparations were given and how that particular group went about doing so. Next, I will share existing proposals for how reparations are to be disseminated within the United States specifically for African American descendants of slavery. Third, I will use all of that information to formulate a project outline that explains what I personally plan to do for my capstone to help get reparations for African Americans. Finally, I will conclude the literature review with a summary of all of the major points that I have made and further research that I plan to do.
Offering reparations to marginalized and mistreated populations of people has become a modern tradition of states that commit human rights violations and are trying to ameliorate the damage that has been caused. According to History.com, “The idea of a state apologizing for, much less paying for, its actions towards its own citizens was almost unthinkable until Nazi Germany orchestrated a large-scale genocide… Germany has since paid hundreds of millions of dollars to Israel, individual Holocaust survivors, and others (Blackmore, 2019).” The Jewish Virtual Library explains that the reparations given by the German government to holocaust survivors manifested as monthly payments of $290 for the rest of their lives. Another international instance of reparations was in South Africa in response to the horrors that Black Africans faced during apartheid which lasted from 1948 until the 1990s. After the end of apartheid, South Africa created the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) which helped share testimonies from over 20,000 victims of apartheid and also gave several recommendations for reparations. However, “the South African government refused to connect actions with the ethical questions raised by the testimonies or with the obligations of the state to provide adequate and timely redress and reparations for victims. In 2003, President Thabo Mbeki announced a once-off payment of approximately $4,000 each to 18,000 victims who testified before the TRC, and announced that community reparations programs, which aim to uplift black communities as a whole, would be implemented as part of broader development programs for all South Africans (Naidu-Silverman, 2019).” One thing that this Washington Post article, entitled, “What South Africa can teach the U.S. about reparations”, can show us is that not only did creating a forum in which people could share their stories was effective in gaining community programs and monetary compensation, but it also proved that by sharing stories of racism and discrimination helps centralize the general conversation of race in this country instead of keeping it on the fringes as a taboo topic. Acknowledging that South Africa has been able to implement reparations for marginalized Black Africans in the aftermath of apartheid is good for comparison with what the United States can do as a response to not only slavery, but the civil rights movement, modern day slavery with mass incarceration, and police brutality. With the prominence of the Black Lives Matter movement, speaking up about race relations and racism in America has become more normalized which is a great step in getting people to recognize that reparations might be able to help solve some of the issues that systemic racism has caused. The United States has also offered reparations to several different populations within the 20th century. One instance was when the government offered reparations was to 120,000 Japanese Americans under the Civil Liberties Act of 1988 as a response to the unjust internment of Japanese Americans during WWII. One of the main wrongs that this country committed during its early stages was its treatment towards Native Americans. According to history.com, “in 1946, Congress created the Indian Claims Commission, a body designed to hear grievances and compensate tribes for lost territories. It commissioned extensive historical research and ended up awarding about $1.3 billion to 176 tribes and bands…however, the actual funds only averaged out to about $1,000 per person of Native American ancestry, and most of the money was put in trust accounts held by the United States government, which has been accused of mismanagement over the years (Blackmore, 2019).” Additionally, the United States had to address its treatment towards Native Hawaiians whose land was taken by the federal government in the late 19th century where by 1920, only approximately 3% of the Native Hawaiian population remained. The U.S. government created The Hawaiian Homes Commission Act of 1920 which, “established a land trust for Native Hawaiians and allowed people of one-half Hawaiian ancestry by blood to lease homesteads from the federal government for 99 years at a time for a total of $1 (Blackmore, 2019).” The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiments that happened over a few decades in the 1900s in Tuskegee, Alabama, carried out by the U.S. government on Black individuals, also resulted in the government providing some sort of reparations for their victims. “After a class-action lawsuit, the men were awarded $10 million and the United States promised the provide healthcare and burial services for the men. Eventually, the state ended up awarding healthcare and other services to the men’s spouses and descendants, too (Blackmore, 2019).” However, it took decades until 1997 for an apology for the experiment which President Bill Clinton made on behalf of the country. Since reparations have been happening for a while during the past few decades, smaller entities have been trying to enforce some sort of reparations programs. For example, a New York Times article entitled “Is Georgetown’s $400,000-a-year Plan to Aid Slave Descendants Enough?”, written by Rachel L. Swarns, discusses how in 2019, Georgetown University joined several other American institutions in implementing a reparations program directed towards “the descendants of the 272 enslaved people who were sold to help keep the college afloat nearly two centuries ago (Swarns, 2019).” They will use the $400,000 a year that they garner from increased student fees to support community projects, health clinics, and schools. In recent news, The Washington Post reported on March 22nd, 2021 that “Evanston, Illinois Leads the Country with First Reparations Program for Black Residents”, in an article written by Mark Guarino. This article explains that the reparations program, “represents a critical step in rectifying wrongs caused by slavery, segregation and housing discrimination and in pushing forward on similar compensation efforts across the country (Guarino, 2021).” This program acknowledges the harm caused by discriminatory housing policies and practices by making $400,000 available in $25,000 homeownership and improvement grants, mortgage assistance for Black residents who can prove that they are direct descendants of Evanston residents who lived there between 1919 and 1969. This in whole $10 million package is funded by income from annual cannabis taxes over the next decade. Shortly after, on March 24th, 2021 The Washington Post reported that Oakland, California is creating their own reparations program in an article titled “Oakland Will Give Some Families of Color $500 a Month, One of the Biggest Tests yet for Guaranteed Income” written by Tea Armus. This program will be launching within the next coming months and will distribute $500 a month to 600 randomly selected, qualifying families for at least a year and a half. Qualifying families have to have at least one child, make less than $59,000 annually for a family of three, and are people of color. All of these sources prove that reparations are possible and have been done before internationally and within the United States in very recent history. This gives realistic precedent to support reparations for African American descendants of slavery. There have been many examples that reparations are possible to implement into society and it seems that there are many different ways that reparations can be disseminated. The Morningside Center for Teaching Social Responsibility explains that there are five forms of reparations. First there is restitution which is the restoration of a victim’s rights, property, and citizenship status. Next, there’s rehabilitation which could be psychological and physical support. Third, there’s compensation which is pretty straightforward. Fourth, there’s satisfaction which includes the acknowledgement of guilt, apology, burials, and construction of memorials. Finally, there’s guarantees of non-repetition which would be reformation of laws and civil and political structures that led to or fueled violence. In Alan Greenblatt’s article “Reparations for Slavery”, he states that, “A majority of African Americans believes the United States should make amends for the intergenerational harm caused by slavery and post-Civil War segregation, with some calling for cash payments to descendants of slaves and others favoring programs to help poor communities narrow the economic gap between blacks and whites. More than a half-dozen Democratic presidential candidates, along with some congressional Democrats, either support cash reparations, which could total billions of dollars, or formation of a commission to study the issue. But a majority of the public opposes reparations, as do President Trump, many other top Republicans and some African Americans. They argue that Americans living today are not responsible for slavery and that methods other than reparations would be more effective in helping African Americans. Some legal experts are skeptical that reparations would pass constitutional muster. But proponents point to other examples, domestic and international, in which governments have paid reparations to atone for systemic harm (Greenblatt, 2019).” In reference to the data that I gathered from my survey and other historic and modern examples of reparations; I think that the most effective way to assist African American descendants of slavery would be to implement monetary reparations. This is because the cycle of poverty is such a prevalent and unfortunate part of the Black experience in America and it is extremely hard to get out of that cycle. That cycle was started because of racial stratification as a result of slavery but is continually perpetuated by further systemic racism in the 21st century. For example, according to Inequality.org, the racial wealth divide has grown over the past three decades where an average White family in America has a wealth of around $147,000 while the average Black family just has approximately $4,600. It must be noted that the wealth for Black Americans has decreased by nearly $4,000 since 1983 meanwhile the wealth for White families has increased by over $30,000 in that same time frame. The cycle of poverty affects everything from education, housing, food, jobs, transportation, health, and many more main aspects of American life. By offering monetary reparations, there is an opportunity to improve the communities and quality of life to the standard that an average White family could. The late Congressman John Conyers Jr. introduced House Resolution 40 – The Commission to Study and Develop Reparation Proposals for African Americans Act every year from 1989 until 2017. It was reintroduced to the House of Reparations by Congresswoman Shelia Jackson Lee in January of 2019 and has since been referred to the Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties as of March 1st, 2021. According to Congress.gov, “the bill establishes the Commission to Study and Develop Reparation Proposals for African Americans. The commission shall examine slavery and discrimination in the colonies and the United States from 1619 to the present and recommend appropriate remedies. This commission shall identify the role of the federal and state governments in supporting the institution of slavery, forms of discrimination in the public and private sectors against freed slaves and their descendants, and lingering negative effects of slavery on living African Americans and society.” This is reminiscent of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission that was created in South Africa in response to apartheid. As many people in my survey responded, the best way to implement reparations would be through Congress. There were a few worried individuals who were concerned that it wouldn’t be taken care of properly, but by the formation of the Commission to Study and Develop Reparation Proposals, staffed by social scientists, historians, economist, activists, and politicians, they can be in charge of figuring out exactly who will be receiving reparations, in what format, how much, and exactly how they will disseminate it. The Human Rights Watch say that H.R. 40 is supported by prominent organizations such as the NAACP, the National African American Reparations Commission (NAARC), Human Rights Watch, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), and the National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America (N’COBRA).
Since H.R. 40 and other reparation-related policies for African American descendants of slavery have been pushed through to Congress for several decades, I would like to focus my capstone on garnering more support for the bill. I plan to do this by utilizing all of the research that I have collected through academic journals, books, podcasts, news articles, and my own survey to formulate a well written and supported letter to local elected officials. This letter will include background on reparations, why they are necessary, why I believe that they should support it, and in what ways would it be best for them to support it. For elected officials in Congress, I will send them this letter but specifically focus on asking for support for H.R. 40 in the House of Representatives and eventually the Senate. As for local elected officials, in particular ones in Howard and Baltimore counties, I will urge them to pass some sort of reparations related bill to be implemented at a local level, similar to what cities like Evanston and Oakland have done recently. Prior to interning on Capitol Hill, I was skeptical that contacting elected officials was superfluous and that they didn’t actually consider what individual constituent voices said. However, during my internship, myself and other people on staff logged every single constituent message, letter, email, and phone call which resulted in us creating policy recommendations for the Congressman to either introduce to the House of Representatives or to sign on in support. I think that writing letters to elected officials urging them to act on some sort of reparations bill or program would be a worthwhile capstone project because it might be exactly what they need to hear or see to get the ball rolling. I think that this is something that is easily accomplishable in a semester long project.
After conducting my own research survey to garner general opinions on reparations for African American descendants of slavery along with extensive research on previous and current instances of reparations following human rights atrocities, and understanding the current sociopolitical climate as a result of the resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement and their demands, I have come to the conclusion that the best way to improve racial stratification of African Americans is to implement a reparations program. This program would provide monetary compensation for those who are descendants of slavery and as a result have most likely endured generational wealth issues such as being stuck in a cycle of poverty and lack of wealth. To do so, I will write letters to elected officials urging them to support local and national reparations bills and programs aimed towards Black Americans. Going forward I plan to draft my letter of support for representatives, continue to collect data on my survey, and potentially schedule interviews with some major stakeholders. Even though the goal of my semester long capstone project is to write informed letters, the information and connections gained in this project can be continually used in formulating programs or commissions to help support reparations.
References:
Armus, Teo. “Oakland Will Give Some Families of Color $500 a Month, One of the Biggest Tests Yet for Guaranteed Income.” The Washington Post, WP Company, 24 Mar. 2021, www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2021/03/24/oakland-guaranteed-income-race-wealth/.
August 26, 2019 Teresa Ann Willis, and 2015 Laura McClure May 9. “What Do Reparations Look Like?” What Do Reparations Look Like? | Morningside Center for Teaching Social Responsibility, 26 Aug. 2019, www.morningsidecenter.org/teachable-moment/lessons/what-do-reparations-look.
Blakemore, Erin. “The Thorny History of Reparations in the United States.” History.com, A&E Television Networks, 28 Aug. 2019, www.history.com/news/reparations-slavery-native-americans-japanese-internment.
Boxill, Bernard R. A Lockean Argument for Black Reparations.
“Enslaved: Peoples of the Historical Slave Trade.” Enslaved Peoples of Historical Slave Trade, enslaved.org/search/people?limit=20&offset=0&sort_field=label.sort&display=people.
Guarino, Mark. “Evanston, Ill., Leads the Country with First Reparations Program for Black Residents.” The Washington Post, WP Company, 23 Mar. 2021, www.washingtonpost.com/national/evanston-illinois-reparations/2021/03/22/6b5a308c-8b2d-11eb-9423-04079921c915_story.html.
Jackson Lee, Sheila. “H.R.40 - 117th Congress (2021-2022): Commission to Study and Develop Reparation Proposals for African Americans Act.” Congress.gov, 1 Mar. 2021, www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-bill/40.
Naidu-Silverman, Ereshnee. “Perspective | What South Africa Can Teach the U.S. about Reparations.” The Washington Post, WP Company, 24 June 2019, www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2019/06/25/what-south-africa-can-teach-us-about-reparations/.
“Reparations for Slavery.” CQ Researcher by CQ Press, library.cqpress.com/cqresearcher/document.php?id=cqresrre2019082300.
Swarns, Rachel L. “Is Georgetown's $400,000-a-Year Plan to Aid Slave Descendants Enough?” The New York Times, The New York Times, 30 Oct. 2019, www.nytimes.com/2019/10/30/us/georgetown-slavery-reparations.html.
“Wealth Inequality.” Inequality.org, 18 Mar. 2021, inequality.org/facts/wealth-inequality/.