RACE, HISTORY & ACCOUNTABILITY
How Far Have We Come? Show Me the Receipt.
Seat Summary
Celebrate the person who breaks a barrier. But do not confuse that person's victory with proof that the system has repaired everything the barrier caused. If America wants credit for progress, show what changed, what was repaired and what is still missing.
America loves the word “first.”
The first Black president. The first Black justice. The first Black governor, astronaut or chief executive.
Give those people every flower they earned. Their achievements are real.
But the word “first” is also evidence. It tells us how long people who looked like them were kept outside the room.
Compared with what?
We often hear, “Look how far we’ve come.”
Fine. Compared with what starting point?
If the comparison begins with slavery, America has obviously changed. Black people are no longer legally owned as property. But “better than slavery” is a painfully low standard for equality.
There is also a contradiction. When Black Americans ask about responsibility or repair, they are often told slavery happened too long ago. But when America wants praise for progress, slavery suddenly returns as the before picture.
The country cannot call slavery irrelevant when discussing the debt and relevant when collecting applause.
Removing a barrier is not the same as repairing its damage
Imagine that someone blocks the entrance to a business for fifty years. During that time, other people earn money, gain experience, build relationships and pass the business to their children.
Then the barrier is removed.
Removing it is necessary. But the people who were excluded do not receive the income, experience or opportunities they lost. They are simply allowed to begin competing against people who had a fifty-year head start.
That is the difference between ending a wrong and repairing what it caused.
America knows how to create redress
When slavery ended in Washington, D.C., in 1862, the federal government paid loyal former enslavers up to $300 for each enslaved person freed.
The payment went to people losing a claim of ownership. The people who had been owned did not receive an equivalent national payment for their stolen labor and liberty.
After the federal government incarcerated Japanese Americans during World War II, Congress eventually passed the Civil Liberties Act of 1988. The government apologized and paid $20,000 to more than 82,000 eligible survivors.
The payment could not restore lost homes, businesses, freedom or time. But the structure mattered. The government identified a wrong, accepted responsibility, named the injured people and attached a real remedy.
That is a receipt.
Celebrate the people, not the delay
When a Black person finally enters a profession or office that excluded Black people for generations, celebrate that person’s work and courage.
But do not automatically congratulate the institution for finally opening the door. The credit belongs first to the people who pushed, organized, sued, voted and survived long enough to force the change.
Their victory is not proof of the system’s virtue.
What should progress actually measure?
Do not count only how many barriers disappeared. Ask what happened to the people harmed while those barriers were standing.
What was owed? What was returned? Who received it? What land, wages, education, safety or political power was lost? What damage was repaired? What was simply passed to the next generation?
Black billionaires, judges, professors, generals, mayors and a former president are achievements. They are not proof that the entire account has been settled.
Pull Up a Chair
The next time somebody says, “Look how far we’ve come,” do not reject the progress. Ask them to finish the sentence.
How far have we come from what? Who forced the change? Who was helped? Who is still waiting? What repair accompanied the celebration?
Celebrate every person who broke through a barrier. Then keep the receipt for the barrier itself.
Who is missing?
Ally = Action.