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Running in Circles on Racial Justice
Hard-fought victories in terms of racial justice in the U.S. are always met with a vicious backlash that makes progress a circular motion where we end up, it seems, where we began.
Jan 20, 2025
We keep running in circles when it comes to addressing racial justice in the U.S. This means that with every advance we almost come back to the same place and must fight the battles all over again. It doesn't mean that progress has not been made, but the progress retrogresses due to the immediate backlash that charges any advance to rectify past racial injustices as an affront to white people. At best there is an ebb and flow when it comes to rectifying the racial harms and damages of the past.
Race history and the many initiatives to rectify past wrongs is more of a circle than a linear line. It may be an expanding circle considering advances, but for every victory won there is a vicious throw back. It is almost like the 1993 movie Groundhog Day where morning after morning we awaken to history repeating itself, and where victories of racial justice are swept away by the courts or a change in the body politic. The struggle continues, and in many cases, we must begin again.
Every racial justice victory in the United States came about because of the Civil War and the various modes of resistance employed by victims of racial injustices. Mass protests and resistance has generally forced those in power to seek easy answers to placate the anger of the victims of racial injustice. But every attempt to satisfy and pacify the various protests is met with vociferous protests that erase hard fought victories. Just a few examples over four centuries in U.S. history serve as evidence. At each juncture of political protest those in power have historically responded with various initiatives designed to calm the uprisings and unrest. However, any advance is quickly eradicated under the guise of reverse discrimination.
If the United States is ever going to create a society of real growth and opportunity, it needs to stop chasing its tail.
After the Civil War, one man, one vote was militarily imposed resulting in the elections of Black men to numerous political offices in the South. With those advances came the passage of the 13th Amendment in 1865 abolishing slavery. The Civil Rights Act of 1866 granted citizenship to people born in the U.S. This served as a response to the 1857 Supreme Court Dred Scott decision that ruled Blacks were not citizens. The 14th Amendment passed in 1868 addressed and attempted to rectify state laws that abridged the rights of Black people. In 1870 the 15th Amendment was adopted that attempted to grant the right to vote to Black men (It should be noted that it wasn't until 1920 that women had the right to vote). In 1871 another Civil Rights Act was passed, also known as the Klu Klux Klan Act, which was a response to the growing terrorism used by whites against Blacks and advances in civil rights. These acts of terror were designed to take away the vote, enforce racial codes, and re-impose restrictions on Black people that had been granted post-Civil War. The backlash turned back the clock on the numerous advances that sought to correct the racial injustices of the past.
In 1865 Abraham Lincoln was assassinated, and Andrew Johnson became President. Andrew Johnson was a Southerner who worked to turn back the numerous advances made in racial justice. Under his administration amnesty was granted to Confederates. Confiscated lands (plantations) were returned to those who rebelled against the Union. The last remaining Union troops were withdrawn from the South in the Compromise of 1877 resulting in the reestablishment of pre-Civil War policies that completed the circle of restoring white Southern rule, reinstating the Black Codes, and allowing states to make policies that re-created de facto enslavement. The circle turned 360 degrees from voting rights, citizenship, anti-terrorism, social rectification, and attempts at inclusion to making it virtually impossible for Blacks to vote, live and work, or engage in the routines of life without fear and intimidation. Reconstruction, a response to racial injustices and calls to the nation to be inclusive and equitable, was short lived—from 1865-1877—and in that short time it ushered in amendments and civil rights acts. However, it was attacked from the beginning, sabotaged, and died because of white backlash. Most of the steps forward were spurned within 12 short years, and all the advances undone. The circle of racial justice took Blacks from winning to having to fight all over again.
In response to the racial justice organizing in the 20th century and the social unrest through demonstrations, sit-ins, and mass marches, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed. This act prohibited discrimination in labor and attempted to end segregation in public facilities, public schools, and federally funded programs (keep in mind that 10 years prior, in 1954, the Supreme Court had already ruled segregation in public schools unconstitutional and ordered schools to desegregate). In 1965 the Voting Rights Act was passed to challenge the many schemes employed by states to abridge the ability of Blacks to vote. It also required Southern states to seek permission to substantively change voting practices. However in 2013, the Supreme Court in Shelby County v. Holdergutted these protections arguing that they were "based on 40-year-old facts having no logical relationship to the present day." Hence voting protections enacted in 1965 were gutted effectively rendering the act a relic of the past. This is an example of the ebb, or the circular motion, of the nature of racial rectification in the U.S.
In the 21st century white resistance to the freedoms of Blacks to move and live within the society coupled with continued fears of whites towards Black people resulted in "Stand Your Ground" laws. These were boilerplate legislation written by the American Legislative Exchange Council and offered to state legislators which produced glaring and frightening consequences for Black people. Black people were shot for ringing the wrong door bell, or for being in the wrong neighborhood. But all of this played into a larger scheme to erode equal rights and turn back the clock on racial rectification.
The reaction to racial justice is relentless and comes whenever strides are made to make the nation more inclusive. The Black Lives Matter movement emerged, trying to hold people and society accountable. The movement was spurred on by the killings of Trayvon Martin and Ahmaud Arbery by vigilantes. George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Sandra Bland, and Philando Castile were examples of police killings. In the streets voices chanted, "Defund the police," and bodies blocked expressways and intersections. Political leaders and bodies across the country entertained discussions on the matter. Corporate America responded along with other entities employing "Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion" (DEI) measures. DEI became part of the discussion in the economic, political, and educational arena. The corporate world responded to the various outcries of disadvantaged groups that included racial and the LGBTQIA community and sought ways to demonstrate their desire to include and sell to these groups. Among those employing DEI initiatives were Amazon, Meta (FaceBook), McDonald's, Walmart, Ford, Lowe's, John Deere, American Airlines, Boeing, Jack Daniel's (Brown-Forman), Caterpillar, Harley-Davidson, Molson Coors, Nissan, Polaris, Toyota, and Anheuser-Busch.
The criticisms however grew louder as the "Turn Back the Clock" and Make America Great Again activists homed in on "wokeness" and began to attack those corporations for their support of racial justice and gay rights. The 2023 Supreme Court decision on college admissions, which struck down affirmative action programs declaring that race cannot be a factor in college admissions, was used to advance charges of reverse discrimination and of lowering standards. Then with the election of President Donald Trump the attacks on DEI found greater energy and corporations demonstrated lesser courage. Each of the corporations mentioned have since rolled back or eliminated their Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion programs. This is another example of a 360-degree turn in the struggle for racial justice and inclusion within the society, culture, and workplace.
Blacks have been historically wronged and remain disadvantaged. We continue to lag behind our white counterparts in terms of education, economics, and wealth. If progress is linear then we could surmise that at some point Blacks would catch up to whites. Instead, in most categories, the gaps and disparities have grown wider. The only way to explain this phenomenon is that we are engaged in a circle of gaining and then losing. The circle may grow larger signifying the progress being made, but the hard-fought victories in terms of racial justice are always met with a vicious backlash that makes progress a circular motion where we end up, it seems, where we began.
If the United States is ever going to create a society of real growth and opportunity, it needs to stop chasing its tail. It needs to change its belief that correcting past wrongs is somehow to penalize someone else. The irony is that those who complain about reverse discrimination are the ones who have been the beneficiaries of a system of discrimination. A strong society must come to terms with its history; tell the stories of the good, the bad, and the ugly; and muster the courage to create and maintain policies, programs, and systems that correct the sins of the past.
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Senate Dems Reintroduce Bill to 'Restore Critical Safeguards' of Voting Rights Act
One advocate said the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act is "critically important for Congress to pass at a moment in our history when the freedom to vote is under attack in our nation."
Feb 29, 2024
Civil and voting rights advocates on Thursday cheered the reintroduction of the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, legislation its sponsors say will "update and restore critical safeguards of the original Voting Rights Act."
Introduced by Sens. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.), Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Laphonza Butler (D-Calif.), and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), S.B. 4—a companion to H.R. 14, introduced last September—is named in honor of John Lewis, a late civil rights icon and longtime Georgia congressman. Republicans filibustered the previous iteration of the bill.
"In our nation, there's no freedom more fundamental than the right to vote," said Durbin. "But over the past several years, there has been a sustained effort to chip away at the protections guaranteed to every American under the Voting Rights Act. That's why we've joined together today to reintroduce a bill that would not only restore the protections of the Voting Rights Act, but strengthen it."
We just re-introduced the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act. I’m joined by @SenSchumer, @SenatorWarnock, and civil rights group leaders now.
Our message it’s clear: we must ensure that democracy works for all of us. https://t.co/SH7ujaLfjw
— Senator Dick Durbin (@SenatorDurbin) February 29, 2024
Warnock said: "I was Congressman Lewis' pastor, but he was my mentor and hero because he believed voting is a sacred undertaking that's about more than a person's voice, it's about their humanity. That's why this legislation is more important than ever, because the fight to protect voting rights and voting access for every eligible American remains unfinished and even worse, so much of the progress Congressman Lewis fought for is being rolled back."
NAACP Legal Defense Fund president Janai Nelson called the bill "a vital piece of legislation that will safeguard the fundamental right to vote by strengthening and restoring the Voting Rights Act, one of the most impactful civil rights laws in our nation's history."
"It is fitting that this critical legislation is put forward as we approach the 59th anniversary of Bloody Sunday, when Black Americans—including civil rights hero John Lewis—endured brutal state-sponsored violence while marching for basic rights, which led to the enactment of the Voting Rights Act."
"The fight to protect voting rights and voting access for every eligible American remains unfinished and even worse, so much of the progress Congressman Lewis fought for is being rolled back."
The landmark VRA was meant to ensure that state and local governments could not "deny or abridge the right of any citizen of the United States to vote on account of race or color."
However, the VRA has been eroded in recent decades by Republican-controlled state legislatures across the country, including with restrictions on voter registration, reduction in early voting options, and voter identification laws. These measures disproportionately disenfranchise minority voters, and some GOP officials have admitted that they are intended to give Republican candidates an electoral edge.
In 2013, the U.S. Supreme Court dealt a major blow to the VRA in Shelby County v. Holder, which eviscerated a key section of the law that required jurisdictions with a history of racist disenfranchisement to obtain federal approval prior to altering voting rules. In 2021, the nation's high court voted 5-4 in Brnovich v. Democratic National Committeeto uphold Arizona's voting restrictions—even as Chief Justice John Roberts acknowledged that they disproportionately affect minorities.
"Since Shelby and more recently Brnovich v. DNC made it even harder to challenge discriminatory voting laws, states have continued to limit access to the ballot and use the redistricting process to dilute Black voters' voices," Nelson asserted. "States that were formerly protected—including Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, and Texas—are all places where LDF has been forced to bring recent litigation to challenge unlawful racial discrimination in voting."
Common Cause president Virginia Kase Solomón asserted that the protections proposed in the new bill "are critically important for Congress to pass at a moment in our history when the freedom to vote is under attack in our nation."
"A bedrock of our democracy, the freedom to vote has been under sustained assault since the 2020 election with dozens of anti-voter laws passed in states all across the country to make it harder for Americans—particularly in Black and brown communities—to have a say in choosing their elected leaders," she added.
Arturo Vargas, CEO of the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials, said in a statement that "in the Shelby decision, the U.S. Supreme Court acknowledged that there is still discrimination in our nation's electoral process—and this bill would provide strong and robust safeguards to combat it."
"We urge Congress to work in a bipartisan manner to pass the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act and help make our democracy more responsive to all of our nation's voices," he added.
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US Democracy Defenders Applaud Fresh Push for 'Urgently Needed' Voting Rights Bill
"It will take passage of the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act to curb this new generation of assaults on the freedom to vote," said one campaigner.
Sep 19, 2023
Although it is nearly certain to go nowhere in a Republican-dominated U.S. House of Representatives, pro-democracy groups nationwide celebrated on Tuesday as Congresswoman Terri Sewell reintroduced the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act.
"Generations of Americans—many in my hometown of Selma, Alabama—marched, fought, and even died for the equal right of all Americans to vote," Sewell (D-Ala.) said in a statement. "But today, their legacy and our very democracy are under attack as MAGA extremists target voters with new laws to restrict voting access."
"The fight for voting rights has never been more urgent," she argued, explaining that the legislation—named for the late Democratic Georgia congressman and civil rights leader—aims to restore and modernize the full protections of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (VRA), which was gutted by the U.S. Supreme Court a decade ago in Shelby County v. Holder.
The bill is backed by every House Democrat but faces tough odds in both chambers. Early last year, Democratic right-wing Sen. Joe Manchin (W.Va.) and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (Ariz.), who switched from Democrat to Independent in December, worked with Republicans to block a megabill that included the Freedom to Vote Act and the John Lewis legislation.
Still, U.S. advocacy groups on Tuesday applauded the lawmakers' renewed push for federal voting rights reforms—as they did in July, when Democratic leaders reintroduced the Freedom to Vote Act.
"The John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act is key in preserving democracy, full stop," declared Public Citizen executive vice president Lisa Gilbert. "A decade after the Supreme Court gutted 'preclearance' protection in the Voting Rights Act, more than half of U.S. states have passed over 90 laws that make it harder to vote for communities of color, in particular."
"Without this legislation, we risk further entrenching anti-democratic, partisan forces that want to choose their own voters," Gilbert warned.
According to the Declaration for American Democracy coalition:
In the last decade since the Shelby County v. Holder Supreme Court decision gutted key enforcement mechanisms in the Voting Rights Act, at least 29 states have passed 94 laws making it harder to vote, with at least 11 states enacting 13 restrictive voting laws in 2023 alone.
Attacks on our freedom to vote disproportionately impact Black, Latino, Asian, Native, and other voters of color. Since Shelby v. Holder, the racial turnout gap has grown significantly in 5 of the 6 states previously covered by the preclearance sections of the Voting Rights Act.
Sylvia Albert, Common Cause's director of voting and elections, stressed that "this ongoing effort to suppress the vote harkens back to the shameful Jim Crow era. At that time, it took the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and rigorous enforcement by the U.S. Department of Justice to curb the wholesale abuses and attacks on the freedom to vote."
"Today it will take passage of the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act to curb this new generation of assaults on the freedom to vote and to strengthen the ability of the Department of Justice to protect that sacred freedom with the tools it used for decades," she asserted, specifically calling out Republican-controlled state legislatures that have tried "to silence Black and Brown voters after they showed up to vote in record numbers during the 2020 election."
Noting that the VRA "has a long history of bipartisan support," Leslie Proll of the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights said: "We applaud our elected officials who have responded to the call of the majority of people in this country who support new legislation to protect the vote. We need federal action now."
Michael Waldman, president and CEO of the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law, also highlighted previous bipartisan support for the VRA, pointing out that "the last time the Voting Rights Act was reauthorized, in 2006, it gained 98 votes in the Senate." He called on Congress to swiftly pass the "urgently needed" John Lewis bill and the Freedom to Vote Act.
Organizations focused on key issues like abortion rights and the climate emergency also demanded action on the proposal.
"This legislation is long overdue," said a 15-member coalition that included Clean Water Action, Climate Hawks Vote, the Climate Reality Project, Earthjustice, EDF Action, Environmental Law & Policy Center, Greenpeace USA, Interfaith Power & Light, League of Conservation Voters, the National Wildlife Federation, NextGen America, Sierra Club, Union of Concerned Scientists, WE ACT for Environmental Justice, and Zero Hour.
"We cannot effectively tackle the critical issues our nation faces—like combating the climate crisis, advancing environmental justice, and protecting our air, lands, waters, biodiversity, wildlife, and oceans—without fixing the broken system that caters to corporate polluters and disenfranchises too many voters," the coalition argued.
Meanwhile, NARAL Pro-Choice America said on social media that "voting rights and reproductive freedom are deeply intertwined."
"Anti-abortion extremists attack voting rights knowing that it is critical to electing repro champions," the organization added. "Congress MUST pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Act."
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