Some new pretty big developments:
Gov. Jack Markell on Tuesday embraced a call for the Delaware General Assembly to apologize for the state’s role in slavery. […] “The governor … would certainly be inclined to sign it if the Legislature moved forward on it and puts it on his desk,” said Brian Selander, a Markell spokesman.
Well, let me stop right there. “Embracing a call” is not “yeah, he will sign it if it just so happens to get to his desk.” I blame the News Journal for a little overindulgence there. Markell did not personally hold a news conference calling on the General Assembly to pass the measure. Brian Selander just said the Governor would sign it. Big difference there. Ok, digression over…
But in Legislative Hall, a majority of lawmakers interviewed were reluctant to take a stand. Dover City Council, heeding a call from its Human Relations Commission, voted 5-3 Monday to urge the state Legislature to apologize for “the state’s practice of slavery and for the historic wrongs committed against all persons who suffered discrimination and injustice under this dehumanizing system.”
Senate Majority Leader Patricia Blevins, D-Elsmere, said she would gladly entertain a debate on the floor of the Senate. “I can’t imagine who would vote against something like that,” Blevins said. “I guess the question is if people want to take time to debate it.”
Well, I can imagine some teabagger conservatives who long for the good ole days of slavery, or at the very least the Jim Crow era, would vote against it. And their opposition almost makes me ardently support an apology, for I hate it when racists win anything. And then there is this sentiment….
Rep. Donald A. Blakey, R-Woodside, who is black, noted that slavery was in the country’s distant past but recognized that “what took place in those days has an effect on what goes on today.”
Well, yes, what happened before does have an affect on what is now. We fought a civil war to end slavery and hundreds of thousands died in that effort. The civil rights movement 100 years later ended overt state discrimination and began the process of ending discrimination in our hearts and minds. And 60 years after that we have elected ourselves our first black President. That is progress. Sure, racism and discrimination still exist and where we find it we should and must end it, but I tend to think righting the wrong is an inherent apology in and of itself. Further, I am a progressive, so I tend to look forward in working to make the country better, rather than backward to what we were before. So that makes me naturally against pursuing something that reopens old wounds, especially when it is clear and obvious to all but the teabagging racists that slavery is and was wrong, and especially when there is just so much other work to do, not only in this state but in this country, and not a lot of time to do it in. An Apology to me is a unnecessary distraction.
I expect this to be a minority opinion on Delaware Liberal, so feel free to lambast me.