Lynching Memorial Opens to Near-Universal Praise
Last Thursday the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, better known as the lynching memorial, opened to wide coverage and effusive praise from all quarters — well, almost all quarters.
The memorial stands in Montgomery, Alabama, near the former site of the city’s slave auction. Montgomery also is home to the Equal Justice Initiative, founded by attorney Bryan Stevenson. His nonprofit, which he started in 1994 to represent wrongly convicted prisoners, has grown to handle cases for poor prisoners and guarantees to defend anyone in a death penalty case in the state, which has the most per capita in the country.
I met Stevenson, who was raised in Milton and graduated from Cape Henlopen High in 1977, a decade or so ago when he spoke at our church. He is an amazing man, not only incredibly intelligent but entirely without malice, perhaps the most placid person I’ve ever met. He has suffered the usual share of indignities heaped on any African American, especially in Alabama, where he moved to practice law after attending Harvard Law on a full scholarship (he also earned a Masters from the Kennedy School of Government while he was at it; he’s that smart). Yet he expresses no trace of resentment, only compassion even for the racists he encounters. Even for someone with a religious upbringing who did his undergraduate work at a theological seminary, his humility and empathy are transcendent.
The memorial got wide exposure two weeks ago with a segment on “60 Minutes” in which Stevenson was interviewed by Oprah Winfrey. I’m not sure if anything appeared in the News Journal, but Delmarva Now ran a locally written Sunday story.
Stevenson has earned many accolades over the years, but I think this is going to propel him to another level. This memorial has a visual and emotional impact to rival the Vietnam Memorial in Washington. It consists of more than 800 blocks of steel — one for every county in which EJI could document at least one lynching — hung from the ceiling and engraved with the names, where known, of the 4,400 victims. Two of Delaware’s three counties are included. Sussex is not one of them.
Thank you for this post.
The lynching in New Castle County took place in 1903, when a mob broke down the doors of the county work house to get George White, who had confessed to a murder of a white woman. The News Journal’s Harry Themal wrote about this last year:
The lynching made news not just nationwide but internationally, where it was compared with the anti-Jewish pogroms then being carried out by Russia.
I second Elaine. Thanks for taking the time and the follow up comment.
Stevenson is one of the best humans around. One of my greatest hopes is that the next Democratic president nominates him to the Supreme Court.
@LG: That would diminish his impact. I think he will someday win the Nobel Peace Prize. And that’s not hyperbole.
Very good.
I’ve also had the pleasure of meeting Stevenson. He’s exceptional, no doubt.
He signed my copy of Just Mercy (his book about getting the wrongly convicted on death row exonerated).
He spoke about this lynching project then. It looks a very powerful monument to some disgusting shit that remains more or less unaddressed in our country.
I hope to go experience it.
I think he can do both. Having his voice on the bench would be the best thing since Thurgood Marshall sat there. Marshall made great strides in both contexts.
Hopefully he wins that prize in the spirit of Mandela in ’93 rather than another person more recently.
I’m convinced that America needs some sort of Truth and Reconciliation Commission and some manner of reparations.
Just saying “we don’t do it anymore” isn’t enough.* Demanding people just move on isn’t good enough.
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*N.B. We basically still do it.
You don’t think a “truth and reconciliation commission” smacks of thought control? Or is that ok as long as they’re the “right” thoughts. I know what you’re saying, but it seems like a tricky area.
But I like your taste in music as seen on another thread. Enjoy the fest down there.
You don’t think a “truth and reconciliation commission” smacks of thought control? Or is that OK as long as they’re the “right” thoughts? I know what you’re saying but it seems like a tricky area.
But I like your taste in music as seen on another thread. Enjoy the fest down there.
Testing: Trying to post
OK, so where’s my other one?
Russian hackers
Now they’ve made me send it twice. (See above.)
Won’t take my comment now. I’ll try tomorrow. Have an answer…
Any particular individual can still disagree, but the nation must acknowledge and actively address. This “thought control” idea is very queer. Is telling me I must sell war planes to Saudi thought control?
Has no impact on what anyone thinks. People can think slavery, lynchings, Jim Crow, redlining, employment discrimination, mass incarceration, extrajudicial police executions and racism have zero impact on outcomes today and needn’t be dealt with in any way. Perfectly legal to think that.
The nation needn’t act based on the most corrupt and dispicable thoughts of its citizens. Like if some percentage of people disagree than nothing is done.
So, no, it doesn’t smack of anything other than a required step toward justice.
So no, I don’t think there’s any issue with it like that.
(For some reason I needed to post it it pieces. No clue…)
Last thing before I head to the bayou for a day trip.
Mandela considered everyone a victim of the system including his jailers, apartheid bureaucrats & FW de Klerk. de Klerk shared to ’93 Nobel with Mandela.
REV – Sorry. Something screwy is going on in wordpress labs right now.
REV: The idea of making sure everybody has the correct “truth” is what bothers me. Maybe it’s the “commission” idea. If people go before a commission designed to make sure they get the “truth” right isn’t that commission trying to enforce its version of the truth? Isn’t it looking for signs of improper thinking? You can enforce proper actions — think police behavior — but what people think is their own business. (You kind of say that at one point.) Idealism can lead to over-zealousness, although I don’t really think you want the kind of thought-enforcement I’m talking about. I see more hints of that on the other blog. But maybe being a skeptic leads to over-zealousness in the other direction.
In my preceding comment, I mean enforcing proper “police behavior” in the sense of stopping police abuse of power.
There is no correct truth, just the truth. It’s the truth even if you don’t believe it. That’s what makes it true. And you’re free not to believe it.
And you’re free not to believe it.
And you’re free not to believe it.
I feel like we’re getting into some “alternative facts” realm or some liberal horseshit like “everyone has their own truth”.
And it’ss not an interogation whereby if you disagree you get sent to reeducation (as much as I prefer that approach).
If you begin with the idea that all individuals have been victimized (which the ANC did) your concern moot.
Do me a favor and read a bit about it. We can hash it out more later. I gotta catch a fishing boat…
Who decides what that “truth” is?
And I have read about it. But I’ll do more.
And, too, I don’t feel especially victimized. So maybe not “all.”
Happy fishing!
Granted, most of the time there is a consensus about what the truth is. (This is a chair. Or what we call a chair.) But I’m not sure how often that applies to politics. There’s a lot of room for nuance and interpretation.
Now I think I’m outta here. And that’s the truth.
I lied. I’m back. Just wanted to add that the devoutly religious think they know what the ttruth is, but there’s no way they can.
Now I’m truly out of here. I think.