Reparations Forum held at Suffolk County Community College

ike colleges across the nation, Suffolk County Community College (SCCC) in Long Island celebrated Black History Month with a number of very meaningful events both on and off campus. This included a film fest, a trip to Harlem’s historic Cotton Club, and, on February 20^th, an eight-hour-long Forum on Reparations.

The forum started off with a workshop led by the current writer, who is the Communications Director for Caucasians United for Reparations and Emancipation (CURE), an organization of white Americans who support reparations to descendants of slavery. In it, the questions whites most often ask about reparations were addressed. The questions included:

"My family didn't own slaves, so why should I have to pay?" "What about all the poor people who immigrated here long after slavery - isn't it unfair to expect them to pay?" And, "It was Africans who sold each other into slavery, so why should Americans have to pay?"

It was explained that this nation’s entire economy, in the North as well as the South was based on slavery, either directly or indirectly. Therefore, everyone, from the richest to the poorest, benefited from it - and continues to do so to this very day.

The facts were also brought forth that Americans and Europeans stirred up wars in Africa to get people to sell each other into slavery, and also that, after they found out about the unspeakable cruelties suffered by Africans transported to the New World, many African nations stopped participating, and even mounted armies to defend their people from being captured and enslaved.

Next, there was an exciting discussion, led by SCCC’s Professor Norman Daniels, Chair of the Office of Multicultural Affairs, in which students of African ancestry told how they first heard of reparations and then voiced their opinions about what they thought reparations must include.

They spoke, for example, about the need, first and foremost, for educational facilities, but also for state-of-the-art medical centers in Black communities to deal with the many health problems facing people there, problems such as high infant mortality and low life expectancy as well as diabetes, high blood pressure and obesity. They also called for mental health treatment centers where what has come to be called Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome is well understood and can be dealt with effectively. The entire discussion was so engrossing it was difficult to draw it to a close.

This was followed by a screening of Alfred Santana’s, Durban 400, which looks at the 2001 UN World Conference against Racism and the struggle for reparations.

This video documents quite valuably the actions of the coalition of political activists, educators and students who traveled to Durban, South Africa, to fight for reparations for the trans-Atlantic slave trade and slavery. They scored a huge victory when key language was included in the final Durban document declaring that the trans-Atlantic slave trade, slavery and colonialism were "crimes against humanity."

The final speaker of the day was the internationally renowned Viola Plummer from Millions for Reparations, who gave a wide-ranging and fascinating presentation that included an update on the latest court decision pertaining to reparations.

She told about the litigation against corporations – such as Aetna Inc., R.J. Reynolds Tobacco and FleetBoston Financial Corporation – based on the fact that they or their parent companies profited from slavery. The cases were filed in the federal court, the first one in New York and then in New Jersey, Texas, Virginia, North and South Carolina, Mississippi and Louisiana.

The cases were then consolidated and brought before the federal court in Chicago. In January, U.S. District Judge Charles R. Norgle – a Reagan appointee who is one of the most conservative judges in the country - dismissed the lawsuit, stating that the plaintiffs had not established a clear link to the companies they targeted.

Norgle also said that the slave descendants lacked "constitutional standing" because their claims were filed too long after slavery ended, and that they raised complicated social and political issues that should be resolved by the legislative branch of government, not in the courts. However, he left the door open for further litigation by dismissing the case "without prejudice."

Plummer said that the attorneys for the plaintiffs are far from discouraged and are preparing to submit amended complaints. This time they will do so in the state courts, and if they are dismissed, they will be appealed. And she said that whether or not they win in court, this litigation performs the tremendously important service of keeping the issue of reparations in the public eye.

Viola Plummer is confident, however, that the reparations movement will be victorious because it is a just demand. As she put it so succinctly, "They stole us. They sold us. Now they owe us!"