THE INTERNATIONAL DAY FOR THE ELIMINATION OF RACIAL DISCRIMINATION 2021

 THE INTERNATIONAL DAY FOR THE ELIMINATION OF RACIAL DISCRIMINATION 2021

 

 

Sunday, March 21, 2021 will be 61 years since a group of African men, women and children were killed and wounded by white police in Sharpeville, Azania (South Africa.) On 21 March 1960, in Sharpeville, Azania (South Africa) 69 Africans were killed and more than 300 were wounded (shot in the back) as they fled the murderous gunfire of white police. It will be 55 years (1966) since the United Nations (UN) passed a resolution to recognize March 21 as the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination.

 

DR FRANCES CRESS WELSING INTERNATIONAL DAY FOR THE ELIMINATION OF RACIAL DISCRIMINATION 2013

Murphy Browne © Wednesday, March 20, 2013

"Racism (White Supremacy) is the local and global power system and dynamic, structured and maintained by persons who classify themselves as white, whether consciously or subconsciously determined, which consists of patterns of perception, logic, symbol formation, thought, speech, action and emotional response, as conducted simultaneously in all areas of people activity (economics, education, entertainment, labor, law, politics, religion, sex and war), for the ultimate purpose of white genetic survival and to prevent white genetic annihilation on planet Earth - a planet upon which the vast majority of people are classified as nonwhite (black, brown, red and yellow) by white skinned people, and all of the nonwhite people are genetically dominant (in terms of skin coloration) compared to the genetic recessive white skin people."

From “The Isis Papers: The Keys to the Colors” by Dr Francis Cress Welsing

 

 

March 21 is the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination and Dr. Francis Cress Welsing is one of the recognized voices that has defined “racism.” She is an African American psychiatrist whose definition of racism has been explored and documented in “The Cress Theory of Color-Confrontation and Racism (White Supremacy)” published in 1970 and “The Isis Papers: The Keys to the Colors” published in 1990. Cress Welsing was born on March 18, 1935 during the time when African Americans were forced to live, study and work in a segregated USA. Even though she was born and raised in Chicago which was the destination of thousands of African Americans who fled the Jim Crow south, Cress Welsing would still have witnessed the racist practices of White America. Emmet Till the 14 year old African American child who was brutally beaten and lynched on August 28, 1955 (for supposedly whistling at a White woman in Money, Mississippi) was born and raised in Chicago. As a 20-year-old African American woman at that time Cress Welsing would have known about Till and the many other African Americans lynched by White Americans (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QDCk4s0Cof4.) Just 15 years before she was born (July 27-August 3, 1919) White American mobs in Chicago lynched African Americans and destroyed their homes. In spite of the atrocities that White Americans committed against their African American compatriots for more than 400 years, the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination is hardly recognized in that country.

 

 

The date March 21 was chosen to recognize and address the scourge of racism because of the massacre of Africans in South Africa during the apartheid era. On March 21, 1960 a group of Africans in Sharpeville, South Africa were peacefully demonstrating against the white supremacist apartheid "pass laws" when they were murdered by white police. The Sharpeville Massacre where 69 Africans were killed and almost 300 wounded (shot in the back as they fled the murderous police gunfire) led to worldwide condemnation of the white minority who had seized power in the African nation. The government in South Africa at the time was in power because Africans were denied the vote in their own country. In the wake of the Sharpeville Massacre where the white minority government declared a state of emergency and arrested more than 18,000 people even the very conservative United Nations (UN) was forced to take a stand and condemn the action of the state sanctioned massacre of peacefully protesting Africans.

 

 

In 1966 the General Assembly of the UN proclaimed March 21, the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. The UN called on the international community to redouble its efforts to eliminate all forms of racial discrimination. Although condemned by the UN many of the world powers continued to trade with the apartheid minority White supremacists who ruled and oppressed Africans in South Africa. American President Ronald Reagan had to be forced to sign the Comprehensive Anti-Apartheid Act of 1986 into law. He vetoed the Act which was sponsored by African American U.S. Representative Ron Dellums in 1972 with support from the Congressional Black Caucus and Representative Howard Wolpe, chair of the House Africa Subcommittee. Reagan’s veto of the law was overridden by Congress (the Senate 78 to 21 and the House 313 to 83.) The Canadian government and various institutions in Canada including Carleton University and the University of Toronto, colluded with the White supremacist apartheid government of South Africa by refusing to divest and continuing to trade with the government and South African companies long after the UN called for sanctions.

 

 

Africans in Canada whether they are the descendants of Africans who were enslaved by the French in the 1600s or by White United Empire Loyalists after 1776 or fled slavery in America and sought freedom in Canada or immigrated from the Caribbean beginning in the 1830s after slavery was abolished by Britain are subjected to a White supremacist culture. The African Canadian Legal Clinic (ACLC) in a report dated January 24, 2012 wrote as part of its submission to the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD): “Canadian society is still affected by racism and racial discrimination. Because of its history, Canadian society, as in all the countries of Northand South America, carries a heavy legacy of racial discrimination, which was the ideological prop of trans-Atlantic slavery and of the colonial system. The ideological aspect of this legacy has given rise to an intellectual mindset which, through education, literature, art and the different channels of thought and creativity, has profoundly and lastingly permeated the system of values, feelings, mentalities, perceptions and behaviours, and hence the country’s culture. Racist stereotypes are the result but also the cause of racist practices. 

In the past, stereotypes of Black people were used to justify slavery and segregation. Today, they provide the basis for discriminatory policies and practices such as over-policing of African Canadian communities, police brutality, disparities in sentencing, disproportionate discipline of African Canadian students, and failure to implement equitable policies to address disparities in employment, economics, and education. These phenomena reveal a legislative, administrative and judicial focus on the perceived deviance of members of the African Canadian community and ignorance of their underlying socioeconomic and historic causes.”

Usually when the word “racism” is mentioned there are denials and excuses. Some of the more famous and ridiculous pronouncements: “I am not a racist. I have friends of all races. I treat everyone the same. I do not see colour.” Racism is more than one White person making derogatory comments about a racialized person or a group of racialized people. It is more than some random White person deciding not to give a job to a qualified racialized person. Racism is the White supremacist culture that allows and in many cases encourages White skin people to act out their prejudices and negatively affect the lives of racialized people. It is the power invested in White skin which allows the discrimination and the prejudice to cause harm to racialized people. In recent years there have even been White people who recognize and acknowledge the existence of White skin privilege and the scourge of racism. When Peggy McIntosh (https://susanarinderle.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/White-Privilege-Unpacking-the-Knapsack.pdf)  writes in her well-publicized piece “White Privilege; Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack” about the unearned privileges of White skin colour she knows what she is writing about being one of the privileged. After listing all the unearned privileges of her White skin McIntosh writes: “Disapproving of the systems won't be enough to change them. I was taught to think that racism could end if white individuals changed their attitudes. But a white skin in the United States opens many doors for whites whether or not we approve of the way dominance has been conferred on us. Individual acts can palliate, but cannot end, these problems. To redesign social systems we need first to acknowledge their colossal unseen dimensions. The silences and denials surrounding privilege are the key political tool here. They keep the thinking about equality or equity incomplete, protecting unearned advantage and conferred dominance by making these taboo subjects. Most talk by whites about equal opportunity seems to be now to be about equal opportunity to try to get into a position of dominance while denying that systems of dominance exist.”

 

 

Dr. Cress Welsing who will be speaking about her definition of racism at York University on Saturday March 30 as an African American who has lived in a racist White supremacist society her entire life says: “The system of Racism (White Supremacy) utililizes deceit and violence (inclusive of chemical warfare, biological warfare and psychological warfare), indeed Any Means Necessary, to achieve its ultimate goal objective of white genetic survival and to prevent white genetic annihilation on planet Earth. In the existing system of Racism (White Supremacy) when the term is undefined and poorly understood there is general confusion and chaos on the part of the victims of that system (local, national and global). It then becomes impossible for the victims of racism (White Supremacy) to effectively counter the global system of Racism (White Supremacy). The African enslavement, imperialism, colonialism, neo-colonialism, fascism, etc., are all dimensions and aspects of Racism (White Supremacy.)”

 

Murphy Browne © Wednesday, March 20, 2013

CHLOE COOLEY MARCH 14-1793

 

CHLOE COOLEY MARCH 14-1793 

 

Murphy Browne © March 8-2021 

 

On March 14, 1793, Chloe Cooley an enslaved African woman in Ontario, made history when she fought for her freedom. Cooley was being sold and she vigorously resisted. Being tied up and sold was just one more incident in a lifetime of indignities. Cooley’s struggle for her freedom gave the lie to the myth of the happily enslaved African and led to an unsuccessful effort to end slavery in Upper Canada (Ontario.) During the four hundred years enslavement of Africans by Europeans there was a concerted effort to portray the enslaved Africans as being happy with their lot. The image of the fat, perpetually grinning desexualized mammy who loved the White family more than she loved her own life was used by White people to rationalize the inhumanity of slavery. To deal with the cognitive dissonance of holding other humans in captivity and exploiting their labour, White people had to convince themselves that enslaved Africans enjoyed being enslaved and loved the people who enslaved them. Members of White families would brutalize enslaved Africans daily and then on Sunday attend church, so they had to convince themselves that as good Christians their brutal treatment of the Africans they enslaved was justified. 

 

In the 1982 published book “The Plantation Mistress: Woman’s World In The Old South” White American history professor Catherine Clinton wrote : “The Mammy was created by white Southerners to redeem the relationship between black women and white men within slave society in response to the antislavery attack from the North during the ante-bellum period. The Mammy was the positive emblem of familial relations between black and white. She existed as a counterpoint to the octoroon concubine the light skinned product of a ‘white man’s lust’ who was habitually victimized by slaveowners’ sexual appetites.” 

 

There is no evidence that Cooley was sexually exploited by her owner or his friends and relatives, but it is hardly likely that this would have been documented unlike the infamous slaveholder of the Jamaican plantation Egypt. In 1989 African Jamaican history professor Douglas Gordon Hall published the diary of British slaveholder Thomas Thistlewood where Thistlewood documented his rape of enslaved African women on his plantation. Thistlewood had the time to document those rapes because he did no work since he was the owner of a plantation and had enslaved Africans who were forced to do the work. In his 2007 published book “The Trader, The Owner, The Slave: Parallel Lives in the Age of Slavery” White British historian James Walvin comments on the diary of Thistlewood: “Thomas Thistlewood left a 14,000 page diary. He details the daily life of a slave owner and the quite extraordinary levels of brutality he meters out to his slaves; the sexual brutality to the women, and the physical brutality to all of them.” Walvin also muses on the reasons given for the continued enslavement of Africans and the hypocritical reality: "One of the justifications for slavery put forward by the planters was that you could treat slaves like this because they were not like us: they were sub-human. But against that of course was the fact that all the planters had sex with their slaves, so if they're sub-human what were they doing have sex with them, and having children with them?” Enslaved African women in the Caribbean, Central, North or South America and Europe, suffered the same fate. 

 

Cooley’s documented struggle in Ontario, Canada also helps to explode the myth that there was no slavery in Canada. The popular stories of enslaved Africans fleeing slavery in the USA to find freedom in Canada continue into the 21st century. Documentation of slavery in Canada is not popular and the few books that have been published are not particularly popular even during February, African History Month. When Toronto celebrated 180 years since it was incorporated as the capital of Ontario on March 6, 1834, there was no mention of slavery. Yet the enslavement of Africans in this city and throughout this country ended on August 1, 1834. Coincidentally the same year (1793) that Cooley made a valiant effort to resist being sold is the same year Toronto (the home of the Mississaugas of the New Credit First Nation) was occupied by the British. In an article published on March 6, 2014 commemorating Toronto’s 180th birthday this information was provided: “The British settlement formally began with John Simcoe, who renamed Toronto in 1793, proclaiming the town of York and centring around Fort York, which was located in the area around the present-day St. Lawrence Market. It would be 41 years and one five-day American invasion later that York would revert to its native name, Toronto, on March 6, 1834.” 

 

There was no mention of Chloe Cooley even though her struggle happened in 1793 and led to Simcoe passing the first legislation in the British colonies to restrict the slave trade and slavery ended in 1834. Apparently, Chloe Cooley’s Black life did not matter in 1793 nor did it matter during the celebration of Toronto’s history. 

 

Murphy Browne © March 8-2021 

 

 

MARCH 9-1841 AMISTAD AND SENGBE PIEH

 AMISTAD AND SENGBE PIEH MARCH 9-1841 

 

One hundred and eighty years ago today on March 9-1841 a group of Africans who had been on trial for "mutiny" were set free. On March 9, 1841, the U.S. Supreme Court, in United States v. The Amistad, ruled in favour of a group of Africans captured by U.S. authorities after they had seized control of a Spanish schooner, La Amistad, that was transporting them to a life of slavery in Cuba; the justices ruled, 7-1, that the Africans had been illegally enslaved, and should be set free. 

 

Murphy Browne © Friday, December 3-2010  

 

 

SENGBE PIEH 

 

On November 27, 1841 thirty-five Africans aboard a ship the Gentleman sailed out of New York bound for Sierra Leone. These Africans were part of a group of 600 who had been kidnapped in West Africa, forced onboard a slave ship Tecora (flying a Portuguese flag) in April 1839 and taken to Cuba. The story of their struggle for freedom was fictionalized and immortalized in the movie La Amistad which was released in 1997. Several books have also been written about the Africans who were on La Amistad when it was intercepted on August 26, 1839 off of Long Island, New York, by the crew of the U. S. Coast Guard vessel, the USS Washington. These books include the 1953 published novel Black Mutiny: Revolt on the Schooner Amistad written by William Owens, the 1988 published Mutiny on the Amistad: The Saga of a Slave Revolt and Its Impact on American Abolition, Law, and Diplomacy written by Professor Howard Jones and the 1998 published Freedom's sons: the true story of the Amistad mutiny written by Suzanne Jurmain. 

 

When the Africans were kidnapped in 1839, Britain, the USA, France, Portugal and Spain had on paper at least outlawed the transportation of Africans from the African continent into slavery in the various European occupied colonies. The enslavement of Africans by Europeans was still a pratice but the importation of Africans had been abolished. Britain abolished the trade in 1807, the USA in 1808, the Portuguese in 1810, the Austrians, Danes, French, Russians and Prussians in 1814, the Dutch in 1818 and the Spanish in 1820. When the Portuguese owned slave ship Tecora set sail with the Africans in April, 1839 the owner, captain and crew were breaking an international law and “violated all of the treaties then in existence.” 

 

Although all these European nations had abolished the slave trade, yet Africans were bought and sold in the various European occupied colonies. The British had outlawed the transportation of Africans from the continent yet the Africans who were taken on board the Tecora in April 1839 were kidnapped and taken from Sierra Leone which was a British protectorate. Like millions of Africans before them, the occupants of the Portuguese slave ship Tecora were forced into the hold of the ship and shackled in place for the roughly 10 weeks of brutal travel along the Middle Passage. After enduring a horrific journey and landing at Havana in the Spanish colony Cuba, the Africans were fraudulently classified as Cuban-born slaves (renamed with Spanish names) and sold at auction to Jose Ruiz and Pedro Montez, who planned to transport them to their plantations on another part of the island aboard the cargo schooner La Amistad. 

 

Three days into the journey aboard La Amistad the understandably angry and desperate Africans seized control of the ship in an effort to return to Africa. The Africans were led by Sengbe Pieh, a 25-year-old member of the Mendi nation (the Spanish had renamed him Joseph Cinque) who had managed to free himself and his companions. The Africans ordered the two Spanish sailors who survived the revolt to sail La Amistad east towards the rising sun and to Africa. During the night, the Spaniards secretly changed course, attempting to sail back to Cuba or to the southern coast of the United States and after more than two months at sea La Amistad eventually reached Long Island Sound in August 1839. In search of food and water, the Africans went ashore on Montauk Point, Long Island, where they were recaptured on August 26, 1839 by the crew of the Federal naval brig USS Washington. On August 29, 1839, three days after the La Amistad was towed to New London, Connecticut, Judge Judson presided at a hearing on complaints of murder and piracy filed by the two Spaniards Montes and Ruiz who had purchased the Africans in Havana. Thirty-nine of the 43 Africans who had survived the weeks at sea were present, including their acknowledged leader Sengbe Pieh. The three main witnesses at the hearing were the first mate of the USS Washington and Montes and Ruiz. After listening to the testimony, Judge Judson referred the case for trial in Circuit Court, where in 1839 all federal criminal trials were held and ordered the Africans put into custody at the county jail in New Haven. The incarcerated Africans were subjected to more indignities when reportedly as many as 5,000 people a day visited the jail where the jailer charged "one New York shilling" (about twelve cents) for close looks at the captives. 

 

Meanwhile the Spanish government urged the United States government to return La Amistad to its Cuban owners, concede that the U. S. courts had no jurisdiction over Spanish subjects and return the beleaguered Africans to Havana. The almost two year legal struggle for the Africans’ freedom had begun. 

 

On September 14, 1939, the Africans were sent by canal boat and stagecoach to Hartford for trial in the Circuit courtroom of Judge Smith Thompson who also served as a justice on the United States Supreme Court. District Attorney Holabird asked the court to let President Martin Van Buren decide the fate of the Africans since he (Holabird) viewed this as a matter that could affect the relations between two great powers. Lawyer for the defence, Roger Baldwin argued that the United States should not become a "slave-catcher for foreign slave-holders." After three days of argument Judge Thompson decided that because the alleged mutiny and murders occurred in international waters and did not involve U. S. citizens, the court had no jurisdiction to consider the criminal charges. He also decided that whether or not the Africans were slaves and if they were slaves who owned them was a decision for the district court; and he further ruled that although the Africans were no longer considered prisoners they should be detained until the district court could make a decision about their status. 

 

The Amistad civil trial began on November 19, 1839 in Hartford and after two days of testimony, the trial was adjourned until January 7, 1840. Meanwhile President Van Buren, in anticipation of the court ruling in favour of the Spaniards, sent the naval schooner Grampus, to wait in the New Haven harbour to take the Africans back to Cuba. 

 

Judge Judson announced his decision on January 13, 1840, after a weekend of deliberation. He ruled that the Africans were "born free" and had been kidnapped in violation of international law. He ordered that the Africans be "delivered to President Van Buren for transport back to Africa." The government appealed Judson's decision, but it was affirmed by Circuit Judge Thompson. The government then appealed to the United States Supreme Court, where five of the nine justices were southerners who either owned or had owned slaves. On March 9, 1841, the Supreme Court announced its decision based on the fact that Sengbe Pieh and his companions were "kidnapped Africans, who by the laws of Spain itself were entitled to their freedom." 

 

Although the American government was willing to transport the Africans to slavery in Cuba, they refused to provide transportation back to Africa. Private donors provided the finance for the charter of the Gentleman which sailed out of New York on November 27, 1841 taking the surviving Africans including Sengbe Pieh back to their home. 

 

Murphy Browne © Friday, December 3-2010 

SELMA AND BLOODY SUNDAY MARCH 7-1965

 

Fifty six years ago today on March 7-1965 African Americans in Selma, Alabama were brutalized, viciously beaten and killed as they attempted to bring attention to the fact that as US citizens they were prevented from voting by white Americans. Since the enslavement of Africans was abolished on January 1-1865 white people in the southern states had unleashed a campaign of terror on African Americans to “keep them in their place” as third class citizens in the country where African blood, sweat, tears and coerced, unpaid labour had enriched generations of white people.

Murphy Browne © Thursday, January 22, 2015

SELMA AND BLOODY SUNDAY

“I know you are asking today, ‘How long will it take?’ I come to say to you this afternoon however difficult the moment, however frustrating the hour, it will not be long, because truth pressed to earth will rise again. I know you are asking today, ‘How long will it take? How long will prejudice blind the visions of men, darken their understanding, and drive bright-eyed wisdom from her sacred throne? When will wounded justice, lying prostrate on the streets of Selma and Birmingham and communities all over the South, be lifted from this dust of shame to reign supreme among the children of men? When will the radiant star of hope be plunged against the nocturnal bosom of this lonely night, plucked from weary souls with chains of fear and the manacles of death? How long will justice be crucified, and truth bear it?’ I come to say to you this afternoon, however difficult the moment, however frustrating the hour, it will not be long, because ‘truth crushed to earth will rise again.’ How long? Not long, because ‘no lie can live forever.’ How long? Not long, because ‘you shall reap what you sow.’ How long? Not long, because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”

Excerpt from “How long, Not long” speech made by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., on March 25, 1965 on the steps of the capitol building in Montgomery, Alabama

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., made his famous “How long, Not long” speech on the steps of the state capitol building in Montgomery, Alabama on the completion of the 54 mile long Selma to Montgomery march to petition for African American right to vote. On Sunday, March 21, 1965 approximately 8,000 people assembled at Brown Chapel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Selma, Alabama in preparation for the to 54 mile walk to Montgomery, the state capital. On March 25 a group of approximately 25,000 people gathered to listen to Dr. King speak after the completion of the 4 day, 54 mile walk Although Dr. King was the recognized leader of that 3rd attempt during March 1965 to make the journey from Selma to Montgomery, there were many African Americans in Alabama and specifically Selma who had worked for years advocating for African American right to vote. The movie “Selma” which is in the theatres in time for Martin Luther King Jr., Day 2015 pays tribute to some of those activists. The movie “Selma” brings to life on “the big screen” the story of the African American struggle during March 1965 to gain what is the right of every citizen (the right to elect our government representatives.) African Americans in the southern US states were denied that right even though they and their ancestors built the US economy with their blood, sweat, tears and (during slavery) unpaid labour.

Reading and even writing about “Bloody Sunday” the first attempt on March 7, 1965 to walk from Selma to Montgomery did not prepare me for the sight of that fateful day acted out on screen “in living colour.” I re-read John Lewis’ 1998 published book “Walking With the Wind: A Memoir of the Movement” on the January 3-4 weekend and then went to see the movie “Selma” on Thursday, January 8. Even with Lewis’ description of police using “rubber hose wrapped with barbed wire” to brutally beat peaceful African Americans I was not prepared for the sights on the screen as I watched “Selma.” In his description of March 7, 1965 Lewis writes: “I was bleeding badly. My head was exploding with pain. There was mayhem all around me. I could see a young kid – a teenaged boy- sitting on the ground with a gaping cut in his head, the blood just gushing out. Several women, including Mrs. Boynton, were lying on the pavement and the grass median. People were weeping. Some were vomiting from the tear gas. Men on horses were moving in all directions, purposely riding over the top of fallen people, bringing their animals’ hooves down on shoulders, stomachs and legs.” Lewis suffered a fractured skull from the vicious police attack on March 7, 1965 and he carries the scars from that “Bloody Sunday” of 50 years ago.

The movie “Selma” presents the brutal facts of “Bloody Sunday” and many of those who laid their lives on the line are portrayed. The Mrs. Boynton that Lewis refers in his book is Amelia Boynton Robinson (born on August 18, 1911) who was a 54 year old Civil Rights activist in 1965. In December 2014, Boynton Robinson now 103 years old was interviewed by the New York Post and spoke of being savagely beaten by White police who then pumped tear gas into the unconscious woman’s throat leaving her for dead. Boynton Robinson recovered and photographs of her unconscious on the Edmund Pettus Bridge on March 7, 1965 remain as evidence of that horrific day. She plans to attend the 50th anniversary of “Bloody Sunday” at the Edmund Pettus Bridge in March 2015. In “Selma” Boynton Robinson is portrayed by African Trinidad actress Lorraine Toussaint who visited Boynton Robinson when she was researching the role.

Following the savage and vicious beating and other brutality visited upon peaceful African Americans by White police in Selma, caught on camera for the world to witness, American President Johnson was shamed into signing the Voting Rights Act on August 6, 1965. The signing of the Voting Rights Act did not change the attitude of White people in the South and especially did not affect the behaviour of those who were in power. From the history channel website: “Although the Voting Rights Act passed, state and local enforcement of the law was weak and it was often outright ignored, mainly in the South and in areas where the proportion of blacks in the population was high and their vote threatened the political status quo.” In the movie “Selma” President Johnson signs the Voting Rights Act in the presence of Dr. King and other Civil Rights activists.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., would have been 86 years old on Thursday, January 15, 2015 if he had survived the single (.30-06 bullet) fired from a Remington Model 760 that entered through his right cheek, breaking his jaw and several vertebrae as it traveled down his spinal cord, severing his jugular vein and major arteries before lodging in his shoulder on April 4, 1968 at 6:01 p.m. After viewing “Selma” I have to wonder what Dr. King would say of the recent spate of White police killing African American men, women and children. Would he still say: “Not long, because ‘you shall reap what you sow.’ How long? Not long, because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice?” Since 1965 “Not long” seems like a very long time!

Murphy Browne © Thursday, January 22, 2015