Last summer, while the world watched in horror as a police officer knelt on the neck of George Floyd, an unarmed father of five, my community’s gaze turned toward another atrocity unfolding right before our eyes. COVID-19 has disproportionately devastated the African American community, as Black people in the United States are twice as likely to die as a result of contracting COVID-19, and people of color constitute a significant portion of the frontline workers who bear the brunt of exposure to the virus. The whirlwind events of 2020 — including the pandemic, George Floyd’s murder, and the subsequent resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement — brought the topics of institutionalized discrimination, racism, and oppression to the forefront of national discussions regarding equality, causing the subject of reparations to dominate public consciousness like never before.
For example, as the novel coronavirus preys especially on individuals with underlying conditions, the outbreak has revealed the large-scale impacts of structural racism on the health of African Americans nationwide. According to a peer-reviewed study conducted by Harvard researchers, if the United States had paid reparations to the descendants of enslaved Black Americans, the risk of severe illness and death from the virus would be far lower, in some cases even diminishing statewide coronavirus transmission by up to 68%. This study’s findings reinforce the burgeoning evidence-based philosophy that reparations can significantly combat systemic racism in the United States. However, despite intense national conversations and public demonstrations in recent years surrounding anti-racist messaging, progressives have yet to pursue meaningful legislative solutions to the systemic issues they denonce, particularly by neglecting the idea of reparations.
Will financial restitution eradicate prejudice or pervasive racial hatred in American society? Certainly not, but it will undoubtedly aid in closing the enormous divide between Black and White American wealth, and in turn, diminish racial gaps in education, health care, employment, and housing access. Implementing comprehensive reparations would not only guarantee compensation for the unpaid, forced labor that Black people supplied for over 200 years, but also diminish the wealth gap between White and Black Americans facilitated by discriminatory U.S. government laws. It would also atone for the moral debt owed to Black Americans after centuries of plunder and oppression.
In the wake of America’s recent racial reckoning, the United States government has taken several significant steps to confront its legacy of racial hatred, discrimination, and oppression. Some of these measures have been largely symbolic, such as establishing Juneteenth as a federal holiday, while others — including the drafting of legislation to address police brutality — remain more actionable. Yet still, reparations remain a contentious topic in Congress and American society at large, eliciting tensions from both sides of the aisle.
Some legislators, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (whose ancestors owned slaves), argue that since no Americans alive today bear any direct responsibility for slavery, the government cannot justifiably ask taxpayers to fund reparations. However, non-Black Americans have benefited tremendously from the economic advantages granted to them by slavery, even if their ancestors did not own slaves. For example, regression analysis research comparing census data from 1860 and 2014 demonstrates that modern-day White populations in regions that once had high levels of slave ownership are financially better off today as a result of their slave history, even if their ancestors had no direct ties to slave ownership or related industries. Therefore, reparations would aid in leveling the socioeconomic playing field between Black and White Americans. If generational wealth can be inherited, so can generational debt.
As an African American woman living in Southern California, a region well-known for its prevalence of liberal sentiment, I have often been disappointed to witness my own local governmental officials parroting McConnell’s argument to deflect responsibility for instituting reparations. For instance, when Manhattan Beach’s violent history of stealing waterfront property from its Black residents came to light in the summer of 2020, the city refused to even offer an apology. Manhattan Beach City Councilmember Steve Napolitano said in a statement, “For those demanding reparations, these are typically considered by levels of government much higher than cities…The issue of reparations for historic wrongs against any group of people is much bigger than Manhattan Beach, and not the sole responsibility of our current residents.” Napolitano’s assertion that cities do not generally consider reparations is fallacious, as demonstrated by the reparations policies of major metropolitan areas like Evanston, Illinois, Providence, Rhode Island, and Asheville, North Carolina. Furthermore, although most Americans — including Manhattan Beach residents — would likely prefer to only pay taxes for issues they solely bear responsibility for, taxation requires that all American citizens finance a broad collection of efforts that often extend far beyond their personal interests.
While many Southern California residents pride themselves on their liberal, forward-thinking attitudes, the topic of reparations has revealed a stark divide between how White progressives portray themselves and the level to which they are actually willing to take action to address the social problems they decry. It is easy to performatively declare that Black lives matter and that racism is bad, but it is seemingly much harder for them to acknowledge that they have personally benefited from racist policies that have disadvantaged Black Americans, and in turn, must take steps to rectify that injustice. Therefore, the root of the local and national dispute regarding reparations does not truly concern whether or not America should pay for the sins of its past, but rather whether or not Americans possess the sufficient courage to assume their obligation to grant Black Americans the restitution they deserve.
As such, it’s time for White progressives to start bridging the gap between their fervent rhetoric on racial equality and their stagnant inaction on reparations policy implementation in order to reduce racial disparities in generational wealth that still impact Black Americans today. By financing Black reparations, the federal government has the opportunity to diminish the persistent economic disadvantages that African Americans face as a direct result of slavery and subsequent racially discriminatory legislation imposed by the United States government.
White Americans should not regard reparations as a source of guilt, but instead as an opportunity to provide Black Americans with restitution for not only the unparalleled cruelty that their ancestors endured, but also for the continued social, political, and economic restrictions that slavery has brought upon them and their descendants. Without any form of reparations, America will never even begin to truly repay the tremendous debt it owes to its Black citizens for centuries of devastation and exploitation.
