Earlier This Week at Occupy Boston

by Benjamin T. Greenberg on 14. Oct, 2011 in boston, civil liberties, class and poverty, friends, local politics, massachusetts, photo, photography, slideshow, video

On Monday evening, I got a call from my friend Jesse who had been down at Occupy Boston earlier in the day. Mayor Menino and Boston Police were telling the protestors that they could not stay at the second camp they’d started a block away from the original Dewy Square site, on the Rose Kennedy Greenway; the protestors had till midnight to leave the second site at Atlantic Avenue and Pearl Street or they’d be forcibly removed and arrested. Jesse asked me if I’d go there with him to be unofficial observers and document the goings on should the police take action against the protestors. I’d been wanting to visit Occupy Boston to learn more about it firsthand, and this seemed important to do, so I said yes.

Jesse shot stills with his SLR, and though I brought one, too, I focused on posting in real time via Instagram and Justin.tv. But before I highlight any of that material, I want to direct you to this great 10 minute documentary about Monday night, by Michael Gill.

Gill captured many moments that I also witnessed and shows what it was like there very well. My iPhone video streams are much lower quality and, of course, unedited, but at various times I was broadcasting live to over 3000 viewers, after the police had made most official media leave the scene, so they served a function. One thing not shown in Gill’s film was how, after the camp was cleared of protestors, police and sanitation workers disposed of all items remaining—tents, sleeping bags, bedrolls, signs, chairs, supplies—in two sanitation trucks. Here’s some footage:


Watch live video from minorjive on Justin.tv

Here’s a small slideshow of scenes I captured with the the camer on my phone.

More information about night of October 10 and early morning hours of October 11 at Occupy Boston:

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Cold Case Reporting

by Benjamin T. Greenberg on 24. Sep, 2011 in alabama, civil rights cold case project, civil rights movement, clifton walker case, family, hungry blues, mississippi, photo, race and racism, southwest ms

I started this blog in 2004 to write about things like this photo of my father and James Baldwin in Birmingham, AL in 1963 at the height of the Civil Rights Movement.

James Baldwin and my father, Paul Greenberg, at the AG Gaston Motel, Birmingham, Alabama, August 4, 1963. (Photo credit: Robert Adamenko)

James Baldwin and my father, Paul Greenberg, at the AG Gaston Motel, Birmingham, Alabama, August 4, 1963. (Photo credit: Robert Adamenko)

In time, however, blogging led to investigative journalism about unpunished lynchings and other violence from the civil rights era.

In the summer of 2007, I returned to Mississippi to look into violence that had taken place near Woodville in the southwest part of the state. After I interviewed an NAACP official, a black woman in her early 70′s who owned a shop in the town center stopped me on the street. “You a reporter?” she asked. Before long, she and her husband were sharing stories of violence against blacks in Woodville in the ’50′s and ’60′s. They asked if I had ever heard of Man Walker whose given first name was Clifford or Clifton. He was shot in his car on Poor House Road and they thought his children lived nearby in Louisiana.

Since I was on my way to Hattiesburg to do research in the McCain Archives at the University of Southern Mississippi, I couldn’t stick around to learn more. Yet at the archives, I found a number of Mississippi Highway and Safety Patrol reports on the Clifton Walker case. The reports were riveting. I had to investigate.

I’ve located a number of Walker’s family members and have been working closely with three of his children since 2008. One daughter, Catherine, has joined me in questioning those with possible involvement in her father’s murder. On one occasion there was a surprising moment of reconciliation between Catherine and a member of a white Woodville family. Walker’s murder had allegedly been planned at this family’s truck stop, and at the end of the interview with the elderly business owner and his daughter, Walker and the other daughter hugged. Catherine had not expected to meet whites from Woodville willing to talk about the murder. This small but significant step toward the closure that she and her siblings need gave us a taste of what might be possible for her family and for this small backwoods Mississippi community that is still largely committed to silence and to protecting murderers.

I tell this story in the Fall 2011 issue of Nieman Reports, which is devoted to cold case reporting. The issue also includes stories by my colleagues from the Civil Rights Cold Case Project:

The issue also includes stories by Simeon Booker, Bill Minor and Jan Gardner.

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HONK! Photo Exhibit in Davis Square

by Benjamin T. Greenberg on 05. Sep, 2011 in boston, Music, photo, photography

I’m honored to again be one of the photographers exhibiting photos of the HONK! Festival at the Inside/Out Gallery, in the windows outside the Davis Square CVS in Somerville, MA. The photos are on display now through the first weekend in October when the 6th Annual HONK! Festival of activist street bands comes to Somerville and Cambridge. Below are three of the photos I have on display, along with photos by Jesse Edsel-Vetter, Greg Cook, Chirs Yeager and Mike Dannenhauer. Stop by and see our photos, if you come through Davis Square. Visit honkfest.org for a full schedule of events and more information about the festival and bands.

Rude Mechanical Orchestra at HONK! 2010 in Davis Sqaure (Ben Greenberg)

Rude Mechanical Orchestra at HONK! 2010 in Davis Sqaure (Ben Greenberg)

DJA-Rara at HONK! 2010 in Harvard Square (Ben Greenberg)

DJA-Rara at HONK! 2010 in Harvard Square (Ben Greenberg)

Extraordinary Rendition Band at HONK! 2010 in the Somerville Theatre (Ben Greenberg)

Extraordinary Rendition Band at HONK! 2010 in the Somerville Theatre (Ben Greenberg)

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Why Won’t the Justice Department Reopen the Malcolm X Murder Case?

by Benjamin T. Greenberg on 24. Jul, 2011 in breaking news, civil rights cold case project, civil rights movement, new york, race and racism, Weblogs

New York Times reporter Shaila Dewan blogged yesterday that the Justice Department has declined to reopen the Malcolm X murder case.

“Although the Justice Department recognizes that the murder of Malcolm X was a tragedy, both for his family and for the community he served, we have determined that at this time, the matter does not implicate federal interests sufficient to necessitate the use of scarce federal investigative resources into a matter for which there can be no federal criminal prosecution,” the department said.

This was follow up to her reporting in the Times on new attention to the Malcolm X case and new calls to investigate on the heels of the late Manning Marable’s recent biography of Malcolm X and in light of the successful prosecutions of  decades old civil rights murder cases in the South.

I’ll explain why I think the funding issue is a bit of red herring in a minute. The more important question, which Dewan raises, is why isn’t the Justice Department taking up the murder of Malcolm X under the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crimes Act of 2008? “The department, without elaborating, said the crime did not fit the parameters of that act,” Dewan reports.

If the Till Act is applied to the Malcolm X case, jurisdiction and funding would not be concerns. A House Judiciary Committee report (PDF) found that though federal prosecution may not be possible in many of the civil rights era crimes addressed by the Act,

Concurrent federal jurisdiction is necessary only to permit joint state-federal investigations and to authorize federal prosecution in those instances in which state and local officials are either unable or unwilling to pursue cases that adequately address the federal interest in fighting bias crime.

This Committee nevertheless expects the federal government to still play a vital role in these prosecutions. First, in terms of investigations, in 2006 the FBI began a comprehensive effort to identify and investigate racially-motivated murders committed during the 1950s and 1960s. The FBI has already started to accumulate information from outside organizations and to follow those leads. We expect this initiative to continue and to expand….

in terms of resources, the federal government has the resources and expertise to provide valuable assistance to state and local entities pursuing state prosecutions. In the Emmett Till case, although no federal jurisdiction was present, the Department conducted an investigation into a local matter because Till had traveled from out-of-state into the state in which he was murdered. The FBI reported the results of its extensive investigation to the District Attorney for Greenville, Mississippi. We expect such cooperation and assistance to continue and to expand into other scenarios. While maintaining the primary role of state and local governments in the investigation and prosecution of violent hate crimes, the bill would authorize the federal government to work in partnership with state and local law enforcement officials and to serve an important backstop function with regard to a wider range of hate-motivated violence than federal law currently permits. (Emphasis added)

Furthermore, FBI spokesperson Christopher Allen has insisted to me in an email that “No case” taken up under the Till Act or the FBI Cold Case Initiative “has suffered as a result of lack of funding.”

So if under the Till Act, the FBI is mandated to assist in investigations even where there is no federal jurisdiction, and there is no funding obstacle to federal involvement, then the real question is why won’t the Department of Justice consider the Malcolm X murder under the Till Act?

For one, it is not clear if the killing could be considered a civil rights crime because both the perpetrators and the victims are black.

[Historian David] Garrow said the definition of a civil rights crime should not be too narrow. “When a major civil rights leader is assassinated, I’d like the civil rights division to be interested, regardless of the color of the gunman,” he said, referring to the federal unit.

Some experts say the Justice Department’s participation is crucial because the F.B.I. and the New York Police Department had Malcolm X under surveillance at the time of his death, raising questions about whether law enforcement officials had knowledge beforehand of the assassination plot.

It would be a shame if the color of the gunmen became a convenient cover for not examining possible failures of law enforcement to stop a crime officials may have had foreknowledge of; it would also be a shame if avoiding a full investigation allowed a known, alleged perpetrator who currently lives free to evade prosecution.

Here also are two of the thornier obstacles to resolving any number of civil rights era cold cases: black involvement in and government responsibility—direct or indirect—for the crimes. Though the approach to these issues in southern cases has largely been inadequate, it may yet be more palatable to many to consider involvement of blacks who were more widely subject  to subtle and overt forms of coercion in the South and to call up stereotypes of racist southern law enforcement and lawmakers who participated in and/or fomented and supported Klan violence.

The Till Act is meant to address the very problem that most of the cases it covers were never fully investigated at the time they occurred.

David Garrow, a historian and a King biographer, obtained and reviewed the Federal Bureau of Investigation files on Malcolm X in the 1990s. He said it was probable that reams of wiretaps of the Nation of Islam had never been combed for clues. In 1980, the bureau said it had never investigated the assassination.

Without a full investigation, justice will not be done and the truth cannot be known.

(Cross-posted on Colorlines.)

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47th Annual Mississippi Civil Rights Martyrs Memorial Service, Conference and Caravan

by Benjamin T. Greenberg on 18. Jun, 2011 in civil rights movement, friends, mississippi, neshoba murders, photo, race and racism

Civil Rights Movement leader Diane Nash speaks on the steps of the Neshoba County Courthouse, Philadelphia, MS, June 23, 2007, at the 43rd annual Mississippi Civil Rights Martyrs Memorial Service, Conference and Caravan. (Photo by Ben Greenberg)

Civil Rights Movement leader Diane Nash speaks on the steps of the Neshoba County Courthouse, Philadelphia, MS, June 23, 2007, at the 43rd annual Mississippi Civil Rights Martyrs Memorial Service, Conference and Caravan. (Photo by Ben Greenberg)

Today and tomorrow in Neshoba County, MS is the annual memorial for James Chaney, Michael Schewerner, Andrew Goodman, and all civil rights era racial murder victims. I first attended in 2005. It is an important, meaningful event that is also an opportunity to meet and listen to famous Civil Rights Movement veterans and many unsung heroes of racial justice.

There’s an announcement with details posted on the Veterans of the Civil Rights Movement website. Attached is a more recent and detailed press release (PDF) sent to me by the organizers. The event is free and open to the public.

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Alabama Senate Apologizes to Recy Taylor for 1944 Rape Case

by Benjamin T. Greenberg on 22. Apr, 2011 in alabama, breaking news, civil rights cold case project, civil rights movement, race and racism, violence against women, women and feminism

The Alabama Senate joined the state House yesterday in passing a resolution for an official state apology to Recy Taylor, 91, who was raped by seven white men in Abbeville, Ala., in 1944. According to the AP:

The Senate gave final approval Thursday on a voice vote to a resolution that expresses “deepest sympathy and deepest regrets” to Recy Taylor, now 91 and living in Florida. She told The Associated Press last year that she believes the men who attacked her in 1944 are dead but that she still wanted an apology from the state of Alabama.

The House approved the resolution last month. It now goes to Gov. Robert Bentley, who said Thursday he’s not personally familiar with details of the case, but sees no reason why he wouldn’t sign it.

Taylor’s case has for decades lingered as an icon of the sexual violence black women suffered from white men in the South. At the time, her case became a rallying point for a movement to end impunity for that violence. Today, federal law enforcement officials have reopened dozens of civil rights era murders, but have not revisited the rapes and sexual assaults that went un-prosecuted.

Taylor, who now lives in Florida, is not well enough to be interviewed, but I spoke to her brother Robert Corbitt, who has been her spokesperson since The Root first reported in February that Taylor wants apologies from the state and from the county and city where the rape occurred and was covered up. Corbitt is currently a resident of Abbeville.

“I’m glad to know that it’s gone that far,” Corbitt said. “I’m waiting for the ink to dry and then I’ll feel like it’s official.”

Recent public interest in Taylor’s case has followed the September 2010 publication of Danielle McGuire’s book, “At the Dark End of the Street: Black Women, Rape, and Resistance,” which tells Taylor’s story. AChange.org petition drive and coverage by Colorlines and others has spurred Rep. Dexter Grimsley and other Alabama officials to respond swiftly to Taylor’s request for formal apologies.

A month ago, Corbitt attended a press conference held by Abbeville Mayor Ryan Blalock with Grimsley and other city and county officials, who offered personal apologies to Taylor and discussed issuing official state, county and city apologies.

“Our representative [Grimsley] said from the beginning that he was going to push it hard; he kept his word,” said Corbitt. “I’m still waiting for the mayor to do whatever he’s gonna do.”

County and city apologies are also in order, Cobitt explained, because in 1944, in the face of a state investigation, the Henry County sheriff and an Abbeville policeman took part in covering up the rape.

Corbitt hasn’t heard from Blalock or any other local officials since the press conference last month. “A personal apology and a official one is two different things,” said Corbitt.

(Cross-posted at Colorlines.)

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Alabama House Approves Apology for Recy Taylor

by Benjamin T. Greenberg on 30. Mar, 2011 in alabama, breaking news, civil rights movement, race and racism, violence against women, women and feminism

The Alabama House made an historic move Tuesday evening towards a state apology to Recy Taylor, 91, who was gang raped by 7 white men in Abbeville, Ala., in 1944. The AP reports:

The House on Tuesday approved by an apparent unanimous voice vote a resolution that expresses “deepest sympathies and solemn regrets” to Recy Taylor….

Her 74-year-old brother, Robert Corbitt, who still lives in Abbeville, said he was happy his sister was finally going to get what she wanted — an apology.

The strongly worded resolution said the failure of Alabama law enforcement and the court system to prosecute the crimes “was, and is “morally abhorrent and repugnant.”

It was introduced by freshman Rep. Dexter Grimsley, D-Newville. It now goes to the Senate, where Democratic Sen. Billy Beasley, D-Clayton, who also represents Abbeville, said he expects it to pass.

“The most important thing is to say we are sorry and we hope you are doing well. … It’s important we move on in Alabama,” Beasley said.

Grimsley’s resolution was spurred by revelations of Taylor’s story by Danielle McGuire in her book “At Dark End of the Street: Black Women, Rape and Resistance,” published last fall, and by a Change.org petition to Alabama officials, launched in February after The Root’s Cynthia Gordy reported that Taylor, now living in Florida, and her brother wanted the state of Alabama and the city Abbeville to apologize for officials’ inaction and obstruction of justice. After Colorlines broke the news earlier this month that Grimsley was planning to introduce a resolution, signatures skyrocketed on the petition. Grimsley, Abbeville Mayor Ryan Blalock and other local officials held a press conference, where they made personal apologies to Taylor and declared that formal apologies were on the way.

Taylor’s case has for decades lingered as an icon of the sexual violence black women suffered from white men in the South. At the time, her case became a rallying point for a movement to end impunity for that violence. Today, federal law enforcement officials have reopened dozens of civil rights era murders, but have not revisited the rapes and sexual assaults that went un-prosecuted.

Grimsley’s resolution reads in part (scroll down for full text):

WHEREAS, this deplorable lack of justice remains a shame for all Alabamians; now therefore,

BE IT RESOLVED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF ALABAMA, BOTH HOUSES THEREOF CONCURRING, That we acknowledge the lack of prosecution for crimes committed against Recy Taylor by the government of the State of Alabama, that we declare such failure to act was, and is, morally abhorrent and repugnant, and that we do hereby express profound regret for the role played by the government of the State of Alabama in failing to prosecute the crimes.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, That we express our deepest sympathies and solemn regrets to Recy Taylor and her family and friends.

Grimsley “now vows to take the official House resolution to her Florida doorstep,” according to Change.org’s Alex DiBranco.

“I’m excited for the family,” Grimsley told Change.org following the vote. “I’m excited that I could have the resolution introduced and at least get it through the House, that I had the opportunity to do something for a resident of my district and a former resident of my district.”

“It’s not ‘justice,’ but a big step and all she’s asked for,” The Root’s Gordy tweeted this morning. I concur—though it’s not quite all Recy Taylor has asked for. There is still no news regarding an official apology from the city of Abbeville or from Henry County.

*This article has been altered since publication.

(Cross-posted at Colorlines.)

FULL TEXT OF HOUSE RESOLUTION (download as PDF)

EXPRESSING REGRET FOR THE STATE OF ALABAMA’S INVOLVEMENT IN THE FAILURE TO PROSECUTE CRIMES COMMITTED AGAINST RECY TAYLOR.

WHEREAS, on September 3, 1944, in the small Town of Abbeville, Alabama, Recy Taylor, a young Black mother was walking home from church with her companions when she was confronted by a car of seven white men; the men forced Ms. Taylor into the car at knife and gunpoint, drove off, and six of the seven men brutally raped her in a deserted grove of pine trees; and

WHEREAS, Taylor’s younger brother, Robert Corbitt, of Abbeville, said he remembers the day his sister was raped 67 years ago like it was yesterday, saying the police tried to blame his sister, and the family was harassed so that he was not allowed to play in the front yard; and

WHEREAS, an all white, all male grand jury failed to bring any charges for indictment; and then Governor Chauncey Sparks ordered a second investigation, and the grand jury again failed to indict; and

WHEREAS, the case got the attention of NAACP activist Rosa Parks, who interviewed Taylor in 1944 in Abbeville and later recruited other activists to create the “Alabama Committee for Equal Justice for Mrs. Recy Taylor”; and

WHEREAS, in an interview last year with the AP, Recy Taylor, who now resides in Florida, said she eventually gave up trying to bring charges against the men; and

WHEREAS, this deplorable lack of justice remains a source of shame for all Alabamians; now therefore,

BE IT RESOLVED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF ALABAMA, BOTH HOUSES THEREOF CONCURRING, That we acknowledge the lack of prosecution for crimes committed against Recy Taylor by the government of the State of Alabama, that we declare such failure to act was, and is, morally abhorrent and repugnant, and that we do hereby express profound regret for the role played by the government of the State of Alabama in failing to prosecute the crimes.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, That we express our deepest sympathies and solemn regrets to Recy Taylor and her family and friends.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, That it is the specific intent of the Legislature that reparations shall not be considered or made regarding past actions of the government of the State of Alabama concerning the lack of prosecution of the crimes committed against Recy Taylor, and that this resolution shall not be used or construed in any manner whatsoever as support for such reparations.

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Recy Taylor Gets a Personal Sorry, But No Apology From Alabama

by Benjamin T. Greenberg on 22. Mar, 2011 in alabama, breaking news, civil rights cold case project, civil rights movement, race and racism, take action, violence against women, women and feminism

Recy Taylor, 91, in her home in Winter Haven, Fla., in October 2010. AP Photo/Phelan M. Ebenhack, File

Recy Taylor, 91, in her home in Winter Haven, Fla., in October 2010. AP Photo/Phelan M. Ebenhack, File

Yesterday, Abbeville city and Alabama state officials held a press conference at the Henry County Courthouse to express their sympathy for Recy Taylor, 91, a former Abbeville resident who was gang raped there by seven white men in 1944. But the officials made clear the apologies were personal rather than on behalf of the city or state. That leaves Taylor and her family still awaiting some modicum of justice for an assault that, then and now, has become a symbol for untold numbers of rapes southern black women suffered throughout the Jim Crow era.

Last week, I reported for Colorlines on a building effort, led by Taylor’s family, to win an apology for the failure to meaningfully investigate and prosecute her assailants.

Local TV station WTVY reports on Monday’s press conference:

Public officials are now giving the victim and her family personal apologies for the events of that era.

“I open my heart up and say that I am deeply sorry for what happened,” says AL Representative Dexter Grimsley.

“Anytime one of our residents whether past or present feels pain or feels victimized we certainly want to offer that apology,” says Abbeville Mayor Ryan Blalock.

Following the press conference, Taylor’s brother Robert Corbitt told me by phone, “While I’m pleased with the mayor’s apology, it’s nothing official. We were looking for an official one from the city, the state and the county.”

“I did hear the representative say he was gonna get a resolution in to the state,” Corbitt said, “but I never heard the mayor say that he was going to present it to the city council. He just said it must come from the city council. He never said anything about when he was gonna do it.”

State and city governments are often reluctant to issue official apologies for past injustices for fear that it will leave them vulnerable to civil suits.

Rep. Grimsley reaffirmed Monday his intent to introduce a House resolution calling for a state apology to Recy Taylor “before the session is out.” The current legislative session started March 1 and goes about another six weeks, Grimsley said.

Recent overtures by city and state government officials towards Recy Taylor and her family follow mounting public interest in Taylor’s case, starting with the September 2010 publication of Danielle McGuire’s book, “At the Dark End of the Street: Black Women, Rape, and Resistance,” which tells Taylor’s story.

Recy Taylor and Robert Corbitt first publicly conveyed their wishes for city and state apologies in a Feb. 9 article about Taylor by Cynthia Gordy in The Root. On Feb. 16, after reading Gordy’s article, Change.org editor Alex DiBranco launched a petition asking Alabama government officials for city and state apologies to Taylor. Corbitt has since put the petition under his name.

After 12 days, the Change.org petition gathered 1,000 signatures. When Colorlines broke the news on March 16 that Grimsley is planning to introduce a resolution for a state apology, the petition was up to 2,100 signatures. Signatures more than doubled in the first 24 hours after the Colorlines article and additional coverage by the AP and the Root. At this writing, the petition has more than 7,100 signatures.

Grimsley has told the AP that he became interested in Taylor’s case partly because of the Change.org petition.

(Cross-posted at Colorlines.)

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Possible Apology to Recy Taylor for Obstruction of Justice in Racist Gang Rape

by Benjamin T. Greenberg on 20. Mar, 2011 in alabama, breaking news, civil rights cold case project, civil rights movement, race and racism, violence against women, women and feminism

The Update

This morning in an op-ed at the Anniston Star, I reported that an apology to Recy Taylor may be forthcoming soon from the city of Abbeville and Henry County, AL.

Last Wednesday, I reported for Colorlines.com that state Rep. Dexter Grimsley, D-Newville, wants Alabama to issue a formal state apology to Recy Taylor, 91, who was abducted and raped at gunpoint by seven white men in Abbeville on Sept. 3, 1944.

“The circumstances merit it,” Grimsley said recently. “It’s something that should be done. Recy Taylor found herself in a situation that wasn’t responded to, the way that the law would respond to something today.”

Now it appears that an apology from Henry County and the southeast Alabama city of Abbeville may come as soon as Monday, but it is unclear whether the state will take part. In a follow-up interview last Thursday, Rep. Grimsley said he would hold a press conference with Abbeville Mayor Ryan Blalock and County Commission Chairman Joanne Smith and “present a formal letter to the family.”

Asked if the apology would also be on behalf of the state, Grimsley said, “We haven’t addressed that level yet.”

Recy Taylor in her Florida home (AP Photo/Phelan M. Ebenhack)

Henry County Public Information Officer Chad Sowell has told me on the phone that there will be a press conference tomorrow, Monday, March 21, 10:30 am Central Time, at the Henry County Courthouse.

Officials scheduled to be there are Alabama State House Representative Dexter Grimsley, Mayor Ryan Blalock and members of the Abbeville City Council.

Whether an apology will be issued to Recy Taylor tomorrow has not been verified. Abbeville Mayor Ryan Blalock and Alabama Representative Dexter Grimsley have asked Recy Taylor’s brother Robert Corbitt to attend the press conference, and he has told me that he plans to be there.

Margaret Burnham stated the importance of an apology.

“Clearly there should be an apology from the state here as well as the county,” said Professor Margaret Burnham, director of the Civil Rights and Restorative Justice Program at Northeastern University School of Law. “Each failed to pursue the investigation aggressively and promptly, and more generally afforded utter impunity to white men who raped black women. Such a statement would not only honor Recy Taylor and her family for their courage and tenacity in seeking justice, but it would speak to scores of victims who similarly suffered in silence.”

Other Questions

Even if Recy Taylor gets her due from Alabama officials, many questions remain about how countless other cases of decades old racially motivated rapes will be addressed. There are some states where the FBI could play a role.

The FBI’s role

Though Alabama and five other Southern states have no statute of limitations on rape, only civil rights-era homicides of African Americans — mostly of men — have commanded the official attention of the FBI and other federal and state officials.

The six Southern, formerly segregated states with no statute of limitations on the crime of rape are: Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina and South Carolina.

Yet, local police and county sheriffs rarely have the staff or the budgets to conduct such investigations. Further, officials in small communities may lack motivation because they would be investigating their own relatives or the politically powerful.

When it comes to decades-old racially motivated deaths, the FBI can investigate cases even when there is no federal jurisdiction. The Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crimes Act of 2008 directs the FBI to investigate and do community outreach with the express purpose of supporting or encouraging state and local action.

Asked if the FBI could play a similar role in addressing decades-old racially motivated rapes, FBI spokesman Christopher Allen said, “The public is always welcome to report an allegation of a crime to their local FBI office, where it will be reviewed to determine if a federal violation exists.”

No special consideration would be made. “We would handle [it] as we do every other allegation of a crime: on its own merits,” Allen said.

Testimony of black women

In an e-mail interview, Professor McGuire says her research “covers about 64 cases of white on black rape from 1940 to 1975 and is not exhaustive in any way.

“I found black women’s testimonies of sexual violence everywhere I looked.”

Does Professor Burnham think the Department of Justice ought to address civil-rights era, racially motivated rapes in states like Alabama?

“The Emmett Till Act itself only covers murders,” Burnham said. “But the animating spirit of the act is to encourage law enforcement and courts to redress the racial wrongs that locked black crime victims out of the justice system during the mid-20th century. Certainly, if opportunities for prosecution remain open, the Justice Department should play a role.”

(Cross-posted at the Civil Rights Cold Case Project)

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Recy Taylor’s 67 Year Quest for Justice

by Benjamin T. Greenberg on 16. Mar, 2011 in alabama, breaking news, civil rights cold case project, civil rights movement, human rights, race and racism, women and feminism

Recy Taylor, Willie Guy Taylor, and their child, Joyce Lee Taylor (Courtesy of the Chicago Defender)

My latest is out on Colorlines. Here’s an excerpt:

At 91, Recy Taylor May Finally See Alabama Acknowledge Her 1944 Rape

Recy Taylor was abducted and raped at gunpoint by seven white men in Abbeville, Ala., on Sept. 3, 1944. Her attack, one of uncounted numbers on black women throughout the Jim Crow era in the South, sparked a national movement for justice and an international outcry, but justice never came. Now, decades later, there may finally be some solace for Taylor, 91, as Alabama state Rep. Dexter Grimsley tries to make his state issue a formal apology.

Reached by phone on Monday, Grimsley confirmed he is drafting a resolution for a state apology to Taylor. “The circumstances merit it,” he said. “It’s something that should be done. Recy Taylor found herself in a situation that wasn’t responded to, the way that the law would respond to something today.”

The FBI is currently investigating dozens of civil rights-era murders, mostly of men. But the sexual violence visited upon women like Taylor has never commanded the official attention of the FBI and other federal and state officials who have tried to right the crimes of our past.

“From slavery through the better part of the 20th century, white men in the segregated South abducted and assaulted black women with alarming regularity and often impunity,” explained historian Danielle McGuire, whose new book “At the Dark End of the Street: Black Women, Rape, and Resistance” was the first history of white-on-black sexual violence and black women’s organized resistance to it. “They lured black women and girls away from home with promises of work and steady wages; attacked them on the job; abducted them at gunpoint while traveling to or from home, work, church or school; and sexually harassed them at bus stops, grocery stores and in other public spaces.”

New awareness of Taylor’s case, and of the pervasiveness of many more cases like it, has begun attracting new bands of supporters who want justice for past crimes of sexual violence against black women—from members of an online social network for social change, to the NAACP Alabama State Conference, to a black lawyers’ association in Michigan, to individual letter writers and callers from all over the country who have contacted Taylor’s family.

(Read the rest at Colorlines.)

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We Interrupt Our Regularly Scheduled Support for Wisconsin Because Detroit is Burning

by Benjamin T. Greenberg on 21. Feb, 2011 in breaking news, children, civil rights, class and poverty, economic policy, education, family, human rights, labor movement, race and racism

If you’re following me on Twitter or Tumblr, you know that I’ve been heavily preoccupied with the situation in Wisconsin.

So much is at stake for Wisconsin and the country, and the labor movement legacy runs deep in my veins.

But I’d like everyone to take their eyes off Wisconsin for long enough to take in what is happening to Detroit, Michigan.

(AP) DETROIT – State education officials have ordered the emergency financial manager for Detroit Public Schools to immediately implement a plan that balances the district’s books by closing half its schools. The Detroit News says the financial restructuring plan will increase high school class sizes to 60 students and consolidate operations.

I haven’t been watching the situation in Detroit closely enough to understand the ins and outs of the underlying politics, but this simply cannot be justified. Half the schools? 60 student high school classes? I don’t see how one can even call this policy.

The crisis in Detroit has captured the attention of the White House, but rather than devise an immediate response to effect some semblance of stability for Detroit’s young people (not to mention for the untold number of teachers and staff who will presumably lose their jobs), US Secretary of Education Arne Duncan has declared that Detroit’s best hope is to compete with other districts for a new round of so-called “Race to the Top” funds.

President Barack Obama and Duncan are pushing for a third round of his hallmark Race to the Top competition, outlined last Monday in the president’s budget proposal.

Unlike the first two rounds in which states competed for federal dollars based on education reforms (Michigan lost in both rounds), the proposed $900 million third round would be targeted directly at school districts.

“It would be a huge, huge, huge opportunity for Detroit,” Duncan said. “We would love to see them put forward a fantastic application. Nothing would please me more.”

DPS, steeped in a more than $300 million deficit, wants to compete.

“Detroit Public Schools would look forward to an opportunity to apply for and win Race to the Top funds if another round is approved by Congress,” DPS spokesman Steve Wasko said in an e-mail….

“The district has made real progress,” Duncan said. “(But) the district frankly has an extraordinarily far way to go. If you look at some of the results from different cities around the country, Detroit’s at the bottom in a lot of the results. So the work is nowhere near done.”

Added Duncan: “I would love to see Detroit leapfrog other districts in five years from now (and) be in a very, very different place than it is today.

The students of Detroit don’t have time for Duncan’s unproven, destructive notions of education “reform.” In five years the remaining public schools in Detroit will be nothing better than holding pens for young people who have been deprived of their right to education.

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Breaking: Grand Jury Begins Hearing Testimony in Frank Morris Murder Case

by Benjamin T. Greenberg on 09. Feb, 2011 in breaking news, civil rights cold case project, frank morris case, friends, louisiana, race and racism

Today Stanley Nelson reports:

The Concordia Parish Grand Jury began hearing testimony Tuesday concerning the 1964 murder of Ferriday shoe shop owner Frank Morris.

Witnesses were seen entering the courthouse to appear before the panel which is looking into the 46-year-old murder.

Neither federal nor local authorities would comment on the Grand Jury.

The U.S. Attorney’s office in Louisiana’s Western District announced in 2009 that the Concordia Parish District Attorney’s Office would become involved in the Morris investigation. At that time, former U.S. Attorney Donald Washington of Lafayette said the probe would eventually include the appointment of a federal attorney as an assistant district attorney in Concordia.

The Sentinel has learned that a DOJ attorney appeared before the Grand Jury on Tuesday.

Morris, 51, an African-American, died Dec. 14, 1964, four days after his shoe shop was torched by at least two men. Before he died, Morris told authorities that he saw two men outside the shop on the night of the arson. He said one had a shotgun, the other a gasoline can. He also said he glimpsed another man and a car in the alley beside his shop.

Morris said the man with the shotgun prevented his exit from the front of the shop while the man with the gasoline can ignited the shoe shop with what appeared to be a match.

It was Stanley’s reporting that first revealed there is a living suspect in this case.

Read More

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Lolita’s Family Photos

by Benjamin T. Greenberg on 05. Feb, 2011 in boston, friends, katrina, louisiana, massachusetts, MS Gulf Coast, nola, photo, photography, race and racism, video

Check out this video about my friend Lolita’s quest for her family photographs.

(DDFRtv visits Lolita Parker Jr @ Boston from Digital Diaspora Family Reunion on Vimeo.)

What the video does not fully explain is that Lolita is herself a professional photographer. Though we’re both from Boston, I met Lolita in Turkey Creek, MS at Derrick Evans’ place in January 2006 (see previous post). It is therefore especially moving at the end of this video when Lolita unexpectedly brings up being in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. When I interviewed Katrina survivors in Mississippi (PDF), back when I met Lolita in 2006, lost and damaged photos were a common theme.

I owe a lot to Lolita, who recently reminded me that it was five years ago in last month that we met. From her prodding me to put my then never-exhibited photos in a show she was curating, to her thrusting her camera into my hand and sending me into the crowd at Wally’s to shoot, to her stories about how photos of hers came about, to our long conversations about family and history—she’s been an important friend and teacher.

This photo, of a family diptych found on the foundation slab of a house obliterated by Hurricane Katrina in Bay St. Louis, MS, was one of the ones that Lolita insisted I include in her show back in 2006.

DSCN0714 by minorjive

Photo by Ben Greenberg

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Save the Blacks

by Benjamin T. Greenberg on 25. Jan, 2011 in environmental justice, katrina, mississippi, MS Gulf Coast, photo, race and racism, video

This is brilliant coverage of the fight of Turkey Creek, Mississippi African Americans to save their community. Turkey Creek was founded by freed slaves in 1866. Their descendants have been fighting dispossession by developers and environmental racism for years. I interviewed Wyatt Cenac’s guide, Derrick Evans, in January 2006, 6 months after Hurricane Katrina devastated his community with little-reported inland flooding and heavy winds. Derrick is a tireless advocate on behalf of his community and on behalf of the Gulf Coast region.

Derrick Evans and journalist Jonathan Tilove outside Mt. Pleasant United Methodist Church, Rippy Road, Turkey Creek, MS. (Photo by Ben Greenberg)

Derrick Evans and journalist Jonathan Tilove outside Mt. Pleasant United Methodist Church, Rippy Road, Turkey Creek, MS. (Photo by Ben Greenberg)

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Charter Schools: What Would Dr. King Say?

by Benjamin T. Greenberg on 17. Jan, 2011 in civil rights, class and poverty, economic policy, race and racism

As we mark another day of commemoration for the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., we may wonder what Dr. King would make of our current state of educational affairs, wherein education is declared by reformers, with no apparent irony, as the civil rights issue for a generation of children whose schools are more segregated by race and class than those of 30 years ago. We can only guess how he might respond to business and political leaders who offer segregated total-compliance schools run by corporations as the only other choice for parents who desperately want something more than the malignantly neglected public schools that have recently had the remaining trust and human caring squeezed out of them under the weight of test-and-punish reforms. Indeed, we may wonder what Dr. King would say to those federal officials and corporate foundation heads who view children principally for the future capital they will generate to maintain a corrupted anti-worker political economy and corporate welfare system that threaten to undermine democracy, equal opportunity and free enterprise itself….

In the coming years, if corporate foundations like Gates, Broad, Fisher and Walton, along with the political establishment whose favor they curry, would put as much economic and ideological weight behind rebuilding a stronger and more equitable public system of schools, rather than tearing down a system that took almost 200 years to create, then the ideals of American democracy would have a much better chance to survive these difficult times and, perhaps, one day flourish in ways we have yet to witness. I believe Dr. King would agree.

(Jim Horn, Charter Schools: What Would Dr. King Say?)

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