My latest is now out in The American Prospect online (free registration required), in many ways a companion piece to my previous blog post.
For the last eight days in Jackson, Mississippi, reputed Ku Klux Klan member James Ford Seale has sat, mostly silent, in the James O. Eastland U.S. Courthouse. Seale has been watching the parade of witnesses take the stand -- his former daughter-in-law, his pastor, a fellow Klansman, FBI agents, a retired Navy diver, an elderly church deacon, a small town newspaper publisher -- to testify about his involvement in the 1964 murders of Henry Hezekiah Dee and Charles Eddie Moore, two 19-year-old black men from southwest Mississippi.
The horrific deaths of the two young men, and their families' years of suffering without remediation, illustrate why it is so important for perpetrators to be brought to justice, even decades after the crime was committed. "I've had nightmares every night for 43 years," Charles Moore's older brother Thomas told me in April. The Dee-Moore murders also raise questions about government complicity in Civil Rights era crimes -- and whether case-by-case prosecutions are an adequate response.
Read the rest at TAP.
In doing this article, I had the great honor of interviewing Diane Nash, Ben Chaney, John Steele, John Dorsey Due, Jr., Alvin Sykes, Kenneth O'Reilly and Congressman Kendrick Meek. Stay tuned for some of the outtakes, audio and text. There was some great stuff that was beyond the scope of the article or had to be cut because of space considerations.
UPDATE (via David Ridgen):
James Ford Seale was found GUILTY on all three counts of kidnapping at 6:30 pm (Central Time) this evening. The jury deliberated for under three hours. Sentencing in August. Each count carries a life sentence.
More in the news.
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Justice will not be denied for long. It may be stomped and crushed into the ground, but, it will triumph against all who try and destroy it.
So many black women and men who have been murdered just for desiring the most basic of human rights. So many whose bodies lie mute in some unmarked grave, testament to a countries depravity and atrocities to deny the humanity of its citizens.
“Diane Nash, Ben Chaney…”
I envy you. To be able to meet these profoundly wonderful people, women and men who made a change through love, patience and belief in this country, this country which sought to tear them to pieces. But, in the end, the many known, and unknown, Diane Nashes and Ben Chaneys prevailed and would not give up no matter what the cost.
Right and justice sometimes take long to arrive. It may take a lifetime, many times it never comes, but, the few times that justice does come, it rolls down like a mighty stream and is welcomed for the quenching water of hope that it brings.
Peace.
With all due respect, I must say that, unfortunately, justice in Mississippi has not rolled down like a mighty stream. The families of these victims are certainly grateful for the measures of justice that have been achieved, but it would be naive to think that Mississippi is awash in justice when it is clear that the collective will does not exist to pursue full measures of truth and justice in all of the civil rights murders and at all levels of the state-sanctioned terrorism against the Civil Rights Movement in Mississippi.
You are right. Justice in MS is nowhere near to fruition even on an infinitesimal scale. Yes, that some black families have been able to see ONE WHITE MAN convicted, CENTURIES (and yes, on a time-scale, it would rachet up to centuries, and not years because of the overwhelming murders/rapes that have not been brought to justice), but that a few black families have seen some semblance of justice for the murder of innocent black human beings during the Civil Rights Movement is not justice enough.
I usually am not so reticent or tender in my telling the truth on this country that has had it in for my people for over 400 years nor in withholding in my assessment of how white-run America has destroyed so many countless black lives, and how white-run America is STILL destroying so many black lives. True, black America has been the real moral conscious of this country more than any other race, and that is one reason why black people are so vilified by this country. That we have survived so much vicious hatred should be cause for celebration, but, instead, it is cause for denigration against us. That we have not stooped to the level of black hatred against white-run America is a testament of our will and fortitude to overcome hatred against a country that still treats us like third-class citizens.
America stood by and gave not a damn about her black citizens, while we were immolated, tortured and dismembered by lynch mobs with the burned remains carted off as souvenirs.
America stood by while white men walked into black families homes and raped black women and young black girls.
America stood by while white men fathered tens of thousands of children with black women and girls, then abandoned those children as if they were not human, as if those children were so much trash. Adult children of whom many are alive in their late 50s, in their 60s, and 70s—adult children who have some white brother or sister who know nothing of their existence, or prefer to not know of their existence, because white father felt the need to hate, use, abuse and impregnate a defenseless black woman or girl.
America stood by while sub-standard segregated education was forced on black people, segregated municipal amenities were forced onto black people, all the while black people’s TAX DOLLARS were used to provide higher standards of education, public services, etc., for white people.
America has built up a special place in Hell for herself.
Like a ravening she-wolf Whore of Babylon, she has reaped the whirlwind of retribution that will consume her.
It is not black people who were the color problem in America.
It was always white people who were the color problem.
It is not black people who have turned this country into a cesspool.
It is white people.
It is not black people who have sold this country out by outsourcing jobs overseas, selling classified information to foreign governments, moving factories/jobs out of the inner city to the suburbs and rural areas.
It is white people who have done that.
White-run America will NEVER share true economic, social, educational power with black people.
Segregation may no longer be de jure with America, but, segregation still lives via de facto with America, and as long as America’s hatred of black people exists, America will always be a crippled and stunted country. She will never rise and be a true democratic country since she has shown hypocrisy after hypocrisy towards her black citizens.
There are thousands of black people who were destroyed during the Civil Rights Movement.
Many black women lynched (yes, that’s right, lo and behold, black women were lynched just like black men, and so too were little black children; in many intances entire black familes were lynched/destroyed), many black men tortured and castrated for lies and crimes committed by white men who pinned the crimes on black men and boys, black people’s property destroyed or stolen by greedy whites.
I prefer to state the word “destroy” because that is what America has been trying to do to black people ever since we survived and left slavery.
America has been punishing us for surviving slavery and for no longer being slaves.
And that is what America cannot forgive us black people for: surviving a country that had only our destruction in mind and for us having the temerity to survive all that was done to crush and annihilate us.
And that the black-race-hating J.Edgar Hoover/FBI allowed the South to destroy black people, that many white people all across the South saw wrong being done to black Americans and either participated, or stood by and did nothing [save the few whites who stood up and risked life to defend black people], that the many whites outside the South did not care, speaks volumes.
Yes, a few white men have been brought to justice.
Wow! Whoop-de-doo!
Nothing.
Nothing compared to the many white men [and women] still walking around now who destroyed so many black women, men and children.
White men and women who are still eating, drinking, shitting, pissing, living—taking up precious space that truly belongs to the many black people they have destroyed.
The Earth rages and trembles underneath their feet because it knows of the savage crimes against humanity those so-called humans have committed.
The trees of the woods have witnessed the depravities those savages have committed. The mounds of earth that cover dead bodies of innocent black people, know of the abombinations those savages have committed.
The voices and souls of the murdered black people cry out for justice.
One day America will pay for her hellish damnable mistreatment of a race of people who have done her no wrong.
America will pay, and like all bills when they come due, she will be least able to afford the payment.
The day of reckoning is coming, and it will be a great and terrible day.
“With all due respect, I must say that, unfortunately, justice in Mississippi has not rolled down like a mighty stream.”
True.
It is not even a trickle.
More like a drop in a huge vast bucket in a dry desert at high noon.
Hi, Ben. You’ve been tagged. Yes, I know it’s a bit of silliness on a serious blog. We’re all serious most of the time.
Hey Travis. I’m not all serious. I haven’t done one of the memes in a long time. I’ll do mine soon.