Millions of Blacks Coming to DC for Reparations Rally

The Black World Today ^ | June 9, 2002 | Conrad W. Worrill

[H8DEMS]

The Millions For Reparations Rally that will be held on August 17, 2002, the 115th birthday of the Honorable Marcus Mosiah Garvey, in Washington, D.C. promises to be one of the most historic gatherings of African people in America.

Day-by-day, African people in America are becoming more familiar with the concept of reparations and what it means to our continued struggle in America for self-determination, liberation, independence, and freedom. Therefore, we must be clear that reparations means repair for the damages inflicted on a people or a nation.

In pursuit of this repair, we are conscious of the fact we must engage in the process of assuming responsibility for repairing ourselves that includes: changing the way we think, supporting our own institutions, particularly financially, supporting our families, supporting our own Black business enterprises, cleaning up our own communities, and changing the way we relate to, and think of, each other as a people. These are just a few of the internal repairs we must constantly work on.

In this connection, part of our internal repair is to struggle, fight, mobilize, and organize to demand external reparations from those governments, corporations, and institutions that are responsible for our historical and continuing state of oppression. Just as Jewish people proclaim “Never Forget,” African people should do no less.

We should “Never Forget” that “They Owe Us!” Part of our internal repair is to consciously understand that, “We Are Owed” and have a historic responsibility to demand reparations from those forces of white supremacy that continue to benefit from what they did to us that lingers on as part of the vestiges of our enslavement.

As we prepare for our participation in the Millions For Reparations Rally on August 17, 2002, we should be clear that They Owe Us For:

1. The Trans Atlantic Slave Trade and Slavery - The United Nations World Conference Against Racism declared that the Trans Atlantic Slave Trade and Slavery were Crimes Against Humanity. Crimes against humanity have no statute of limitations.

2. Expropriation of Our Labor- For more than 250 years, we were forced to work for free. Our free labor was a major ingredient in the building of America and its wealth as a nation. Also, the thousands of white individuals and their families’ accumulated wealth that continues to benefit them as a result of our free labor.

3. Slave Code Laws- The slave owners developed their own codes of what they could do to enslaved African people in America that permeated throughout the emergence of this country. In many ways, informal slave codes exist today (racial profiling).

4. Destruction of the African Family- The Trans Atlantic Slave Trade and Slavery had a devastating impact on destroying and dismantling African families.

5. Raping of African Women- Our capture and enslavement provided white men with the power to rape African women and girls by the thousands without reprisal.

6. Fugitive Slave Laws- When our enslaved ancestors resisted their enslavement and fled plantations, the government of this country sanctioned laws and policies that supported the capture and return of so-called runaway enslaved Africans. The Dred Scott Decision should be consulted to fully understand the implications of the Fugitive Slave Laws.

7. Colonizing of Our African Culture- Created systems by law and societal practices that forbade African people, in our captured state, to engage in our traditional spiritual cultural practices.

8. KKK Night Riders and Lynchings- The Ku Klux Klan was established in the late 1860s as a secret society whose mission was to exterminate, by any means necessary, African people in America. They were known to have been responsible for the lynching and murdering of thousands of African men, women, and children.

9. The 13th and 14th Constitutional Amendments- The abolishment of slavery was really a constitutional scam and the 14th Amendment that allegedly made African people citizens of America was imposed on us. We were never asked if we wanted to be citizens.

10. Denied Our 40 Acres and a Mule- We didn’t get it! It was sold down the river and the land was given to white confederate soldiers.

11. Jim Crow Laws- The Jim Crow Policies of America became the fabric and foundation of American society after the period of Reconstruction. Jim Crow Laws and Policies reinforced the foundation of white supremacy and Black inferiority in every aspect of American society.

12. Fighting and Dying In Imperialist and White Supremacist Wars- We fought and died for the freedoms of others and were denied our own freedoms and civil rights.

13. Assassination of Black Leaders- Malcolm X, Dr. King, Fred Hampton, and Mark Clark to name a few.

14. COINTELPRO- This was a government program, established by the FBI, under the direction of J. Edgar Hoover, designed to destroy the Black Power Movement of the 1960s and 70s.

15. Crack Epidemic- Research reveals the United States Government, through the CIA, targeted Black communities for the dispensing of Crack Cocaine.

16. Criminalizing Our Youth- It should be obvious that the aim of the Prison Industrial Complex is to Criminalize Our Youth to insure a young and viable work force for this multibillion-dollar industry.

17. Jailing of Freedom Fighters- The incarcerating of our Freedom Fighter thus, making them Political Prisoners.

18. & 19. Centuries of Mis-Education and Mental Atrocities- This has caused serious damage to our people, which continues to cause much mental confusion about our true reality as an African people in America and around the world.

I am sure, as we approach August 17, 2002, you can add to this humble list of why “They Owe Us!”

(Dr. Worrill is the National Chairman of the National Black United Front / NBUF located at 12817 S. Ashland Ave., Fl. 1, Calumet Park, IL, 60827, 708-389-9929, Fax 708-389-9819, E-Mail: nbufchi@allways.net, Website: nbufront.org)

[Telit Likitis]

"Maybe not, but 2 Wrights make an airplane..."

That's Orville!

-Telit

[abishai]

Actually, reparations MAY be a great idea. If the "African American" community was given reparations for years of servitude and oppression, then everything for them should be considered settled. There would then be no need for Rainbow/PUSH, NAACP, and all organizations of that ilk. Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, Kwiese Mfume could all step down, their jobs finished. Racial quotas, welfare, affirmative action, all other minority programs designed to help African Americans would be abolished. All those who have descendents stolen from Africa would be repatriated back to their homelands. The playing field would be equal for all and no one would ever whine or complain about oppression or racism again! I would even shell out a few bucks for that.

[missycocopuffs]

...the 14th Amendment that allegedly made African people citizens of America was imposed on us. We were never asked if we wanted to be citizens.

Dear Mr. Worrill,

You and your brethren, by living in the United States as citizens, are making a choice daily to "be" citizens of this country.

[patriot_wes]

let's see, Aug 17....... 2 weeks till the next welfare check is due, don't have to go to work in the morning,.
....might as well go do some screaming in D.C.

How many honkys died in the civil war to free those people anyway?

[mrustow]

This is the same group that destroyed Cincinnati, and seeks to destroy all of urban America:

Cincinnati, 2002: Return of the Lynch Mob

[Constitutions Grandchild]

Oh...h...h, boy, I mean, brother!

[kcvl]

Marcus Garvey

In the years following the organization's first convention, the UNIA began to decline in popularity. With the Black Star Line in serious financial difficulties, Garvey promoted two new business organizations — the African Communities League and the Negro Factories Corporation. He also tried to salvage his colonization scheme by sending a delegation to appeal to the League of Nations for transfer to the UNIA of the African colonies taken from Germany during World War I.

Financial betrayal by trusted aides and a host of legal entanglements (based on charges that he had used the U.S. mail to defraud prospective investors) eventually led to Garvey's imprisonment in Atlanta Federal Penitentiary for a five-year term. In 1927 his half-served sentence was commuted, and he was deported to Jamaica by order of President Calvin Coolidge.

Garvey then turned his energies to Jamaican politics, campaigning on a platform of self-government, minimum wage laws, and land and judicial reform. He was soundly defeated at the polls, however, because most of his followers did not have the necessary voting qualifications.

In 1935 Garvey left for England where, in near obscurity, he died on June 10, 1940, in a cottage in West Kensington.

[Don Myers]

"What would the response be to an even larger "gathering," demanding racial spoils?"

CNN will run a special outlining the grievances of the Blacks. Bush will call for calm and understanding of the Black culture, and tell us that only a few blacks are extremists. The schools will intensify their diversity indoctrination. Black leaders will be featured on all of the media outlets telling the nation that whites are responsible for the outbursts. Black churches will do the same. People like the Rev. Jackson will climb back onto the soap box. We will import a few thousand more Africans to increase the diversity in our population. In other words, condition normal.

[Don Myers]

"Fine, all "non-citizens" can have a one-way ticket back to that paradise Africa."

From what I see, they are all coming over here.

[Don Myers]

"If there are "millions" (of blacks) who turn out for this, I will eat my hat."

Well, they will probably see this as another chance to riot and do their shopping from looting the stores. They might have a decent turnout for this event.

[kcvl]

The National Black United Front (NBUF), under the leadership of Dr. Conrad Worrill, launched a "We Charge Genocide Campaign," which with the support of the New York based December 12th Movement (D-12), significantly contributed to the popular education of Africans in America about the underlying causes and rationale for reparations. NBUF and D-12 collected thousands of signatures on petitions and presented them to the United Nations. Minister Silas Muhammad and his followers also gathered signatures and took them to the United Nations. In the most recent period, Deadria Farmer-Paellmann broke new ground with her pioneering research on the role of U.S. corporations in perpetuating and/or profiting from slavery (Ms. Paellmann recently sued Fleet Bank, Aetna Insurance Company and CSX Corp. for reparations).

[WIMom]

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[The Iceman Cometh]

1. The Trans Atlantic Slave Trade and Slavery - The United Nations World Conference Against Racism declared that the Trans Atlantic Slave Trade and Slavery were Crimes Against Humanity. Crimes against humanity have no statute of limitations.

Can someone please point out which of the African countries will also be participating in reparations? Without the friendly tribes of Africa, there would not have been any slaves to purchase.

[Windsong]

"Then get the f$*k out of the country"

Or perhaps more appropriately...go back to their OWN country if they hate America so much. In S. Africa, it is literally Hell on Earth. Sometimes I think THEY owe US something.

sheesh..

[CIB-173RDABN]

Reason number 1 why the REPARATION MOVEMENT is going nowhere:

(14th Amendment) Section 4. The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any state shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void. Source

[TomGuy]

Da gits raparrations and dis heer white boy'z buyin' some black shoepolish, shinin' dis white body into a nice tan, and gittin' dezs hans in dat dar han out line, he is...

[biblewonk]

I will NOT write a reparations check to anybody, unless I had something to do with the evil committed.

Don't be too sure about that. If you pay federal income taxes than there are probably a lot of people that you are paying that you would not approve of paying. Fortunately I don't pay federal income taxes.

[finnman69]

YEAHHHHHHH BOOOYYYYYYYYYYYY!

[kcvl]

Farmer-Paellmann not afraid of huge corporations

By James Cox, USA TODAY

Deadria Farmer-Paellmann has spent five years digging for evidence that ties Corporate America to pre-Civil War slavery. She confronted Aetna in 2000.

NEW YORK — Her husband, who's German and white, didn't believe her. So they played a game.

They'd go to a store and each make a purchase with a credit card. Inevitably, she had to produce a picture ID and give her address; he was rung up, no questions asked.

"Sometimes I tell (sales clerks), 'Hey, slavery's over. Black people have money now,' " says Deadria Farmer-Paellmann.

Slavery is anything but over for Farmer-Paellmann, 36, a researcher and mother of one. For five years, she has spent hours online and in archives hunting evidence that ties Corporate America to pre-Civil War slavery.

Farmer-Paellmann says she has identified about 60 companies that profited from slavery. She says she has taken her findings to nine — banks, insurers and a textile maker — and one estate. So far, none has made a public apology or agreed to her suggestion to put together a reparations plan.

If corporations with slaves in their past ever do pay reparations, Farmer-Paellmann can take much credit, says Charles Ogletree, the Harvard law professor heading a group looking to file reparations lawsuits.

Farmer-Paellmann says slavery lives on, its legacy seen in everything from housing discrimination to racial profiling to police brutality. The quest for compensation and an apology "torments a lot of African-Americans. And it's not because of the money. Our ancestors were kidnapped, whipped, tortured, forced to breed."

Farmer-Paellmann is negotiating with law firms and may file lawsuits separate from those brought by Ogletree's team. She hopes to pick a firm that could represent her as a plaintiff, bring her on to help with research or both.