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.