Mea Culpa, Mea Culpa, Mea Maxima Culpa

It doesn't happen all that much, but once in a while the American body politic engages in a public execution...

In this session of the Virginia General Assembly, Delegate A. Donald McEachin of Henrico county put forth a resolution calling for the Commonwealth of Virginia to publicly apologize for slavery. McEachin, whose great-grandfather was a slave, said that this was part of "a healing process" that "needs to occur." He went on to say that "No one is asking any individual to apologize...but, Virginia is alive and well, and Virginia was built on the backs of slaves, and Virginia’s economy boomed because of slavery, and it is Virginia that ought to apologize."

On the surface, this is the sort of meaningless resolution that looks good to voters, even though it doesn't accomplish much. However, as Delegate Frank D. Hargrove of Glen Allen noted, "I think this is a harmful idea just to keep recycling this thing which we all know and all despise and have no respect for." Delegate Hargrove went on to state that "Slavery was a horrible institution. On the other hand, not a soul in this legislature had anything to do with slavery." He also noted that demanding a statewide apology for slavery was comparable to demanding an apology from France for its treatment of Huguenots or asking the Jewish people to apologize for killing Christ. Finally, he completed his perfect storm of controversy by stating that slavery had been abolished for over 140 years and that "I personally think that our black citizens should get over it...by golly, we’re living in 2007."

It was mere nanoseconds before legislators and political activists began pillorying Hargrove in an orgy of self-righteous posturing. On the gentler end of the spectrum, there was Delegate Vincent F. Callahan Jr. of Fairfax County, whose only issue was with the impolitic nature of Hargrove's statements: "People ought to have learned a lesson from this past year's senatorial campaign in Virginia...we live in a different age as far as sensitivity goes...Particularly in a legislative body, where we operate in a goldfish bowl, we ought to be very careful about what we say in public."

On the more strident end, Delegate Dwight Clinton Jones of Richmond, chairman of the black caucus, argued that Hargrove's statement that black citizens need to "get over" slavery likened the institution to "a birthday party that somebody had last Saturday night." Jones went on to state that "I want to apologize to the mothers and fathers of my ancestors who were transported to this nation against their will in order that this nation might be built upon their backs. I want to apologize to the mothers and fathers of the civil rights generation who were hosed and bitten by dogs, and their children killed in churches as they burned, because of hatred that was put upon them. I want to apologize to them."

Piling on ridiculousness, Delegate David Englin of Alexandria held up a photo of his 7-year-old son, stating that, because of Hargrove's comment about Christ-killers, the boy was now "that much more likely to be verbally attacked or physically attacked." Hargrove responded "I didn't know you were Jewish...and I really don't care...I think your skin was a little too thin about this."

Of course, no one bothered to note that Hargrove commented about Jews killing Christ merely as a means of pointing out the ridiculousness of such a claim. For that matter, few pundits noted that Hargrove is the descendant of French Huguenots who fled religious persecution, which means that he was offering his own genetic ill-will on the sacrificial pyre of ridiculous grudges.

This furor was an odd experience for me, as I found myself in complete agreement with Hargrove. While his decision to make these statements on Martin Luther King Day was idiotic, he raised some very solid points that the Virginia House of Delegates, not to mention the rest of the country, should keep in mind:

1. Slavery has been abolished for over 140 years
Slavery has left a scar on this country, not to mention this state, but it's worth noting that it is, indeed, over. Yes, black people came to this country unwillingly. Yes, they were brutally mistreated when they arrived. However, our intense focus on the institution of slavery has obscured an important point: African-Americans are, fundamentally, Americans. After the Emancipation Proclamation, their ancestors chose to stay in this country. They helped build it, and worked very hard to carve out a place for themselves within its structures. Ignoring this choice, and the sacrifices that it engendered, is an insult to their memory. It seems to me that apologizing to African-Americans for the existence of an institution that they never experienced is, at the end of the day, the same as telling them that they haven't made any progress over the last century and a half. Frankly, this is the greatest insult at all.

2. With regard to slavery, people should "let it go."
I was discussing Cold Mountain with a friend of mine. She said that she disliked the movie because it was about the civil war but never mentioned slavery. I noted that Malcolm X was about the 1950's and 1960's, yet never mentioned JFK. She failed to see the connection.

If we make slavery the definitive event of Black America, then an entire segment of this country will be permanently enslaved. Personally, I nominate the Civil Rights movement as that definitive event. In it, African American leaders demonstrated to the U.S., and the world, the greatest intellectual and spiritual qualities to which humans can aspire. They provided an inspiring example, not just to blacks, but to every race. In short, they showed themselves to be active, and impressive, members of their society. No longer slaves, they demanded full engagement in America.

"Letting it go" is not the same as forgetting. Some people have likened Hargrove's statement to asking a Jew to let the Holocaust go. While he didn't go that far, I will: as the son of a Jew and a relative of many who were killed in Auschwitz, Bergen-Belsen, Majdanek, and other death camps, I hereby forgive all Germans for the Holocaust. I will continue to honor my dead relatives, but I refuse to allow their murderers to continue to marginalize me. I cannot be a victim of the Holocaust unless I allow myself to become one, and I am not willing to do that.

3. "Not a soul in [Virginia's current] legislature had anything to do with slavery"
I would go further: there is not a single living slave or slave-owner in the United States today. And, to be honest, people are having to go back further and further to keep slavery alive. For example, in his rebuttal to Hargrove, Delegate McEachin said that when he looks into the eyes of his 102-year-old grandmother, whose parents were slaves, "quite frankly, it's hard to get over it." Let's be clear here: McEachin is claiming that he can see the misery of his great-grandparents in the eyes of his grandmother, who is over a century old.

Is it possible that he's reading too much into this? Could he be seeing projections of his own political agenda reflected in her cataracts?

Now, I'm a Virginian, born and raised, and even after I leave this state, I will take much of Virginia with me. However, my great-great grandfather, Seymour Burroughs, fought for the North and was wounded in the Civil War. Here's his picture:


Another one of my great-great grandfathers, Charles Martin, also fought for the North, as did my great-great-great grandfather, Abraham Bowen. As the descendant of at least three Northern soldiers, I find it somewhat ridiculous that I have to apologize for slavery. And the same goes for millions of other Virginians, many of whom are the descendants of slaves. However, to the extent that the Virginia General Assembly represents me, so will their apology.

To look at it another way, we could spend the rest of our lives writing letters of apology and never come close to finishing. For example, my mother's folk are Jews from Eastern Europe. Clearly, I deserve apologies from Russia, the Ukraine, Poland, and Germany. While we're at it, I could use an apology from Rome, as they were responsible for the diaspora. In return, I will apologize for handing Jesus over to the Romans. My bad; we should have handled that in-house.

On behalf of my father's Scottish and Irish relatives, I demand apologies and restitution from the English. In return, I apologize for James VI and I, Charles I, Charles II...hell, I apologize for the entire House of Stuart. My father's English relatives, in turn, demand an apology, and restitution, from the Romans. For that matter, the French owe us an apology as well: we haven't forgotten about William the Conqueror, you Norman bastards!

This could go on and on. While we're at it, it's probably a good idea to remember that many of the Africans who showed up on these shores were sold to white men by other Africans. Do any of us have clean hands?

This is not to say that the Commonwealth of Virginia doesn't owe some serious apologies, and restitution, to its African-American citizens. Wages for blacks continue to lag far behind wages for whites. This is due, in large part, to the lower quality of inner-city schools and infrastructure. Virginia's continued inability to properly educate and care for its minority citizens is a blight on its record and an embarrassment. The same goes for Virginia's eugenics program, which was finally abolished in 1974. Passed as SB 281 in 1924, the Virginia Eugenics law allowed the sterilization of individuals who were considered retarded or otherwise genetically undesirable. An outsized percentage of these people were black. The same day this law was passed, the House of Delegates also ratified SB 219, also known as the "Racial Integrity Act." This law prevented marriage between "white persons" and "non-white persons." It was on the books until 1975.

In 2001, Virginia issued public apologies for its eugenics program. It has also paid compensation to victims of the program.

The victims of slavery are dead and buried, but racism still exists and still continues to victimize all of us. It seems to me that we need to focus on today's problems, not issue self-congratulating apologies for issues that have been dead for over a hundred years.