Overdue Justice For Black Farmers?
Overdue justice
Once upon a time, there were tens of thousands of black farmers in the United States. Today, there is only a relative handful, and a big reason is that for years U.S. Department of Agriculture agents routinely discriminated based on race. Black farmers were often denied loans — or they got them, but nowhere near in the amounts or on the same good terms as the USDA gave to white farmers.
And in what some insist was a blatant conspiracy, USDA bureaucrats delayed black farmers' loan applications for so long that many of the farmers, unable to pay bills or to secure credit to buy the equipment and supplies needed to stay afloat, ended up selling their farms to developers for just pennies compared to what their farms were actually worth.
Whereas most schoolchildren are taught something about Martin Luther King Jr. and the civil rights movement, the disappearance of America's black farmers is a tale of racial injustice that isn't discussed or taught nearly enough. But now, in some cases 40, 50 and 60 years after the fact, an historical moment occurred when the U.S. House of Representatives passed and President Obama on Tuesday signed a $1.15 billion appropriation that will settle the last unresolved discrimination claims of about 80,000 black farmers or their descendants. The bill also allots $3.4 billion to compensate Native Americans who were discriminated against in multiple ways by the Interior Department.
These are sweet victories and long in coming. John H. Boyd Jr., president of the National Black Farmers Association, has been fighting the good fight for years in Washington and with whatever media that would pay attention. They've scored a victory that, unfortunately, not everybody is celebrating. There are conservatives in Congress who are still trying to disparage the harm that was done to the minority farmers and who are ridiculing the historic settlement as little more than undeserved reparations that, they claim, the government cannot afford to pay.
But advocates for the farmers have heard it all before, and instead of getting caught up trying to respond to those in Congress who are out to disparage their cause and the plaintiffs in this long-running, class-action drama, they are focused on doing what's important at this stage. That task is to help the aggrieved farmers and their descendants navigate a claim collection process that Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack admits is “very complicated and detailed.”
It's up to the Obama administration to make sure that the shameful legacy of the past is mitigated with swift, generous payments to those who deserve them.
Editor's comment: We MUST always endeavor to do JUSTICE, and reverse injustice whereever and whenever we find it!
Once upon a time, there were tens of thousands of black farmers in the United States. Today, there is only a relative handful, and a big reason is that for years U.S. Department of Agriculture agents routinely discriminated based on race. Black farmers were often denied loans — or they got them, but nowhere near in the amounts or on the same good terms as the USDA gave to white farmers.
And in what some insist was a blatant conspiracy, USDA bureaucrats delayed black farmers' loan applications for so long that many of the farmers, unable to pay bills or to secure credit to buy the equipment and supplies needed to stay afloat, ended up selling their farms to developers for just pennies compared to what their farms were actually worth.
Whereas most schoolchildren are taught something about Martin Luther King Jr. and the civil rights movement, the disappearance of America's black farmers is a tale of racial injustice that isn't discussed or taught nearly enough. But now, in some cases 40, 50 and 60 years after the fact, an historical moment occurred when the U.S. House of Representatives passed and President Obama on Tuesday signed a $1.15 billion appropriation that will settle the last unresolved discrimination claims of about 80,000 black farmers or their descendants. The bill also allots $3.4 billion to compensate Native Americans who were discriminated against in multiple ways by the Interior Department.
These are sweet victories and long in coming. John H. Boyd Jr., president of the National Black Farmers Association, has been fighting the good fight for years in Washington and with whatever media that would pay attention. They've scored a victory that, unfortunately, not everybody is celebrating. There are conservatives in Congress who are still trying to disparage the harm that was done to the minority farmers and who are ridiculing the historic settlement as little more than undeserved reparations that, they claim, the government cannot afford to pay.
But advocates for the farmers have heard it all before, and instead of getting caught up trying to respond to those in Congress who are out to disparage their cause and the plaintiffs in this long-running, class-action drama, they are focused on doing what's important at this stage. That task is to help the aggrieved farmers and their descendants navigate a claim collection process that Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack admits is “very complicated and detailed.”
It's up to the Obama administration to make sure that the shameful legacy of the past is mitigated with swift, generous payments to those who deserve them.
Editor's comment: We MUST always endeavor to do JUSTICE, and reverse injustice whereever and whenever we find it!
Labels: Justice, News reporting
posted by KYJurisDoctor at 8:23 AM
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