[VAcourier] Slave apology debate exposes old pain

[Virginia Division SCV Communication List]

Slave apology debate exposes old pains for blacks, whites
By Dionne Walker - Associated Press Writer
Daily Press
http://www.dailypress.com/news/local/virginia/dp-sou--slaveryapology0127jan27,0,7472585.story?coll=dp-headlines-virginia

RICHMOND, Va. -- It wasn't Donald McEachin's intention to re-ignite 
Virginia's slumbering racial tensions.

The Richmond area state delegate just wanted recognition for people like 
his great-grandfather, who was among the black slaves forced into 
backbreaking labor, then freed into a life of poverty and racism not 
much better than what they left on plantations.

He wanted two words from a state where slavery existed for 
centuries--I'm sorry.

His proposal has torn delicate bonds between blacks and whites and 
highlighted simmering resentments: for blacks, anger over societal 
inequities they link to slavery, among whites, bitterness over their 
perceived responsibility for ancient sins.

The debate is taking place in a former Confederate state where racial 
progress has been gradual but clear in recent years.

Virginians made Democrat L. Douglas Wilder the nation's first elected 
black governor 17 years ago and he's now mayor of Richmond, the 
Confederate capital. The 140-member state legislature includes 17 black 
members; a civil rights memorial is planned alongside statues of white 
historical figures near the Capitol, blocks from where a slavery 
reconciliation statue is slated.

An apology for slavery would also help, but "the government's not gonna 
do it," said black city resident John Alexander as he paused near a 
statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee. "The average white person 
feels they don't owe us nothing."

He spoke with the matter-of-factness of many blacks who consider an 
apology a duty of white companies and families benefiting from slave 
labor, rather than a polite gesture. Blacks like Alexander hold no 
apparent malice toward whites, but share a sense of being owed 
something--better homes, better jobs, a better life.

Wilder agreed that black community ills such as low graduation rates can 
be linked to a defeatist mentality born during slavery and perpetuated 
by Jim Crow laws that mandated segregation of blacks and whites.

"As a result of all of these things, African-Americans were set back," 
said Wilder, whose grandparents were slaves. "They still have not caught 
up."

Wilder supports an apology but doesn't think it would do much to solve 
economic and educational disparities.

Former U.S. Rep. Tony Hall of Ohio believes an apology would at least be 
a good start. Hall, who is white, proposed a slavery apology in 1997 and 
again in 2000 while he was in Congress.

"I got a tremendous amount of hate mail, but at the same time, I also 
got a lot of mail and people stopping me that were really, really 
thankful," said Hall, a Democrat who was motivated by a televised debate 
on slavery. "There's still a lot of discrimination in our country. We 
need to be about healing it."

But should whites, perceived as having better opportunities due to 
slavery's lingering racial hierarchies, apologize?

"You're damned right they owe an apology," said King Salim Khalfani, 
head of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People 
in Virginia. "They need to repair the damage."

He and other black leaders confronted Del. Frank Hargrove, R-Hanover, a 
white legislator who launched the debate over McEachin's resolution by 
suggesting blacks "get over" slavery. Hargrove said he opposes an 
apology because no one alive today was involved in slavery.

McEachin's resolution says Virginia "acknowledges and atones for its 
pivotal role in slavery."

The Democrat was motivated by stories of how his great-grandfather rose 
from slavery in South Carolina to found a church in Newport News. 
Listening, he felt pride--but also a sadness shared by many slave 
descendants.

"We all have to cope with it. But coping with it is a long way from 
getting over it," McEachin said.

Virginia's first slaves arrived at Jamestown in 1619, though the 
institution never became as entrenched as did in the Deep South along 
the Mississippi River, said Holt Merchant, a professor at Washington & 
Lee University in Lexington.

By 1860, 20 percent of Virginians owned slaves, a number shrinking as 
land wore out, Merchant said. Some owners released blacks to save money. 
Then cotton took hold farther south.

"You sold your slaves into the southwest," Merchant said. "What promised 
to be a move toward emancipation in Virginia, when slaves were an 
economic burden, came apart."

All along, whites felt obligated to "rescue" blacks, who they viewed as 
pagans, Merchant said.

It was a different era with different thinking. Frank Earnest, head of 
the Virginia chapter of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, doesn't feel 
modern whites should have to atone.

"Not every black person in this country is a descendent of slaves. Not 
every white person in this country is a descendent of people who owned 
slaves," he said. "It worsens the tensions between blacks and whites."

Moreover, an apology won't cure community ills, said Mychal Massie, with 
the National Leadership Network of Black Conservatives.

That will come from blacks emphasizing two-parent homes, education over 
fast money and personal responsibility for life choices, Massie said.

"A willing disregard for responsibility, a willing disrespect for 
education, ad nauseam, is not attributable in any way to slavery," said 
Massie, who considers an apology redundant.

"We see black leaders on every level," he said. "America has apologized."

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