Alabama Slavery Reparations?

      As reported by The Associated Press, California is moving ahead with a years long effort to answer the question: should that state offer reparations for slavery, and if so, what form they should take?

“I hope that this report is used not only as an educational tool, but an organizing tool for people not only in California but across the U.S. to educate their communities,” ----task force Chair Kamilah Moore said----, adding that the report also highlights “contributions of the African American community and how they made the United States what it is despite ongoing oppression and degradation.”

Gov. Gavin Newsom signed legislation creating the task force in 2020, making California the only state to move ahead with a study and plan. Cities and universities are taking up the cause with the Chicago suburb of Evanston, Illinois, becoming the first U.S. city to make reparations available to Black residents last year.

The task force voted in March to limit reparations to descendants, overruling reparations advocates who want to expand compensation to all Black people in the U.S.   

EJI Lynching Memorial

If California bears some responsibility for slavery....how much more so does Alabama, which joined the confederacy and fought a four-year Civil War over the issue? There were almost a half-million slaves in Alabama at the start of the war.