The 54th Massachusetts, one of the first black regiments in the Union army. 200,000 black soldiers and sailors played a decisive role in the defeat of the Confederacy.
Reparations: A Socialist Perspective Eljeer Hawkins
T
he 2020 presidential elections are in full swing, and all of the Democratic Party presidential nominees have been asked the question, “Do you support reparations?” Several candidates immediately declared their support for reparations, like Marianne Williamson, Kamala Harris, Corey Booker, Elizabeth Warren and Julian Castro. Even New York Times conservative columnist David Brooks supports reparations. Bernie Sanders, who has also raised legitimate questions earlier about the demand, has also endorsed the demand recently. Institutional racism is unfortunately alive and well in the U.S., a country that has discrimination built into its DNA. The black community faces disproportionate police harassment, state brutality, mass incarceration, unemployment, low wages, substandard housing and lack of education opportunities. In this context, a debate on the demands and strategy necessary to win black liberation is urgently necessary. The recent clamor around reparations is linked to a revival of former Congressman John Conyer’s thirty year old House bill H.R. 40 that would set up a commission to study the lasting effects of slavery and possible reparations for the black community. House representative Sheila Jackson Lee recently re-introduced
H.R. 40; the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties will discuss reparations on June 19; and Senator Corey Booker will present a proposal in the Senate to establish a commission to study possible reparations. The corporate media, liberal and conservatives pundits, and activists have now elevated the reparations demand into a national debate. To make sense of today’s discussion it is worth exploring how reparations emerged in the historical struggle of black people fighting racial oppression before turning to the question of how reparations connects to the struggle to dismantle capitalism and institutional racism today.
Reparations after the Civil War
The demand to provide financial restitution – outside of public apologies, monuments, and memorials – to redress the damage of slavery on the lives of black people began following the end of the Civil War in 1865 with Union General William Tecumseh Sherman’s “forty acres and a mule” field order #15 which was approved by President Lincoln. The aim was to divide plantations among 40,000 former enslaved Africans, providing them the possibility of living a dignified life with economic security post-slavery. WIth the defeat of the Confederacy, a period of “Radical Re-
