Green Party Watch

The National Committee of the Green Party of the United States is currently debating proposed revisions to the national Party Platform. Among the changes under consideration is a proposal to strengthen existing langauge in support of Reparations which already exists in the document:

http://green.gpus.org/cgi-bin/vote/propdetail?pid=510

In response to a Delegate speaking in opposition to Proposal #510 fearing that “the tax burden will fall upon the shoulders” of those who did not benefit from slavery, Hugh Esco from the Georgia Green Party recently offered the following remarks to the National Committee. They are reprinted here by permission.

Dear Delegates:

Pigeon-holing reparations as a mere paycheck is a tactic of the banksters who’s interests are most directly threatened by the movement for Reparations and our unity on this issue.

A careful reading of #510 shows that it puts us on record for no new taxes, that it calls for a shift in existing spending:

“to end the criminalization of the Black and Brown
communities, to eradicate poverty, to invest in education,
health care and the restoration and protection of human
rights,”

and that the only new revenue source advocated in this language is with this language:

“We support the creation of a claim of action and a right
to recover inherited wealth and other profits accumulated
from the slave trade for the benefit of a reparations
trust fund.”

This language clearly says that the banks, insurance companies, railroads and related concerns which profited from the institution of slavery owe monetary restitution for that stolen labor and those stolen lives. The text of the amendment itself makes clear that we as a nation owe a debt as well. But Reparations is no mere paycheck. It is about repairing the fabric torn asunder by the crimes against humanity on which this nation’s wealth has been built.

At root of the myriad issues we face with respect to our nation’s institutional relationship with its Black, Brown, Native and Asian communities is our nation’s ongoing commitment to the ideology of white supremacy. Supporting Reparations for the descendants of enslaved Africans goes to the very heart of this ideologcal commitment built into the fabric of our governing institutions, and prepares the ground for future work to respect the Treaty rights of Native nations within our border, including those long violated tenets from the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo which made real the Gadsden Purchase and ended our 19th Century imperial war to extend the institution of slavery into Mexico.

I personally believe that this nation owes a debt, and yes, not only to descendants of enslaved Africans, but at least to them. Denying this debt we owe will only make it more difficult to acknowledge the debt we owe for the colonization and occupation of Aztlan out West or of New Echota here in Georgia.

To support Reparations does not preclude our support for Treaty Rights. It does put us on the map in a very clear way in opposition to White Supremacy. And as we learn to effectively debunk that mythology, that I am somehow innately superior to Chicanos because of my European ancestry, it positions us to blow down the whole house of cards built on that mythology. It strengthens our hand as we call for an end to the racist wars in the Arab or Persian East, in SouthWest Asia, in Africa and throughout the Americas. It strengthens our hand as we combat the racist profiling which passes for public safety in communities from here in DeKalb County Georgia West to the coast of California. It builds our backbone for the fight against SB-1070 and the apartheid wall being built on the border to divide nations and families. It strengthens our position when we demand that the property rights asserted in the Congressionally suppressed Article X, be honored as promised by those who negotiated the Treaty of Guadalupe Hildalgo.

This country has a shameful history with respect to its relationship with its own word, treaties and laws. The founders wrote of us all (well at least the men) being ‘created equal’ and ‘endowed . . . with certain inalienable rights’. Our history has shown the lie to that time and time again. But our history can also be seen as a chronicle of people’s struggles to make our reality match that rhetoric.

Our full-throated support for Reparations, with your support for the passage of #510, can be a piece of that history. And it can distinguish this Party as one ready to step up and avoid the lessons which history has to teach us.

Hubert Harrison and later W.E.B. Dubois spoke in their day about “the crucial test of socialism sincerity” being the extent to which it addressed the concerns of “the most ruthlessly exploited working class group in America”.

Challenged by racism within the Socialist movement and police state repression from the Palmer Raids, through the Red Scare to this very day, the SP ultimately failed to serve as an electoral vehicle for our movement for Justice, in essentially the same way which too many locals of organized labor have failed us in their own sphere.

In that, they followed the Populists who also failed to rise to the challenge which the ideology of white supremacy presented them in their day.

But the same challenge is put to us now.

As our 2004 Presidential nominee has reminded us time and again, we live in a “racist, sexist, classist” society. We have a responsibility as the custodians of a Party committed to social justice to meet this crucial test, to learn to speak to others outside of our comfort zones, to educate one another and the public about the operation of white supremacist ideology in public and private institutions all around us and to engage our allies to renounce white skin privilege as a necessary precursor to building if not the beloved community, then at least a just society.

We face state repression of our work as well. But we need not ignore the role of race in the status quo, lie to ourselves about the harm of color-blindness, while in effect remaining in our small pond comfort zone putting “race first and class second” as the SP did in their moment on the stage.

Don’t fool yourself. “Reparations” is a powerful word which strikes fear in the hearts of the banksters and war-profiteers who have absconded with our wealth and democracy. There is a reason that Congress has brought themselves to apologize for slavery, but not to committing to make reparations for that history. There is a reason that our inclusion of the word in our Platform inspires interest and hope among the slave-descendant community.

Reparations is the whole enchilada. No simple paycheck will suffice. It is a word which inspires hope for deconstructing the white supremacist foundation on which this nation was built and working people’s labor redistributed as the wealth of a few. It inspires hope that we can rebuild a politically and economically democratic society on a just foundation erected in its place, as we clear away the rotting foundation we offer to replace.

The Atlanta Greens in the early days adopted a mission statement which began, “Recognizing that fundamental change is neccessary, . . . ” This is it, that fundamental change which we are called upon to do here: to deconstruct white (male) supremacy and to build justice in its place.

We already support that and we ought to own it boldly in our Platform. I urge your whole-hearted support for #510.

Thank you,
– Hugh Esco, Alternate
Georgia Green Party

Chair, (GaGP) Committee on the Green Party Platform

member of the Executive Committee for Caucasions United for Reparations and Emancipation

Tags: platform, reparations

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 10th, 2010 at 12:23 am and is filed under National Greens, Social & Economic Justice. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.