My heart aches and my stomach turns whenever this day comes along. It is one day after my daughter’s birthday but today on Juneteenth, I pause to recognize my ancestors. Jane, Alex, and Israel Thomas lived through the pain of slavery somewhere on a farm in the Mississippi Delta. I do not know if President Obama will formally recognize today and its significance, since Michelle Obama and his daughters’ ancestors were victims of slavery, but if he will not because of politics then I will.
For years, I searched records, traveled to different states, made calls, and posted messages on genealogy boards, hoping to find a connection to a past that I knew very little about. I found some answers, but I still had questions. I learned that Jane and Alex, who were my direct relatives, did not know where their parents were from. I searched through Census records and read the words United States in the line of their parents’ birthplace. Both Jane and Alex were illiterate. They had three children, but two died. His occupation was farming, and she "kept house."
It was devastating for me to accept that my people, who shared my DNA, were human chattel. My research made me wish that I had more opportunities to sit down with my ninety year-old great-grandma and talk, but she died when I was nine years old. My great grandmother told my mother that slavery existed well into the 19th century, long after the Emancipation Proclamation was signed in 1863.
I could not believe that many blacks did not know that they were free. With no 40 acres and a mule, many blacks became sharecroppers. Alex became a sharecropper when he took his family to Arkansas. The sharecropping system under Reconstruction was slavery in a milder form. Former slaves became trapped in a system that exploited their farm work for minimal pay, high interest, and scraps of food.
I tried to search even further into my ancestry and I could not find much more. You know, it hurts to know that my country, the country I proclaim to love so much, would not acknowledge my people’s humanity.
Yesterday, I read the Senate passed a resolution "apologizing for slavery" but, as usual with the U.S. government, it has a clause. It states, "nothing in this resolution authorizes or supports any claim against the United States; or serves as a settlement of any claim against the United States." Therefore, the resolution says, "Sorry Black folk, we enslaved you, robbed you of your identity, dehumanized you, raped you, and drained every bit of dignity out of you, but we are technically not responsible. Let’s move on!" The shame is that the United States, despite the election of President Barack Obama, will not take full responsibility for its horrible past. The other shame is that it took 146 years to get a "sorry."
Slavery was "state sponsored terrorism" but unlike the victims of recent terrorist attacks, our ancestors got nothing but more discrimination, unequal education, substandard living, and no representation until 1965, mere twelve years before my birth.
People have debates about whether African Americans of this generation still feel the effects of slavery. The answer for me is yes. When I listened to my grandmother talk about stories of charred carcasses of people hanging from trees, someone calling her a nigger, sundown towns, and not being able to vote, I felt my ancestors’ pain. When she told me stories of substandard education, outdated schoolbooks, and dilapidated school buildings, I felt their pain. When I heard stories of the "black bottle," segregated neighborhoods, blatant discrimination, and my ancestors’ reliance on their faith, I felt their pain.
As much as we move away from the past, the past will never change and it will never go away. All we can do is learn from it, understand it, and never make the same mistakes again. Today on Juneteenth, I will sit with all of my children and explain to them why it is important for us to remember our ancestors, Jane, Alex, and Israel Thomas.
One more thing...
President Obama's Statement on Juneteenth:
On this day in 1865, more than two years after President Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, those who found themselves still enslaved in Galveston, Texas had their hopes realized and their prayers answered. Contrary to what others had told them, the rumors they had heard were indeed true. The Civil War had ended, and they were now free.
General Gordon Granger issued the call with "General Order No. 3" saying "The people of Texas are informed that, in accordance with a proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all slaves are free. " June 19, or Juneteenth, is now observed in 31 states. Nearly a century and a half later, the descendants of slaves and slave owners can commemorate the day together and celebrate the rights and freedoms we all share in this great nation that we all love.
This moment also serves as a time for reflection and appreciation, and an opportunity for many people to trace their family’s lineage. African Americans helped to build our nation brick by brick and have contributed to her growth in every way, even when rights and liberties were denied to them. In light of the historic unanimous vote in the United States Senate this week supporting the call for an apology for slavery and segregation, the occasion carries even more significance.