Say His Name: Police Brutality, Extra-Judicial Killings and Achieving Racial Justice in the American Legal System
With the Black Lives Matter Movement in full swing, I wanted to write an essay about police brutality and the gravity of what we are fighting for. We are not fighting against one incident, we are fighting against centuries of injustice. While there has been an acceptance of responsibly for the slave trade and Jim Crow laws by governments, a minimum acceptance is all there is. I do not focus heavily on the positives of the Civil Rights Movement, most school textbooks have a very poor teaching of racism after the movement. I try to discuss ways in which the governments could take action and how we ourselves can change things (protesting, educating and harnessing white privilege). They did it in the Civil Rights Movement, we can do it now. Note: I am not a scholar, I am just an angry law student; forgive any errors. I also know this is shoddy referencing work but everything has been cited - just not beautifully.
With the Black Lives Matter Movement in full swing, I wanted to write an essay about police brutality and the gravity of what we are fighting for. We are not fighting against one incident, we are fighting against centuries of injustice. While there has been an acceptance of responsibly for the slave trade and Jim Crow laws by governments, a minimum acceptance is all there is. I do not focus heavily on the positives of the Civil Rights Movement, most school textbooks have a very poor teaching of racism after the movement. I try to discuss ways in which the governments could take action and how we ourselves can change things (protesting, educating and harnessing white privilege). They did it in the Civil Rights Movement, we can do it now.
Note: I am not a scholar, I am just an angry law student; forgive any errors. I also know this is shoddy referencing work but everything has been cited - just not beautifully.
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was the Freemen’s Bureau which worked to educate former slaves and assistant them in adjusting to living free. These
victories were short lived, many states enacted various ‘Black Codes’ to again oppress the black community.
Florida was the most ‘bigoted and short-sighted of all southern
legislature of 1865-1866’. 50 A Florida Supreme Court justice told the
legislator which passed the codes: ‘we have a duty to perform – the
protection of our wives and children from threatened danger, and the
prevention of scenes which may cost the extinction of an entire race’. 51
Black Codes only referred to black people (anyone with one-eighth or
more black blood 52 ), and in general treated them as inferior, little more
than subordinate labourers. 53 To ensure they would be good labourers,
a special ordinance was passed for a vagrancy law meaning that any ablebodied
person who was ‘wandering or strolling about or leading an idle,
profligate, or immoral course of life’ could be arrest upon complaint of
any citizen. 54 Penalties for all crimes included imprisonment, whipping,
fines and being sold to the highest bidder for as long as 12 months. 55
Inciting of insurrection, administering poison, burglary and rape of a
white woman however was punishable by death. 56 To illustrate the
excessive sentences during this
Figure 6: 1920 Duluth Lynchings
period, there was a certain case
of a freedman being sold for 40 days for taking a log out of the river and selling
it. 57 However, the federal government did soon intervene and outlawed the use
of whipping and declared it unconstitutional to prohibit the bearing of arms. It
was also warned that there must be no difference before the law based on
colour. 58
Figure 7: Lynching of Laura Nelson. Oklahoma,
1911
Then came the rise of the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) which by 1870 had become a
vehicle for white resistance to the Reconstruction policies which ended the
Black codes. The early 20 th century saw a surge in KKK activity including
bombings of black schools and churches and violence against black and white
activists. 59 Lynching (not exclusively practised by the KKK) during this time
was a huge problem, from 1882-1968, 4,743 lynchings occurred across the US
with 72.7% of the victims being black. 60 Many whites felt that African
Americans were getting away with too much freedom. Lynchings were done
under the name of justice; for example, in the case of Will Brown (fig 8), he
was alleged to have raped a 19-year-old white girl. In another case, three
50
Joe M. Richardson, ‘Florida Black Codes’ (1969) 47 The Florida Historical Quarterly 365, 372.
51
Patrick. ‘Reconstruction of the Nation’ (1865-1866) 34 Florida House Journal 64.
52
n 50, 374.
53
ibid 366.
54
ibid 371.
55
ibid 372.
56
ibid 374.
57
C. M. Hamilton to McHenry, March 31, 1866, Bureau Records, Florida.
58
n 50, 377.
59 <https://www.history.com/topics/reconstruction/ku-klux-klan> accessed 3 June 2020
60
<https://www.naacp.org/history-of-lynchings/> accessed 3 June 2020
6
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