"FINAL THOUGHTS (FOR NOW) ON GOING HOME"

“FINAL THOUGHTS (FOR NOW) ON GOING HOME”

            Three weekends ago Caroline and I were in my hometown of Helena, Arkansas.  We went there to attend the dedication of a memorial to the 235+ victims of a mass lynching in Phillips County.  It was initially called the Elaine Race Riot, which implied that people of both white and black racial classification were participants.  As it turned out, it was a white slaughter of black people in Phillips County, and it is now correctly called the Elaine Massacre, named after the closest town where it began. 

            There are many issues surrounding the Massacre and the Memorial, but for me this fact stands out most clearly:  the Memorial monument is huge, and it will stand as a daily reminder to all who see it of a new narrative of American history.  This Memorial is a marker of a different story of our history – we are not just a nation of self-driven, independent achievers.  Our national story also must include the genocide of those living here when the Europeans came.  It must include the labor and accomplishments of people from Africa, many of whom were brought here in chains as slaves.  This Memorial reminds us that slavery and racism and white supremacy are not unfortunate blots on our national character.  They are fundamental to our national character and must be acknowledged and resisted.

            The dedication was held in Helena at the new monument, and that brought up the first controversy:  why Helena and not Elaine?  The simplest answer is that Elaine is now almost non-existent, and Helena is the county seat where all the trials were – trials not of the white men who did the killing, but rather the black men and women who were the victims.  Yet there is no marker in Elaine, and there should at least be something there.

            The other controversy was the lack of black participation in the dedication.  The venue in Helena was filled with at least 400 people, but 85% of them were Anglos – where were the black people?  Helena is vast majority black demographically, but they were maybe 50-70 African-Americans there.  I learned later that there was an alternative service in Elaine at the same time with about 175 people in attendance there.  I’m guessing that the skin colors of the people at the Elaine gathering looked remarkably different.  That perception leads me to understand how complicated the Memorial is.  From my outsider perspective, it seems to be a white event that expresses white acknowledgment of a horrible crime 100 years ago and our sorrow for it.   Its development and funding suggests that the same dynamic that led to the slaughter still prevails:  people classified as “white” must be in control.  Even at this touchpoint where the violence and brutality of white supremacy are expressed and remembered in a powerful art piece, the power of white supremacy still prevails. 

            This Memorial is a reminder that there are several narratives intertwined in the story of American history.  We are currently engaged in a great struggle over whether the narrative of the power of white supremacy will be acknowledged in our story.  The Trumpster and his base see white supremacy as the natural order, even as God-given.  Many of the rest of us see it as sinful and an abomination that must have things like the Elaine Massacre in order to keep its power.  I am grateful that the Elaine Massacre at least led to a fundamental Supreme Court case, Moore v. Dempsey.  In that decision, SCOTUS decided to overturn the death verdicts of the black men convicted in the Elaine Massacre.  It was the first time since the Civil War that the Court had overturned a criminal case verdict in a state court decision.  It would be the harbinger of many other cases, as the Court began to assert the primary power of the federal government to regulate the states.   That decision echoes now 100 years later in our fundamental struggles today.