In recent months there have been several setbacks that have impacted the Civil Rights Movement in America. From the disappointment of the Trayvon Martin case to the U.S. Supreme Court decision to repeal parts of the Voting Rights Act, the hands of time are slowly turning back on civil rights.
As we embark upon the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, where the late Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his famous “I Have a Dream” speech, the question comes to mind: Have we as African Americans finally arrived?
In 2013, we have an African-American president, 44 black Congressional members, a 27.4 percent poverty rate and a high-school education attainment rate of 84.2 percent. If you compare this to the landscape of the early 1960s, when only five members of Congress were black, 20.1 percent of African Americans had a high school diploma and 35 percent of blacks lived in poverty, it seems as if we have come a long way.
While this appears to be progress on first glance, we must look at the underlying inequality that still persists in our society.
African Americans currently have a slightly lower poverty rate than in 1965, but whites still possess 20 times more wealth than blacks, according to a 2011 Pew Research Center study. The African-American unemployment rate is often three times the rate of whites despite the fact that the educational attainment gap has closed exponentially between whites and blacks.
In 2012, African-American voter participation in the presidential election exceeded that of whites for the first time in history, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. And this is where the conflicts arise. It seems that when African Americans begin to make gains in American society, measures are put into place to hold us back.
Case in point: the recent decision by the U.S. Supreme Court to repeal portions of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 is a measure that is meant to diminish the voting rights of minorities. Chief Justice John Roberts went on record to say “our country has changed” and that the Voting Rights Act “employed extraordinary measures meant to address an extraordinary problem.” The fact that our country has changed to some extent points to the effectiveness of the Voting Rights Act. However, to take the heart out of the law enables our country to regress back to the days of voting discrimination.
As we look back upon the gains and losses that we, as African Americans, have endured over our years of citizenship in this country, it is imperative that we remain vigilant in our fight for civil rights and an equal society for all.
McMillan is president / CEO of the Urban League of Metropolitan St. Louis.
