Delaware apologized for slavery, but is it moral to accept? (op-ed)

Back Story: Harmon Carey, head of Delaware’s Afro-American Historical Society, made two requests to the governor’s office for a formal apology for slavery.

He was ignored.

Carey made a third request right after the 2015 South Carolina church shooting (A white man killed blacks at a prayer meeting which led to a demand to remove the confederate flag from state grounds.) Carey said, “I thought one way for us to respond -- ‘us’ meaning Delawareans -- was for our governor to issue an official apology for slavery.”

This time the governor’s office replied they were “open to having discussions about the request.”

This year, to coincide with Delaware’s celebration of black history month, the governor signed an official apology for Delaware’s role in slavery and Jim Crow.

The resolution stated: Delaware today is impacted by the lasting legacy of slavery, including ongoing tension between races and the existence of institutional racism.

The governor said, “It’s essential that we … recognize the everlasting damage of those sins … Being black in Delaware and being black in America means your likelihood of prosperity and success is less than if you are white.”

Future story: Suppose next century Harmon Carey’s descendents make a request for the governor of Delaware to apologize on behalf of the state for ignoring Harmon Carey’s two requests for a formal slavery apology.

Carey’s descendents issue a statement to the press. They say, “We acknowledge the state of Delaware granted Harmon Carey’s third request in 2016, but the state shouldn’t have ignored his two requests in the first place. By doing so the state engaged in blatant institutional racism.”

The governor doesn’t feel obligated to redress a slight from the previous century but his aides suggest it might have a placebo effect.        

The governor apologizes. 

He says, “W.E.B. Dubois said the problem of the 20^th century will be the color line. It was also the problem of the 21^st century and it’s the problem of our century. For centuries each generation made strides to better this nation by abolishing the prejudice practices of their predecessors but all of those efforts have been in vain. Abolishing the institution of slavery, ending segregation, creating laws to dismantle discrimination have backfired and produced the worst from of oppression in American history which is institutional racism. The state officially apologizes for ignoring the requests of Harmon Carey. And I officially state institutional racism is the permanent problem of the color line, it’s the result of unaccepted progress, its America’s future sin that baptizes blacks before they’re born. And this administration will continue to apologize for past prejudice every time they’re requested so no one feels ignored. This administration will make every symbolic gesture within our power to boost the morale of all victims that suffer from the legacy of slavery, separate but equal, discrimination, which currently manifests itself in institutional racism.”

Moral acceptability: The problem is when the present governor stated, “Being black in America means…” 

No one can make that claim, not even The President.

It implies a universal existence easily characterized and the governor’s depiction is unacceptable. He stated black means less likely to prosper and succeed. It’s a belief the fictitious governor expresses in the future, but the future governor surrenders to the permanence of institutional racism and the incapability of blacks to hurdle the obstacle because progress is rejected over the years by the developing culture of complaint.

That future is inevitable if slavery apologies such as this are accepted because there is no symbolic remedy for the past this will instill the legacy of slavery in the next generation causing the impotence of individuality and that is immoral.

First published in the new Pittsburgh Courier 2/17/16