Arc of justice, interrupted
One of former President Obama’s favorite Martin Luther King Jr. quotes is “the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice” — the idea that positive social change takes decades or even generations, but comes about eventually. The careers of King and Obama were living proof of that: Just 40 years after King’s prophetic “Mountain” speech on the eve of his death, America elected its first black President.
Aside from that singular ascent, in the years between millions of ordinary African-Americans saw so many advancements, even as real deficiencies remain: gains in voting rights, educational advancement, wealth.
Yet as we celebrate the anniversary of King’s birth, it becomes clear that his insight about the arc of justice has a shadow corollary: The arc is long, but it does not inexorably point toward justice. There are fits, starts and, yes, reversals.
In Donald Trump, the United States now has a President whose actions and speech, rather than seeking to lead and inspire America toward an ever more egalitarian future, are content to retreat to a more nastily divided past. This President has: l Appointed an attorney general at war with an emerging bipartisan consensus on criminal justice reform, one that was finally aiming to correct ingrained bias in policing and punishment. l Issued his first pardon to a former Arizona sheriff who reveled in his history of racially profiling Latinos. l Gleefully poured gasoline on a culture war by calling kneeling NFL players — who are black, and who are protesting injustice against fellow blacks — “sons of bitches.” l Dismissed the poor birthplaces of African immigrants as “shithole countries.” l Declared that Haitian immigrants “all have AIDS” and Nigerian immigrants won’t “go back to huts” once they make it to America. l Found it in his heart to sympathize with neoNazis and Confederate sympathizers as “very fine people.”
That’s a very partial list; the 2016 campaign produced twice as many examples, from vilifying Mexicans to smearing inner cities as hellholes to playing coy about KKK grand wizard David Duke to impugning a judge’s integrity, and on and on.
The President’s defenders boast about low African-American unemployment, while insisting there’s no racism in his heart.
The continuation of an economic trend well underway before Trump took office is surely positive.
As to what’s in his heart, it’s beside the point. His many, many words and many, many actions speak louder, and will echo across time.
In less than a year in office, Trump has given license to hatreds long believed buried. Racists, anti-Semites and haters of Islam now proudly strut their stuff under the absurd and obscene pretense that they are merely speaking truth to establishment power.
If so much poison can be released in just one year, what will be unleashed into the cultural ecosphere at the end of a full term — and how long will that last? And, yes, how far will history’s arc have tragically been bent backwards?