Press Contact: Efia Nwangaza, 864-901-8627
JUNETEENTH: DAY OF COMMEMORATION AND OUTRAGE, JUSTICE FIRST
Greenville Based SC Reparations Coalition Calls for Reparations and End to 13th Amendment Slavery Exception
Saturday, June 19th at 1:00 pm ET. Confederate Memorial Park and Soldier Statue, 400 N. Main & Elford Sts, Greenville,SC
In this “Year of Racial Reckoning,” commemoration of the Tulsa Race Massacre, and the signing of federal law making June 19th, “Juneteenth,” a federal holiday, the Malcolm X Center for Human Rights, Upstate Black Lives Matter, SC Stolen Lives Project/October 22nd Coalition, Upstate Food Not Bombs, Justice Intervention Initiative, scholars, and activists call for justice. We will stand in solidarity as and with the descendants of Africans enslaved in the United States--- survivors of unprecedented brutality and continuing discrimination, hate, and violence. We join the international campaign for Reparations and the national effort to repeal the Slavery Exception of the 13th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
We will stand at one of Greenville South Carolina and the United States' most celebrated and protected symbols of racism/white supremacy, hate, and violence--- the Confederacy and the Confederate Soldier. The rally will be held at Greenville's Confederate Memorial Park and Solder statue, Saturday, June 19th, at 1:00pm edt, 400 N. Main Street, Greenville, SC. Participants will enter and converge at Springwood Cemetery Section V, African American Burial Site #30, pour libations and lay a wreath.
We also note the lack of substance these moments have held. Bills intended to outlaw lynching, curb police brutality, and protect minority voting rights are stalled in Congress and states pass laws to limit the way teachers talk about racism. The USA still has the world's longest held political prisoner, largest prison population, and number of people on death row Before “healing” justice must prevail.
There will be reading or summarization of the SC Orders of Session ( instigated and signed by Furman University President James Clement Furman and others which led Greenville to vote for Secession in December 1860,(Https://www.greenvillesc.gov/DocumentCenter/View/1317/History-of-Greenville-PDF?bidId=), Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation on January 1st, 1863 ( Abraham Lincoln issued the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation on September 22nd, 1862.), General William T. Sherman's Field Order Number 15 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Field_Orders_No._15 ) awarding newly freed Afrikans “40 acres and a mule,” https://www.zinnedproject.org/news/tdih/special-field-15/ ) , and the current version of House Resolution 40 ( H.R.40 - 116th Congress (2019-2020): Commission to Study Slavery and its continuing impact, and remediation recommendations https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/40 ), T. Coates A Case for Reparations (https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2014/06/the-case-for-reparations/361631/ ), Professor William Darity, What's at Stake, WPFWFM.org, https://wpfwfm.org/radio/programming/archived-shows, Wednesday, June 16, 2021 9:00 am
We invite all to join us on June 19thth for a national day of action demanding Justice, an end to Hate and Violence in the USA. Juneteenth has been observed in Black communities for over 100 years, in Greenville for more 30 years--- first by the late Hattie Cureton at the Juanita Butler Center. Join us for the protest in front of the Greenville's Confederate Soldier (N. Main & Elford Sts) on Saturday, June 19th at 1:00pm ET!
For interviews, contact Efia Nwangaza (mxcentergvl@gmail.com) , 864-901-8627