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CNN Saturday Morning News

Millions for Reparations Rally Gets Under Way

Aired August 17, 2002 - 09:14   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

CATHERINE CALLAWAY, CNN ANCHOR: Almost a century and a half ago, the issue of slavery ripped apart the nation. Even today, there remains at least one unresolved issue. Should today's blacks be compensated for the suffering of their ancestors during slavery? The supporters are holding a rally today in Washington, and CNN's Kathleen Koch is there -- Kathleen.
KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello, Katherine. Well, as you can see, it's still very, very quiet here. The Millions for Reparations rally doesn't begin until around noon.

The theme here today is they owe us, and basically what members of the African-American community are saying is they should be compensated for the unpaid labors and untold suffering under slavery that their ancestors underwent. And they point to a promise that was made back in 1865. It was a field order made by Civil War General William T. Sherman, and that was when he uttered that famous phrase that every freed slave would get "40 acres and a mule." And largely, that promise was not kept.

And so organizers here say that they should get some form of compensation, if not from the U.S. government, then from firms today that are still in existence today that profited from the fruits of slave labor. Now, they point to, say, survivors of the Holocaust, who have won reparations since the end of World War II, to Japanese Americans who were interred during World War II and in 1988 won an official apology from the U.S. government, as well as a payment of $20,000 per person for those Japanese Americans who were interred.

There is division, though, within the community, within the supporters of reparations as to what form exactly the reparations should take -- whether or not there should be a check for every individual or every family, or whether or not all the money should be put into some sort of national trust fund that then would be drawn on to address pressing needs in the African-American community, such as education or health care.

Now, they're expecting people to be coming here today from roughly 60 cities. They'll be hearing from lawmakers Cynthia McKinney, John Conyers, the Michigan Democrat, as a matter of fact, has every year since 1989 introduced legislation calling for a national commission to take a look at this issue of reparations, but the bill has never made it out of committee.

But so we are looking for some attendance today, but clearly not the roughly 100,000 that organizers are hoping for -- Catherine. CALLAWAY: You're looking kind of lonely out there, Kathleen.

KOCH: Pretty quiet so far.

CALLAWAY: All right, thank you, CNN's Kathleen Koch.

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