#American law inequality

[mkeblr]

"Nothing of tragedy can be written, can be spoken, can be conceived, that equals the frightful reality of scenes daily and hourly acting on our shores, beneath the shadow of American law."

-Harriet Beecher Stowe, Uncle Tom’s Cabin

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Jack Ohman, Tribune Content Agency

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

May 1, 2024

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

MAY 02, 2024

Today, Florida’s ban on abortions after six weeks—earlier than most women know they’re pregnant—went into effect. The Florida legislature passed the law and Florida governor Ron DeSantis signed it a little more than a year ago, on April 13, 2023, but the new law was on hold while the Florida Supreme Court reviewed it. On April 1 the court permitted the law to go into operation today. 

The new Florida law is possible because two years ago, on June 24, 2022, the Supreme Court  overturned the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that recognized the constitutional right to abortion. In Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the modern court decided that the right to determine abortion rights must be returned “to the people’s elected representatives” at the state level. 

Immediately, Republican-dominated states began to restrict abortion rights. Now, one out of three American women of childbearing age lives in one of the more than 20 states with abortion bans. This means, as Cecile Richards, former president of Planned Parenthood, put it in The Daily Beast today, “child rape victims forced to give birth, miscarrying patients turned away from emergency rooms and told to return when they’re in sepsis.” It means recognizing that the state has claimed the right to make a person’s most personal health decisions. 

Until today, Florida’s law was less stringent than that of other southern states, making it a destination for women of other states to obtain the abortions they could not get at home. In the Washington Post today, Caroline Kitchener noted that in the past, more than 80,000 women a year obtained abortions in Florida. Now, receiving that reproductive care will mean a trip to Virginia, Illinois, or North Carolina, where the procedure is still legal, putting it out of reach for many women. 

This November, voters in Florida will weigh in on a proposed amendment to the Florida constitution to establish the right to abortion. The proposed amendment reads: “No law shall prohibit, penalize, delay, or restrict abortion before viability or when necessary to protect the patient’s health, as determined by the patient’s healthcare provider.” Even if the amendment receives the 60% support it will need to be added to the constitution, it will come too late for tens of thousands of women.

It is not unrelated that this week Texas attorney general Ken Paxton, along with other Republican attorneys general, has twice sued the Biden administration, challenging its authority to impose policy on states. One lawsuit objects to the government’s civil rights protections for sexual orientation and gender identity. The other lawsuit seeks to stop a federal rule that closes a loophole that, according to Texas Tribune reporter Alejandro Serrano, lets people sell guns online or at gun shows without conducting background checks.  

In both cases, according to law professor and legal analyst Steve Vladeck, Paxton has filed the suit in the Amarillo Division of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, where it will be assigned to Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, the Trump appointee who suspended the use of mifepristone, an abortion-inducing drug, in order to stop abortions nationally. 

Last month the Judicial Conference, which oversees the federal judiciary, tried to end this practice of judge-shopping by calling for cases to be randomly assigned to any judge in a district; the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas says it will not comply. 

And so the cases go to Kacsmaryk, who will almost certainly agree with the Republican states’ position.

Republicans are engaged in the process of dismantling the federal government, working to get rid of its regulation of business, basic social welfare laws and the taxes needed to pay for such measures, the promotion of infrastructure, and the protection of civil rights. To do so, they have increasingly argued that the states, rather than the federal government, are the centerpiece of our democratic system. 

That democracy belonged to the states was the argument of the southern Democrats before the Civil War, who insisted that the federal government could not legitimately intervene in state affairs out of their concern that the overwhelming popular majority in the North would demand an end to human enslavement. Challenged to defend their enslavement of their neighbors in a country that boasted “all men are created equal,” southern enslavers argued that enslavement was secondary to the fact that voters had chosen to impose it.

At the same time, though, state lawmakers limited the vote in their state, so the popular vote did not reflect the will of the majority. It reflected the interests of those few who could vote. In 1857, enslaver George Fitzhugh of Virginia explained that there were 18,000 people in his county and only 1,200 could vote. “But we twelve hundred…never asked and never intend to ask the consent of the sixteen thousand eight hundred whom we govern.” State legislatures, dominated by such men, wrote laws reinforcing the power of a few wealthy, white men. 

Crucially, white southerners insisted that the federal government must use its power not to enforce the will of the majority, but rather to protect their state systems. In 1850, with the Fugitive Slave Act, they demanded that federal officials, including those in free states, return to the South anyone a white enslaver claimed was his property. Black Americans could not testify in their own defense, and anyone helping a “runaway” could be imprisoned for six months and fined $1,000, which was about three years’ income. A decade later, enslavers insisted that it was “the duty of the Federal Government, in all its departments, to protect…[slavery]…in the Territories, and wherever else its constitutional authority extends.”

After the Civil War, Republicans in charge of the federal government set out to end discriminatory state legislation by adding to the Constitution the Fourteenth Amendment, establishing that states could not deny to any person the equal protection of the laws and giving Congress the power to enforce that amendment. That, together with the Fifteenth Amendment providing that “[t]he right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude,” Republicans thought, would stop state legislatures from passing discriminatory legislation.

But in 1875, just five years after Americans added the Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution, the Supreme Court decided that states could keep certain people from voting so long as that discrimination wasn’t based on race. This barred women from the polls and flung the door open for voter suppression measures that would undermine minority voting for almost a century. Jim and Juan Crow laws, as well as abortion bans, went onto the books.

In the 1950s the Supreme Court began to use the Fourteenth Amendment to end those discriminatory state laws—in 1954 with the Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, decision that prohibited racial segregation in public schools, for example, and in 1973 with Roe v. Wade. Opponents complained bitterly about what they called “judicial activism,” insisting that unelected judges were undermining the will of the voters in the states. 

Beginning in the 1980s, as Republicans packed the courts with so-called originalists who weakened federal power in favor of state power, Republican-dominated state governments carefully chose their voters and then imposed their own values on everyone. 

Just a decade ago, reproductive rights scholar Elizabeth Dias told Jess Bidgood of the New York Times, a six-week abortion ban was seen even by many antiabortion activists as too radical, but after Trump appointed first Neil Gorsuch and then Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court, the balance of power shifted enough to make such a ban obtainable. Power over abortion rights went back to the states, where Republicans could restrict them.

Trump has said he would leave the issue of abortion to the states, even if states begin to monitor women’s pregnancies to keep them from obtaining abortions or to prosecute them if they have one. 

Vice President Kamala Harris was in Jacksonville, Florida, today to talk about reproductive rights. She put the fight over abortion in the larger context of the discriminatory state laws that have, historically, constructed a world in which some people have more rights than others. “This is a fight for freedom,” she said, “the fundamental freedom to make decisions about one’s own body and not have their government tell them what they’re supposed to do.” 

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[wilwheaton]

Over the four decades since the Reagan 1980s, the merely rich have become the morbidly rich while average working people have gone from a middle-class lifestyle being possible with a single income to two or more wage-earners being the now-necessary norm in American households. This crisis of economic inequality has, predictably, led working-class whites to look for villains and scapegoats, and today’s fascist GOP is happy to supply them. They’ve ginned up moral panics around trans kids, bathrooms, abortion, American history in our schools, and affirmative action, all to direct attention away from their embrace of fascism and their ongoing theft of over $50 trillion — so far — from the American middle class. Using racism, faux nationalism, misogyny, and the corruption of both democracy and the rule of law, Republicans are cementing their power in state after state with extreme voter suppression, gerrymandering, dismantling of checks-and-balances, and packing the courts.

Thom Hartmann

[robertreich]

Think Tipping Is Out of Control? Watch This.

TWO DOLLARS AND THIRTEEN CENTS AN HOUR.

That’s how much millions of American workers are paid under the federal subminimum wage — which was set all the way back in 1991.

While many think tipping for services has gotten out of control, arguing over who deserves a tip and how much they should get distracts from what we should really be angry about: business models that depend on not paying workers a living wage.

It’s bad enough that the federal minimum wage is a measly $7.25 an hour. But employers are allowed to pay tipped workers just $2.13 an hour because supposedly the workers will be able to make up for it in tips.

Saru Jayaraman of One Fair Wage has been advocating to change this absurd and exploitative law. I asked her to share with us FOUR big reasons why we need to get rid of the subminimum wage and pay service workers a full living wage with tips on top.

Number 1: Workers who earn a subminimum wage often end up making less than the minimum wage

43 states currently allow certain workers to be paid a subminimum wage. Employers in these states are legally required to make up the difference if a worker’s combined wage and tips don���t reach the full minimum wage. But over a third of tipped workers report that their bosses regularly fail to do this.

That’s because enforcement of wage laws is lax, and it makes it easier for employers to get away with shortchanging staff.

Number 2: The subminimum wage perpetuates gender discrimination and harassment on the job

More than two-thirds of tipped workers — 70% — in the U.S. are women. And one in six women that work a tipped job are living in poverty — that’s nearly 2.5 times the rate for workers overall.

Since workers earning the subminimum wage are so dependent on tips to make a living, they are put in situations where they have to tolerate inappropriate customer behavior. A staggering 76 percent — that’s more than three-quarters of tipped workers — have reported experiencing sexual harassment on the job. And that only got worse during the pandemic.

Number 3: Tipping is actually a relic of slavery

Tipped workers are disproportionately people of color. And Black service workers in particular consistently earn less, including tips, than their white counterparts for doing the same job.

Look, this inequity of the subminimum wage is tied to America’s history of structural racism.

Following the Civil War, tipping was used as a racist solution by employers who didn’t want to pay formerly enslaved Black workers. So by allowing them to pay their workers just in tips rather than a wage, employers were able to avoid directly paying these workers.

Number 4: Paying workers a living wage plus tips is actually better for business — and our economy.

Corporate lobbyists, particularly for the restaurant industry, warn that paying workers a full minimum wage with tips on top will be devastating to businesses. But research shows these fears are completely overblown.

So far, seven states have replaced their subminimum wage for tipped workers with a higher minimum wage that still allows for tips on top. These seven states are actually faring better than the 43 states with subminimum wages for tipped workers — both in the number of restaurants and number of people employed by restaurants. And take home pay for restaurant servers and bartenders in these states was 24% higher than in states with a wage of just $2.13 an hour.

Workers at restaurants that have scrapped their subminimum wages in favor of higher minimum wages with tips on top are more productive, happier, and less likely to quit their jobs. This alone helps business owners cut employee turnover nearly in half. This is especially important following the pandemic, when restaurants are facing historic staffing shortages because over 1 million workers have left the industry due to low pay.

So not only have higher wage states been able to maintain their industries, but workers are more productive, getting paid more, and less likely to live in poverty.  

And when workers have more money, they spend more money — stimulating their local economies in the process.

And for the first time in 30 years, workers are winning on this issue, like in DC and Chicago and a dozen other states.

The bottom line is that ending the subminimum wage for tipped workers is better for workers, it’s better for business, it’s better for our economy — and it’s the right thing to do.

[fiercynn]

let's talk about the palestinians in israeli prisons

content warning for discussion of police and military violence, torture, and murder of palestinians, including of children, though not in graphic detail

in just the past two weeks, israel’s genocidal ramp-up in violence and surveillance towards palestinian has led to the doubling of the population of palestinians incarcerated in israeli prisons. prior to october 7, 2023, there were approximately 5,200 palestinians incarcerated by israel; by october 21, that number had increased to over 10,000. around 4,000 are gazans who were working in israel with temporary labor permits, and another 1,070 are palestinians arrested in overnight army raids in the occupied west bank and east jerusalem.

imprisoned palestinians are being treated worse than ever; israeli forces and guards are assaulting them, starving them, preventing them from accessing healthcare, cutting off of their water and electricity, and prohibiting them from any contact from their families. the knesset (israeli parliament) even voted this past week to allow prisons to reduce the minimum living space allotted to each detainee because of the rising crush of prisoners, and to allow detainees to be imprisoned without a bed.

but this recent ramp-up in detention and increase in the dehumanization of palestinians should not overshadow the long history of oppression, torture, and murder of palestinians by israeli forces through the criminalization. for a good background and summary, rawan masri and fathi nemer’s piece imprisoning palestine: zionist colonialism through an abolitionist lens for scalawag magazine is an illuminating analysis of how israeli law, policing, and incarceration have worked together to advance zionist colonization of palestine and dispossess palestinians of their land, their rights, and their humanity.

as a result of this history, the following dynamics and outcomes have long existed in israeli policing and incarceration of palestinians:

prior to october 7, one in every five palestinians had been arrested and charged under israeli military occupation; that percentage has only gone up now. while the absolute numbers on incarceration are nowhere near a country like the u.s., the rates of incarceration for palestinians are massively higher even than those of black americans (which is not to downplay the latter; the rates of incarceration for black americans is also fucking ridiculous and horrifying.) for palestinian men, that incarceration rate was as high as 40%. the united nations estimates that approximately one million palestinians have been imprisoned since israel occupied the west bank and gaza in 1967, including tens of thousands of children.

the israeli criminal legal system is anti-black as well, particularly towards afro-palestinians, who are tireless in their fight for palestinian liberation. even black jewish people are impacted by carceral anti-blackness: 40% of minors in the israeli correction system are ethiopian israeli jewish people, although ethiopian israelis make up less than 2% of population. but the racism is even clearer for the tiny community of 350-400 afro-palestinians, who live in a neighborhood in jerusalem that is blockaded at both entrances by israeli police, where they are highly surveilled and face constant police harassment. the majority of their community has been arrested at one point or another, and those who are incarcerated, including youth, are subject to constant rearrests for flimsy reasons. for example, mohammed firawi, an afro-palestinian youth who had been arrested when he was in twelfth grade because he was accused of throwing stones at israeli police, was shuttled around nine israeli prisons before being released five years later. however, he was rearrested two days after his homecoming because he “defied Israeli orders to refrain from celebrating [his release].”

palestinians live under a different (and harsher) system of law than israelis – an inequality so profoundly unjust that it didn’t even exist in south africa’s apartheid system. in the occupied west bank, palestinians are tried under military law for the same crimes that israelis are tried under civilian law. teenagers and adults alike are tried in military courts, where simultaneous arabic interpretation is not provided, so palestinian defendants are only provided summaries at the end of proceedings that can leave out important details. virtually all military cases in the west bank end in convictions – 99.74%, to be exact.

the separate systems of law also mean that palestinians can be held without trial or even being charged. “administrative detention” allows the israeli military to hold prisoners indefinitely on secret information, and is applied almost exclusively to palestinians in the occupied west bank, east jerusalem, and gaza. prior to october 7, there were 1,264 administrative detainees out of the total 5,200 palestinian people incarcerated in israeli jails – almost 25%!

palestinian children detained by the israeli military are subject to physical and psychological torture. since the second intifada in 2000, more than 12,000 palestinian children have been detained by the israeli military, and between 500 and 1000 children are held every year. a save the children report from july 2023 found that 86% of palestinian children report being beaten in israeli military detention. 42% are injured at the point of arrest, and 69% report being strip-searched. they are often interrogated without the presence of a parent or lawyer, and potentially even in a language not understood to them. they are also charged according to their age at the time of sentencing instead of at the time of their alleged offense, allowing for higher charges simply because their trials take a long time.

palestinians are often murdered in prison by security forces, and the bodies of palestinians who die in detention can be kept by israeli forces for the remainder of their sentence. since 1967, approximately 237 palestinian detainees have reportedly been murdered with torture, medical negligence, or execution during arrest or an escape attempt. in late 2022 and early 2023, the united nations special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the occupied palestinian territories learned that israeli authorities were holding 125 palestinian bodies, including 13 bodies of palestinians who had died in prison, “allegedly as they need to terminate the execution of the sentence”. the bodies of palestinians are even lost or visibly damaged by israeli authorities when they are returned to families.

palestinian prisoners often face exile to gaza even when they are released, regardless of where they were originally from. former prisoners are often separated from their families, who may have difficulty entering gaza, and who may also lose rights simply for being related to a former prisoner. for example, formerly incarcerated palestinian shuaib abu snina was exiled to gaza, and found that his wife and children in jerusalem were raided and arrested by israeli forces using him as as reason. shuaib was forced to divorce his wife because his eldest son was told that israeli forces “will not deal with your [family] as citizens with rights in jerusalem unless your father divorces your mother”.

but even in captivity, palestinians continue to resist and fight for their liberation. incarcerated palestinians engage in mass disobedience even when faced with beatings or solitary confinement from doing so. since at least the 1960s, palestinians have undergone mass and individual hunger strikes; on may 2, 2023, khader adnan, who was being held without trial in administration detention, was martyred after 80 days of hunger strike. incarcerated palestinians also support each other and have earned concessions through their protests, such as increased visitations, better conditions, access to books and political curriculum, and more – though many of these are clearly being violated by the current israeli acceleration in imprisonment.

as rawan masri and fathi nemer conclude for scalawag magazine:

Today, more than ever, it remains crucial to center any discussion about Palestinian liberation through the lens of abolition and a complete rejection of carcerality. In this context, Incarceration is not only related to prisons and prisoners, but touches upon every aspect of our life. From the moment of birth, Palestinians must contend with being criminalized for existing. We are surveilled and censored, our oppression normalized, and our bodies corralled into various open-air and closed prisons. Such tactics have always revealed more about the jailor than the prisoner, and the logics inherent to the carceral apparatus are shared between all oppressive forces. While the goal is to project strength and power, what it divulges instead is fear, insecurity, and self-doubt. Resorting to locking away the inconvenient reminders of a crooked system betrays its weakness, a society unable to function without constructed villains onto which the world's ills can be pinned. It is an attempt to cover the sun with a sieve. [x]

organizations to follow and support:

addameer prisoner support and human rights association

samidoun palestinian prisoner solidarity network

al-haq

adalah legal center for arab minority rights in israel

adalah justice project

[philosophicalconservatism]

"Freedom is essentially a condition of inequality, not equality. It recognizes as a fact of nature the structural differences inherent in man — in temperament, character, and capacity — and it respects those differences. We are not alike and no law can make us so. ...When you seek the taproot of reform movements, you find an urgency to eradicate these innate differences and to make all men equal; in practice, this means the leveling-off of the more capable to the mediocrity of the average. That is not Freedom.”

Frank Chodorov (1887-1966) American political writer.

[radiofreederry]

Happy birthday, Paul Robeson! (April 9, 1898)

A celebrated actor and bass-baritone singer with a distinctive booming voice, Paul Robeson was born in Princeton, New Jersey to Reverend William Drew Robeson, a Presbyterian minister who had been born into slavery in North Carolina before escaping in his teens. The younger Robeson began acting in high school, and also excelled at sport. He won an academic scholarship to Rutgers University, which he graduated as class valedictorian in 1919. Robeson was socially conscious from a young age, and became especially concerned with inequality, both racial and economic, in American society. He attended Columbia Law School and worked for a time as a lawyer, but left the legal field behind due to its institutional racism. His talent for acting and singing allowed him to build a career in show business with the backdrop of the Harlem Renaissance, and he became especially known for his portrayal of Joe in Show Boat, with his rendition of "Ol' Man River" becoming iconic. He was also one of the first Black leads in American film history. In the 1930s, Robeson's social consciousness expanded, and he became interested in Africanism, anti-imperialism, and socialism, visiting the Soviet Union in 1934. Robeson would later reflect that his treatment in the Soviet Union was so starkly in contrast with the racism he experienced in America that he had felt like a full human being for the first time in his life. He became a left-wing political activist, supporting the Republicans in the Spanish Civil War and unionization in the United States. He was closely associated with a number of prominent socialists and members of the Communist Party, and supported Henry Wallace's 1948 Presidential campaign. He was also heavily involved in the early phase of the Civil Rights Movement. Robeson's political activities resulted in a backlash as the Cold War opened. He was blacklisted, forced to appear before the House UnAmerican Activities Committee, and his passport was revoked for several years, preventing him from touring. He retained popularity outside of the United States, and he was able to find some success touring in Europe and Australia, where he became the first person to perform at the site of the Sydney Opera House, singing the labor song "Joe Hill" for the workers building it. In poor health for much of his later life, Robeson died in 1976.

"My father was a slave, and my people died to build this country, and I'm going to stay right here and have a part of it, just like you. And no fascist-minded people like you will drive me from it. Is that clear?"

[faelapis]

as a scandinavian person i feel i need to speak up in cases of american police violence (like the particularly brutal one that just happened with tyre nichols) to say: it is not enough to just transition to a scandinavian model of less violent policing. that's a good start and you should absolutely push for cops to be properly trained in de-escalation and to be psychologically prepped so they don't see every person as a threat just for existing while black, but its not enough. police here are less violent, but they are still racist. they exist as the protectors of the rich - of property, of unjust laws, of the status quo.

none of this is to discourage you from activism in the service of smaller steps. those are important. i've been to america. while i am white (and so my experience will never come close), i still experienced a marked difference of a more hostile police that felt frightening to approach or interact with, who always seemed on edge and ready to do violence if provoked. just their increased presence, increased militarization and fundamentally different mindset are problematic cultural differences. that culture should be changed as soon as possible. things like "warrior training" should be banned outright, you should need a 3-year degree at least, with mandatory classes on the social causes of crime, socioeconomic inequality, police violence & power inequality, de-escalation, preventative measures, etc. those are all mandatory classes here and its the bare minimum.

[batboyblog]

The Biden-⁠Harris Administration Advances Equity and Opportunity for Black Americans

Growing Economic Opportunity for Black Families and Communities Through the President’s legislative victories, including the American Rescue Plan (ARP), the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL), the CHIPS and Science Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA)—as well as the President’s historic executive orders on racial equity—the Biden-Harris Administration is ensuring that federal investments through the President’s landmark Investing in America agenda are equitably flowing to communities to address longstanding economic inequities that impact people’s economic security, health, and safety. And this vision is already delivering results. The Biden-Harris Administration has:

Powered a historic economic recovery that created 2.6 million jobs for Black workers—and achieved both the lowest Black unemployment rate on record and the lowest gap between Black and White unemployment on record.

Helped Black working families build wealth. Black wealth is up by 60% relative to pre-pandemic—the largest increase on record.

Cut in half the number of Black children living in poverty in 2021 through ARP’s Child Tax Credit expansion. This expansion provided breathing room to the families of over 9 million Black children.

Began reversing decades of infrastructure disinvestment, including with $4 billion to reconnect communities that were previously cut off from economic opportunities by building needed transportation infrastructure in underserved communities, including Black communities.

Connected an estimated 5.5 million Black households to affordable high-speed internet through the Affordable Connectivity Program, closing the digital divide for millions of Black families.

Helping Black-Owned Businesses Grow and Thrive Since the President entered office, a record 16 million new business applications have been filed, and the share of Black households owning a business has more than doubled. Building on this momentum, the Biden-Harris Administration has:

Achieved the fastest creation rate of Black-owned businesses in more than 30 years—and more than doubled the share of Black business owners from 2019 to 2022.

Improved the Small Business Administration’s (SBA) flagship loan guarantee programs to expand the availability of capital to underserved communities. Since 2020, the number and dollar value of SBA-backed loans to Black-owned businesses have more than doubled.

Launched a whole-of-government effort to expand access to federal contracts for small businesses, awarding a record $69.9 billion to small disadvantaged businesses in 2022.

Through Treasury’s State Small Business Credit Initiative, invested $10 billion to expand access to capital and invest in early-stage businesses in all 50 states—including $2.5 billion in funding and incentive allocations dedicated to support the provision of capital to underserved businesses with $1 billion of these funds to be awarded to the jurisdictions that are most successful in reaching underserved businesses.

Helped more than 37,000 farmers and ranchers who were in financial distress, including Black farmers and ranchers, stay on their farms and keep farming, thanks to resources provided through IRA. The IRA allocated $3.1 billion for the Department of Agriculture (USDA) to provide relief for distressed borrowers with at-risk agricultural operations with outstanding direct or guaranteed Farm Service Agency loans. USDA has provided over $2 billion and counting in timely assistance.

Supported small and disadvantaged businesses through CHIPS Act funding by requiring funding applicants to develop a workforce plan to create equitable pathways for economically disadvantaged individuals in their region, as well as a plan to support procurement from small, minority-owned, veteran-owned, and women-owned businesses.

Created the $27 billion Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund that will invest in clean energy projects in low-income and disadvantaged communities.

Increasing Access to Housing and Rooting Out Discrimination in the Housing Market for Black Communities To increase access to housing and root out discrimination in the housing market, including for Black families and communities, the Biden-Harris Administration has:

Set up the first-ever national infrastructure to stop evictions, scaling up the ARP-funded Emergency Rental Assistance program in over 400 communities across the country, helping 8 million renters and their families stay in their homes. Over 40% of all renters helped are Black—and this support prevented millions of evictions, with the largest effects seen in majority-Black neighborhoods.

Published a proposed “Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing” rule through the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), which will help overcome patterns of segregation and hold states, localities, and public housing agencies that receive federal funds accountable for ensuring that underserved communities have equitable access to affordable housing opportunities.

Created the Interagency Task Force on Property Appraisal and Valuation Equity, or PAVE, a first-of-its-kind interagency effort to root out bias in the home appraisal process, which is taking sweeping action to advance equity and remove racial and ethnic bias in home valuations, including cracking down on algorithmic bias and empowering consumers to take action against misvaluation.

Taken additional steps through HUD to support wealth-generation activities for prospective and current homeowners by expanding access to credit by incorporating a borrower’s positive rental payment history into the mortgage underwriting process. HUD estimates this policy change will enable an additional 5,000 borrowers per year to qualify for an FHA-insured loan.

Ensuring Equitable Educational Opportunity for Black Students To expand educational opportunity for the Black community in early childhood and beyond, the Biden-Harris Administration has:

Approved more than $136 billion in student loan debt cancellation for 3.7 million Americans through various actions and launched a new student loan repayment plan—the Saving on a Valuable Education (SAVE) plan—to help many students and families cut in half their total lifetime payments per dollar borrowed.

Championed the largest increase to Pell Grants in the last decade—a combined increase of $900 to the maximum award over the past two years, affecting the over 60% of Black undergraduates who rely on Pell grants.

Fixed the Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) program, so all qualified borrowers get the debt relief to which they are entitled. More than 790,000 public servants have received more than $56 billion in loan forgiveness since October 2021. Prior to these fixes, only 7,000 people had ever received forgiveness through PSLF.

Delivered a historic investment of over $7 billion to support HBCUs.

Reestablished the White House Initiative on Advancing Educational Equity, Excellence, and Economic Opportunity for Historically Black Colleges and Universities and the White House Initiative on Advancing Educational Equity, Excellence, and Economic Opportunity for Black Americans.

Through ARP, secured $130 billion—the largest investment in public education in history—to help students get back to school, recover academically in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, and address student mental health.

Secured a 30% increase in child care assistance funding last year. Black families comprise 38% of families benefiting from federal child care assistance. Additionally, the President secured an additional $1 billion for Head Start, a program where more than 28% of children and pregnant women who benefit identify as Black.

Improving Health Outcomes for Black Families and Communities To improve health outcomes for the Black community, the Biden-Harris Administration has:

Increased Black enrollment in health care coverage through the Affordable Care Act by 49%—or by around 400,000—from 2020 to 2022, helping more Black families gain health insurance than ever before.

Through IRA, locked in lower monthly premiums for health insurance, capped the cost of insulin at $35 per covered insulin product for Medicare beneficiaries, and helped further close the gap in access to medication by improving prescription drug coverage and lowering drug costs in Medicare. 

Through ARP, expanded postpartum coverage from 60 days to 12 months in 43 states and Washington, D.C., covering 700,000 more women in the year after childbirth. Medicaid covers approximately 65% of births for Black mothers, and this investment is a critical step to address maternal health disparities.

Financed projects that will replace hundreds of thousands of lead pipes, helping protect against lead poisoning that disproportionately affects Black communities.

Provided 264 grants with $1 billion in Bipartisan Safer Communities Act funds to more than 40 states to increase the supply of school-based mental health professionals in communities with high rates of poverty.

Launched An Unprecedented Whole-Of-Government Equity Agenda to Ensure the Promise of America for All Communities, including Black Communities President Biden believes that advancing equity, civil rights, racial justice, and equal opportunity is the responsibility of the whole of our government, which will require sustained leadership and partnership with all communities. To make the promise of America real for every American, including for the Black Community, the President has:

Signed two Executive Orders directing the Federal Government to advance an ambitious whole-of-government equity agenda that matches the scale of the challenges we face as a country and the opportunities we have to build a more perfect union.

Nominated the first Black woman to serve on the Supreme Court and more Black women to federal circuit courts than every President combined.

Countered hateful attempts to rewrite history including: the signing of the Emmett Till Antilynching Act; establishing Juneteenth as a national holiday; and designating the Emmett Till and Mamie Till-Mobley National Monument in Mississippi and Illinois. The Department of the Interior has invested more than $295 million in infrastructure funding and historic preservation grants to protect and restore places significant to Black history.

Created the Justice40 Initiative, which is delivering 40% of the overall benefits of certain Federal investments in clean energy, affordable and sustainable housing, clean water, and other programs to disadvantaged communities that are marginalized by underinvestment and overburdened by pollution as part of the most ambitious climate, conservation, and environmental justice agenda in history.

Protecting the Sacred Right to Vote for Black Families and Communities Since their first days in office, President Biden and Vice President Harris have prioritized strengthening our democracy and protecting the sacred right to vote in free, fair, and secure elections. To do so, the President has:

Signed an Executive Order to leverage the resources of the Federal Government to provide nonpartisan information about the election process and increase access to voter registration. Agencies across the Federal Government are taking action to respond to the President’s call for an all-of-government effort to enhance the ability of all eligible Americans to participate in our democracy.

Repeatedly and forcefully called on Congress to pass essential legislation, including the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act and the Freedom to Vote Act, including calling for an exception to the filibuster to pass voting rights legislation.

Increased funding for the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division, which has more than doubled the number of voting rights enforcement attorneys. The Justice Department also created the Election Threats Task Force to assess allegations and reports of threats against election workers, and investigate and prosecute these matters where appropriate.

Signed into law the bipartisan Electoral Reform Count Act, which establishes clear guidelines for our system of certifying and counting electoral votes for President and Vice President, to preserve the will of the people and to protect against the type of attempts to overturn our elections that led to the January 6 insurrection.

Addressing the Crisis of Gun Violence in Black Communities Gun violence has become the leading cause of death for all youth and Black men in America, as well as the second leading cause of death for Black women. To address this national crisis, the President has:

Launched the first-ever White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention, and taken more executive action on gun violence than any President in history, including investments in violence reduction strategies that address the root causes of gun violence and address emerging threats like ghost guns. In 2022, the Administration’s investments in evidence-based, lifesaving programs combined with aggressive action to stop the flow of illegal guns and hold shooters accountable yielded a 12.4% reduction in homicides across the United States.

Signed into the law the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, the most significant gun violence reduction legislation enacted in nearly 30 years, including investments in violence reduction strategies and historic policy changes to enhance background checks for individuals under age 21, narrow the dating partner loophole in the gun background check system, and provide law enforcement with tools to crack down on gun trafficking.

Secured the first-ever dedicated federal funding stream for community violence intervention programs, which have been shown to reduce violence by as much as 60%. These programs are effective because they leverage trusted messengers who work directly with individuals most likely to commit gun violence, intervene in conflicts, and connect people to social, health and wellness, and economic services to reduce the likelihood of violence as an answer to conflict.

Enhancing Public Trust and Strengthening Public Safety for Black Communities Our criminal justice system must protect the public and ensure fair and impartial justice for all. These are mutually reinforcing goals. To enhance equal justice and public safety for all communities, including the Black community, the President has:

Signed a historic Executive Order to put federal policing on the path to becoming the gold standard of effectiveness and accountability by requiring federal law enforcement agencies to ban chokeholds; restrict no-knock warrants; mandate the use of body-worn cameras; implement stronger use-of-force policies; provide de-escalation training; submit use-of-force data; submit officer misconduct records into a new national accountability database; and restrict the sale or transfer of military equipment to local law enforcement agencies, among other things. 

Taken steps to right the wrongs stemming from our Nation’s failed approach to marijuana by directing the Departments of Health and Human Services and Justice to expeditiously review how marijuana is scheduled under federal law and in October 2022 issued categorical pardons of prior federal and D.C. offenses of simple possession of marijuana and in December 2023 pardoned additional offenses of simple possession and use of marijuana under federal and D.C. law. While white, Black, and brown people use marijuana at similar rates, Black and brown people have been arrested, prosecuted, and convicted at disproportionately higher rates.

Announced over 100 concrete policy actions as part of a White House evidence-informed, multi-year Alternatives, Rehabilitation, and Reentry Strategic Plan to safely reduce unnecessary criminal justice system interactions so police officers can focus on fighting crime; supporting rehabilitation during incarceration; and facilitating successful reentry.

FACT SHEET

[fatehbaz]

As early as 1700, Samuel Sewall, the renowned Boston judge and diarist, connected “the two most dominant moral questions of that moment: the rapid rise of the slave trade and the support of global piracy” in many American colonies [...]. In the course of the eighteenth century, [...] [there was a] semantic shift in the [literary] trope of piracy in the Atlantic context, turning its [...] connotations from exploration and adventure to slavery and exploitation. [...] [A] large share of Atlantic seafaring took place in the service of the circum-Atlantic slave trade, serving European empire-building in the Americas. [...] Ships have been cast as important sites of struggle and as symbols of escape in [...] Black Atlantic consciousness, from Olaudah Equiano’s Interesting Narrative (1789) and Richard Hildreth’s The Slave: or Memoir of Archy Moore (1836 [...]) to nineteenth century Atlantic abolitionist literature such as Frederick Douglass’s My Bondage and My Freedom (1855) or Martin Delany’s Blake (1859-1862). [...] Black and white abolitionists across the Atlantic world were imagining a different social order revolving around issues of resistance, liberty, (human) property, and (il)legality [...].

---

Using black pirates as figures of resistance [...], Maxwell Philip’s novel Emmanuel Appadocca (1854) emphasizes the nexus of insatiable material desire and its conditions of production: slavery. [...] [T]he consumption of commodities produced by slave labor itself was delegitimized [...]. Philip, a Trinidadian [and "illegitimate" "colored" child] [...], published Emmanuel Appadocca as a protest against slavery in the United States [following the Fugitive Slave laws of 1850.]. [...] [The novel places] at its center [...] a heroic non-white pirate and intellectual [...] [whose] pirate ship [...] [is] significantly named The Black Schooner [...]. One of the central discourses in [the book] is that of legitimacy, of rights and lawfulness, of both slavery and piracy [...]. About midway into the book, Appadocca gives a [...] speech in which he argues that colonialism itself is a piratical system:

If I am guilty of piracy, you, too [are] [...] guilty of the very same crime. ... [T]he whole of the civilized world turns, exists, and grows enormous on the licensed system of robbing and thieving, which you seem to criminate so much ... The people which a convenient position ... first consolidated, developed, and enriched, ... sends forth its numerous and powerful ships to scour the seas, the penetrate into unknown regions, where discovering new and rich countries, they, in the name of civilization, first open an intercourse with the peaceful and contented inhabitants, next contrive to provoke a quarrel, which always terminates in a war that leaves them the conquerors and possessors of the land. ... [T]he straggling [...] portions of a certain race [...] are chosen. The coasts of the country on which nature has placed them, are immediately lined with ships of acquisitive voyagers, who kidnap and tear them away [...].

In this [...], slavery appears as a direct consequence of the colonial venture encompassing the entire “civilized world,” and “powerful ships” - the narrator refers to the slavers here - are this world’s empire builders. [...] Piracy, for Philip, signifies a just rebellion, a private, legitimate [resistance] against colonial exploiters and economic inequality - he repeatedly invokes their solidarity as misfortunate outcasts [...].

---

All text above by: Alexandra Ganser. “Cultural Constructions of Piracy During the Crisis Over Slavery.” A chapter from Crisis and Legitimacy in the Atlantic American Narratives of Piracy: 1678-1865. Published 2020. [Bold emphasis and some paragraph breaks/contractions added by me.]

[truthdogg]

How long can an extreme ultra-capitalist nation survive without becoming an authoritarian dystopia?

I’ve been pondering that today, but it’s occurred to me that it’s worth noting this extremist capitalist society called the United States did start out as an authoritarian dystopia.

I had originally typed “for a massive number of people living within it” to the end of the sentence above, but I’ve erased it because that’s what all dystopias are. They are never horrific dictatorships to everyone. There is always an in-group that lives in relative comfort with relative freedom that simply does not consider the suffering of others to be relevant to their lives.

The US was built by a wealthy merchant class to be that dystopia where those merchants and landowners were the in-group, replacing the king and his appointees. The country shifted toward freedom for all, toward democracy over time, not away from it. The right to vote was first held only by male landowners of the upper class, it was not designed to be egalitarian for all. The notion that it was ever meant to be for all people is a lie we tell ourselves so we can feel special about our country’s founding, but it’s still a lie, and it’s a dangerous one.

Accepting this history, and considering it, changes the question. It becomes:

How long can an extreme ultra-capitalist nation survive without returning to an authoritarian dystopia?

That’s a more tangible premise to consider. It shifts the argument from an inevitable economic condition in the hands of capital, to a political one in the hands of people. Extreme capitalist oligarchy has always been in direct opposition to full democracy, because under democracy, capital’s power can be overruled by the will of the people. When the needs of the people cannot override the interests of wealth, then democracy is no longer functioning; an oligarchy has control. Maintaining that control in the face of increasing hardship for people inevitably requires more power. This premise leads us to look at how oligarchy may strengthen its grip.

We can look right now and see precisely which elected politicians are arguing that the US is not (and should not be) a democracy, but a republic. We can see exactly who is arguing for a return to constitutional principles, while suggesting we suspend the Constitution. We can see exactly who preaches “Law & Order” while ignoring the law. We can see exactly who claims that some votes should count more than others, and that their candidate is “the real winner.” We can also listen and learn exactly who is paying them to do that. We can then gauge their support and the support for their ideas to see how much time we have left before we empower people to undo the past century of incomplete social progress.

An oddity of today is that the US is hurtling in two directions at once. One is toward a more empowered people, with unions rising, differences celebrated and enjoyed, and a support for struggling individuals. The other is accelerating wealth inequality, indifference to suffering, and desperation driving down wages while increasing profits. Both are happening, both are accelerating. That’s not sustainable.

The highly dedicated people pushing hard in both of those directions often see the other side as a destabilizing anti-American force, determined to upend whatever greatness we have. And they’re both right about that, it’s just that one sees America as a fully-formed sacred ideal that’s been lost, and the other sees it as a process for building a more perfect Union. This is the divide that the nation was born with, and the same divide that led to the Civil War.

I’m not shy about which side I’m on. We have to keep pushing for stronger democracy and a happier people.

The other side, the one that sees America as built by prophets, that wants to ban history so their prophets won’t be questioned, that unrealistically imagines themselves to be the in-group the founders intended, will return us to their authoritarian dystopia. That is where all of their arguments originate, and where all of their arguments lead.

That’s why MAGA uses the word “again.” They mean to return us to a time they thought was great, where the in-group was clear and life was miserable for everyone else, because they genuinely believe they’ll be the new in-group. They won’t, they all can’t, but they will take us there quickly as soon as they can.

[drdemonprince]

The Dawn of Everything is a book about the history of human inequality, and of the concept of states — that is, governments that reign over an entire body of land and the people upon it, using information, violence, and propagandistic charm in order to so. Though today state governments touch basically every corner of the planet, laws dictate how we must behave, and a sharp divide separates the wealthy and powerful from the poor and humble, there is no reason to believe humans were always going to wind up living this way, or that we should continue to.  It turns out that most gatherings of humans that have existed in history were not ruled by states. States are a recent invention, really, dating back only a couple hundred years at most — and before the entire world became covered in seemingly all-powerful state governments, leaders didn’t possess ultimate control over their subjects. In fact, subjects had a degree of choice over whether to remain subjects at all.  Henry VIII certainly wouldn’t have thought of himself as leading a state called England, for example, though we might talk about him as if he were a state leader now. Even with whatever military might, wealth, and charm he might have possessed, he could never ensure that a representative sent on his behalf would actually follow his orders. It was difficult to punish a treasonous or dishonest courtier once they were out of the king’s immediate physical grasp. Wengrow & Graeber state that in fact, this is true of most monarchs and rulers throughout human history.  To take an example from a completely different realm of the world, the societies of the Incas and Aztecs were also quite permeable; though they engaged in warfare, war games, and ritualistic killings, these and many other Indigenous American peoples couldn’t restrict the movement of all that lived within what we now call their “empire”. In fact, they didn’t really have empires in the way we typically mean that word. Individuals moved in and out of these societies quite freely at all times. There was no citizenship, there were no borders, and there usually was no standing military. Kings and chiefs had very little oversight over what was happening in their kingdoms, and people frequently left of their own accord. 

It’s difficult for modern people to imagine a life of such unbridled liberty and unauthoredness. Today, our names and histories follow us everywhere that we go. Knowledge about who we are, where we’ve lived, the kinds of jobs we’ve labored in, and even the medical issues we’ve endured can follow us everywhere we go. Even if we travel to far-away lands with different languages and cultures, we have to seek approval from multiple governments in order to do so, and we can’t be freed of our old associations if we do.  But in the past, humans could cast off their names and histories, or even have their names changed by a new culture they’d joined. Entire societies of people split off from existing cultures, and then chose to distinguish themselves from those old cultures as much as humanly possible, with hunters & raiders sometimes becoming peaceful foragers and vice versa. 

Throughout most of human history, state rule was not supreme, social rules were not inviolable, and people did have some say over the rules of the societies in which they lived. In their book, Wengrow and Graeber argue that most of humanity enjoyed three fundamental freedoms — and that the loss of these three freedoms is why we now live with deeply entrenched inequality that can’t seem to be moved.  The three freedoms that most of our ancestors enjoyed, but which most modern humans lack are:  The freedom to leave. The freedom to disobey an order. The freedom to create new ways of relating to one another.  In the remainder of this essay, I will break each of these freedoms down, provide some historical and anthropological evidence for their widespread existence in human history, and explain what the loss of them means for us today. Consider this a supercharged Spark Notes of Graeber and Wengrow’s Dawn of Everything, and a reflective review sharing some of the book’s most important take-aways. 

The rest of this essay is free to read or listen to on my substack!

[bringmemyrocks]

Noura Erakat short IG live about the ruling. Dr. Noura Erakat is an American legal scholar specializing in human rights and international law. Her book, Justice for Some, highlights legal inequalities that Palestinians face under Israeli apartheid. More info on her on her website: http://www.nouraerakat.com/

Her above Instagram live is 5 mins long. Original insta link: https://www.instagram.com/p/C2kNBRFAhZx/

Note that words like "chance of" and "risk of" are necessary from a legal perspective.

This post and insta live are not a substitute for in-depth research. I had about 20 minutes to throw it together bc I'm at work right now. More analysis at Al Jazeera; please read there as well: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2024/1/26/live-icj-to-issue-preliminary-ruling-in-south-africa-genocide-case-against-i

Key takeaways for anyone who can't watch the video I am not a lawyer; if you have headphones and can understand English without subtitles, please watch the video and don't read my summary:

This ruling stated that further action should be taken, further investigation into the genocide should be done, meaning it is more likely other countries/avenues can prosecute Israel. It easily could have gone the other way and been shut down. That's what Israel wanted. That's not what Israel got.

Erakat's primary feeling was relief, especially knowing that this court decision could be a great source of harm. It easily could have ruled that there was no genocide happening, and it did not do this.

This decision largely vindicated the voices of Palestinians by saying Israel was committing or failing to prevent genocide, and that there is risk of irreparable harm from Israel's actions. If the court had not done this, it would have been far worse, and that was a genuine possibility.

Getting the ICJ to demand a ceasefire was always a long shot (she does not elaborate re: why, but I trust her scholarship on this,) and so having the court uphold every provisional measure except the ceasefire was a really big win.

If the ICJ had ordered a ceasefire, it would still have been unenforceable.

This ruling gives valuable precedent for other countries to impose sanctions and/or condition aid to Israel, and you can see this in how other countries are already reacting.

The ICJ rejected every single one of Israel's arguments.

Yes, the ICJ acknowledging a genocide is a low bar. But it's still a big deal given the international context (how powerful Israel and the USA are) and you can see this in how the Israeli government is reacting right now. (Ben Gvir: "This court is not seeking justice, but rather the persecution of the Jewish people" this has them really shaking)

The courts' rulings were near-unanimous in favor of South Africa. The judge who ruled against South Africa in the 16-1 was not Israel's appointed judge (Ehud Barak), it was the judge from Uganda.

My own note; something she didn't mention: the ICJ did not vote against a ceasefire; rather they did not rule on it at all. Still disappointing, but this is not the same as them specifically ruling against it.

Again, please watch the video if you can. I'm sure she'll put out more info as the day goes on.

Al Jazeera in-depth analysis: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2024/1/26/live-icj-to-issue-preliminary-ruling-in-south-africa-genocide-case-against-i

Perspective from Ali Abunimah of Electronic Intifada (I recommend his twitter rn:https://twitter.com/AliAbunimah)

This post is not to invalidate anyone's anger at the ruling, but hopefully gives some larger perspective for those who are interested from a legal angle from a scholar who specializes in international human rights law. Be angry at the crumbs if you want; this is just the perspective of a legal scholar who does a lot of work on Palestine.

[porterdavis]

A startling fact

Of Americans born in 1940, 92 percent went on to earn more than their parents; among those born in 1980, just 50 percent did.

How and why did this happen?

American voters abandoned the system that worked for their grandparents. From the 1940s through the ’70s, sometimes called the New Deal era, U.S. law and policy were engineered to ensure strong unions, high taxes on the rich, huge public investments, and an expanding social safety net. Inequality shrank as the economy boomed. But by the end of that period, the economy was faltering, and voters turned against the postwar consensus. Ronald Reagan took office promising to restore growth by paring back government, slashing taxes on the rich and corporations, and gutting business regulations and antitrust enforcement. The idea, famously, was that a rising tide would lift all boats. Instead, inequality soared while living standards stagnated and life expectancy fell behind that of peer countries. No other advanced economy pivoted quite as sharply to free-market economics as the United States, and none experienced as sharp a reversal in income, mobility, and public-health trends as America did. Today, a child born in Norway or the United Kingdom has a far better chance of out-earning their parents than one born in the U.S.

Rogé Karma, The Atlantic

[robertreich]

From Robber Barons to Bezos: Is History Repeating Itself?

Ultra-wealthy elites…Political corruption…Vast inequality…

These problems aren’t new — in the late 1800s they dominated the country during America’s first Gilded Age.

We overcame these abuses back then, and we can do it again.

Mark Twain coined the moniker “The Gilded Age” in his 1873 novel to describe the era in American history characterized by corruption and inequality that was masked by a thin layer of prosperity for a select few.

The end of the 19th century and start of the 20th marked a time of great invention — bustling railroads, telephones, motion pictures, electricity, automobiles — which changed American life forever.

But it was also an era of giant monopolies — oil, railroad, steel, finance — run by a small group of men who had grown rich beyond anything America had ever seen.

They were known as “robber barons” because they ran competitors out of business, exploited workers, charged customers exorbitant prices, and lived like royalty as a result.

Money consumed politics. Robber barons and their lackeys donated bundles of cash to any lawmaker willing to do bidding on their behalf. And when lobbying wasn’t enough, the powerful turned to bribery — resulting in some of the most infamous political scandals in American history.

The gap between the rich and poor in America reached astronomical levels. Large numbers of Americans lived in squalor.

Anti-immigrant sentiment raged, leading to the enactment of racist laws to restrict immigration. And voter suppression, largely aimed at Black men who had recently won the right to vote, was rampant.

The era was also marked by dangerous working conditions. Children often as young as 10, but sometimes younger, worked brutal hours in sweatshops. Workers trying to organize labor unions were attacked and killed.

It seemed as if American capitalism was out of control, and American democracy couldn’t do anything about it because it was bought and paid for by the rich.

But Americans were fed up, and they demanded reform. Many took to the streets in protest.

Investigative journalists, often called “muckrakers” then, helped amplify their cries by exposing what was occurring throughout the country.

And a new generation of political leaders rose to end the abuses.

Politicians like Teddy Roosevelt, who warned that, “a small class of enormously wealthy and economically powerful men, whose chief object is to hold and increase their power,” could destroy American democracy.

After becoming president in 1901, Roosevelt used the Sherman Antitrust Act to break up dozens of powerful corporations, including the giant Northern Securities Company which had come to dominate railroad transportation through a series of mergers.

Seeking to limit the vast fortunes that were creating a new American aristocracy, Congress enacted a progressive income tax through the 16th Amendment, as well as two wealth taxes.

The first wealth tax, in 1916, was the estate tax — a tax on the wealth someone accumulated during their lifetime, paid by the heirs who inherited it. The second tax on wealth, enacted in 1922, was a capital gains tax — a tax on the increased value of assets, paid when those assets were sold.

The reformers of the Gilded Age also stopped corporations from directly giving money to politicians or political candidates.

And then Teddy Roosevelt’s fifth cousin — you may have heard of him — continued the work through his New Deal programs — creating Social Security, unemployment insurance, a 40-hour workweek, and requiring that employers bargain in good faith with labor unions.

But following the death of FDR and the end of World War II, when America was building the largest middle class the world had ever seen — we seemed to forget about the abuses of the Gilded Age.

Now, more than a century later, America has entered a second Gilded Age.

It is also a time of extraordinary invention.

And a time when monopolies are taking over vast swathes of the economy, so we must renew antitrust enforcement to bust up powerful companies.

Now, another generation of robber barons is accumulating unprecedented money and power. So once again, we must tax these exorbitant fortunes.  

Wealthy individuals and big corporations are once again paying off lawmakers, sending them billions to conduct their political campaigns, even giving luxurious gifts to Supreme Court justices. So we need to protect our democracy from Big Money, just as we did before.

Voter suppression runs rampant in the states as during the first Gilded Age, making it harder for people of color to participate in what’s left of our democracy. So it’s once again critical to defend and expand voting rights.

Working people are once again being exploited and abused, child labor is returning, unions are busted, the poor are again living in unhealthy conditions, homelessness is on the rise, and the gap between the ultra-rich and everyone else is nearly as large as in the first Gilded Age. So once again we need to protect the rights of workers to organize, invest in social safety nets, and revive guardrails to protect against the abuses of great wealth and power.

The question now is the same as it was at the start of the 20th century: Will we fight for an economy and a democracy that works for all rather than the few?

We’ve done it before. We can — and must — do it again.