California Governor Gavin Newsom (D) signed several “reparations” bills on Thursday, including a formal apology for slavery and racial injustice, despite the state having entered the Union as a free state in 1850.
These bills represent a broader effort to address historical wrongs and racial inequality, though they fall short of the cash reparations that many activists have demanded.
The formal apology acknowledges that, although California was a free state, it still participated in practices that harmed African Americans. The apology reads in part:
“Whereas, well after California entered the Union and declared itself a free state outlawing slavery, more than 2,000 enslaved African people were brought to California from 1850 to 1860. Whereas, the California Supreme Court enforced fugitive slave laws until 1865, stating that the antislavery law in the California Constitution was merely a ‘declaration of a principle.'”
The resolution continues by formally apologizing for the state’s role in perpetuating racial prejudice and discrimination, stating:
“Resolved, the State of California apologizes for perpetuating the harms African Americans faced by having imbued racial prejudice through segregation, public and private discrimination, and unequal disbursal of state and federal funding and declares that such actions shall not be repeated.”
In addition to the apology, Newsom signed several other bills passed by the state legislature that were pushed by reparations advocates.
However, as reported by Breitbart News, these bills did not include direct cash payments or the establishment of a reparations fund, leading to protests from some activists who felt the measures did not go far enough.
The movement for reparations gained momentum during the summer of 2020, a period marked by widespread protests and riots following the murder of George Floyd by police officers in Minneapolis.
The national reckoning over racial injustice spurred many states, including California, to reconsider how they could address systemic inequality.
In 2020, Newsom signed legislation establishing a committee to study reparations and make recommendations.
The committee eventually proposed significant measures, including large cash payments and the creation of racially separate schools.
However, these recommendations were toned down by the state legislature, and Newsom himself only allocated $12 million toward the reparations issue in the state’s current budget—a small sum considering California’s nearly $50 billion budget deficit.
Despite the absence of direct payments, the California Legislative Black Caucus (CLBC) praised the state’s actions, highlighting the apology and other reparations-related legislation as significant steps forward.
CLBC leaders hope that California’s moves will inspire other states, and potentially the federal government, to take similar actions in acknowledging and addressing the long history of racial injustice in the United States.
While the bills represent progress for many, the lack of immediate financial reparations has left some reparations advocates disappointed.
Nonetheless, the legislation and formal apology mark an important moment in California’s ongoing efforts to reckon with its historical treatment of African Americans.
The impact of these efforts, and whether they will lead to broader reparations movements in other parts of the country, remains to be seen.
6 Comments
I fail to understand how a broke state can pay out money that it does not have? Oooops nevermind just the same way the current administration is running the Treasury.
Black Lies Matter has your reparations. You better hurry before it’s all gone
Will the descendants of the African tribal chiefs that sold their people into slavery, the Arab slavers and the ship captains and crews who transported the slaves be contributing to any monetary reparations or will we who NEVER had ancestors who owned slaves be stuck with the bill? I thought so…
The State of California deserves what they voted for, now they are up to their neck in debt and still spending. I have no sympathy for them.
That’s just great. People of a state that was admitted to the Union as a free state apologizing for something they never perpetrated to a people that have never been slaves. I will NEVER apologize for slavery in this country. I have NEVER participated in slavery nor have ever owned a slave and neither did any of my ancestors. In fact, my ancestors fought to FREE SLAVES and SHED BLOOD in doing so. I am owed a grateful thank you for my ancestors. I am a victim of slanderous lies espoused by those who live their lives portraying themselves as victims due to something that happened 150 years ago and more. You want to blame someone? Blame the democrats who fought as confederates to keep slavery, who founded the Ku Klux Klan, who continued with Jim Crow behavior in the South, who continue to try to make laws that demean blacks by their insane voting laws that insist blacks are incapable of getting ID’s. They continue to treat blacks as children, ignorant slaves incapable of working and advancing on their own merit but can only do well as a result of affirmative action and now they have gone “all in” for DEI, which is just affirmative action recycled. The civil rights acts of the early 60’s were passed UNANIMOUSLY BY REPUBLICANS and NOT A SINGLE DEMOCRAT VOTED IN FAVOR OF THOSE ACTS. The only reason democrat President Lyndon B. Johnson wanted them to pass is, as he said, “I’ll have those n…..s voting democrat for the next 100 years”. How sad that so many of you have stayed on that democrat plantation.
Imagine Greusome Neusome is trying to score points for his next fraud election. This is an idiot in action. I say let the slave owners pay the slaves if money is involved. Oh, right, no one is a slave or owner and living. Just dumb. Hope you throw a blood clot Neusome. Stroke out to just lay there. POS.