John,



I was recently given documents showing that both Amy and I are descended
from people who owned slaves. Along with other possessions listed in their
property log were two human beings, Rose and Eliza.

A paternal great-great-great grandfather of mine, Andrew Cowan Jasper,
owned these two women in the 1850s. There are also records showing that a
maternal great-great-great grandfather, Frederick Williams, most likely
owned slaves in the 1860s (“most likely,” because we are not certain that
the Frederick Williams who is my ancestor and the Frederick Williams who
owned slaves are the same person, but there’s enough circumstantial data
to lead me to conclude that it’s likely).

Records also showed that Amy had an ancestor who owned slaves and another
who was a member of the Confederate Army.

Something that we’ve been thinking about and talking about in town hall
meetings and out on the campaign — the legacy of slavery in the United
States — now has a much more personal connection.

Ownership of other human beings conferred advantages not just to Andrew
Jasper and Frederick Williams, but to Jasper’s and Williams’ descendants
as well. They were able to build wealth on the backs and off the sweat of
others, wealth that they would then be able to pass down to their children
and their children’s children. In some way, and in some form, that
advantage would pass through to me and my children.

That those enslaved Americans owned by my ancestors were denied their
freedom, denied the ability to amass wealth, denied full civil rights in
America after slavery also had long term repercussions for them and their
descendants.

The way that fortune was passed through the generations from Andrew to me,
misfortune was passed through the generations from Rose and Eliza to their
descendants who are alive today. Rose and Eliza were denied their freedom
and the benefits that their labor produced; they and their children were
then denied their civil rights after the end of Reconstruction; and their
descendants endured open terrorism, economic exclusion and racism in the
form of Jim Crow, lynchings, convict leasing, voter suppression, red
lining, predatory lending, and mass incarceration. Everything their
descendants have accomplished in their lives is despite having all of
these odds stacked against them.

In the aggregate, slavery, its legacy and the ensuing forms of
institutionalized racism have produced an America with stark differences
in opportunities and outcomes, depending on race.

For example, there is 10 times the wealth in white American than there is
in black America. Black men are six times more likely to be incarcerated
than white men. The disparity in infant mortality between black families
and white families is greater today than it was in 1850. Whether it’s the
economy, healthcare, education, criminal justice or even in the inherent
biases revealed by technology, there really are two Americas.

I benefit from a system that my ancestors built to favor themselves at the
expense of others. That only increases the urgency I feel to help change
this country so that it works for those who have been locked-out of — or
locked-up in — this system.

As a person, as a candidate for the office of the Presidency, I will do
everything I can to deliver on this responsibility.

In addition to making significant changes to education policy (immediately
address $23 billion in underfunding for minority-majority public schools),
economic policy (ensuring equal pay, deploying capital to minority- and
women-owned businesses, $25 billion in government procurement to these
same businesses), healthcare (universal healthcare and home health visits
to women of color to reverse trend in maternal and infant mortality) and
criminal justice (police accountability, ending the drug war, and
expunging arrest records for nonviolent drug crimes), I will continue to
support reparations, beginning with an important national conversation on
slavery and racial injustice.

We all need to know our own story as it relates to the national story,
much as I am learning mine. It is only then, I believe, that we can take
the necessary steps to repair the damage done and stop visiting this
injustice on the generations that follow ours.

- Beto



 


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