(The Slice): With the investigation of the death of Emmett Till being closed recently, it seems fitting to revisit anti-lynching laws proposed by House Democrats, H.R.55, The Emmett Till Anti-Lynching Act. It would define lynching as a hate crime and would associate penalties with an offense. The bill was introduced in 2021 and sponsored by Representative for Illinois's 1st congressional district, Bobby Rush. Rush was joined by 179 Democrat co-sponsors and 2 Republicans. (“H.R. 55 — 117th Congress: Emmett Till Antilynching Act.” www.GovTrack.us. 2021. January 27, 2022 <https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/117/hr55>) Although Congressman Rush is retiring yet the efforts to pass this law do not have to be left as an incomplete part of his congressional service. The haunting past was brought into the present with the normalization of white police killing of Blacks in recent history, making lynching a current reality.
BACKGROUND
Through media and education, the dreadful history of lynching in the United States has been exposed. Lynching is just as much a part of the present in various forms as it was in the nation's Jim Crow past. The story of Emmett Till has been kept alive to seek justice for the lynching of Blacks that went unprosecuted. Like Till, the deaths of an unknown number of lynched African American soldiers who served in World War I was veiled.
In some instances soldiers were beaten and lynched for refusing to remove their military uniforms. Most notably is the lynching of Wilbur Little in the spring of 1919. Little was met at the train station in Blakely, GA upon his return from war by a group of white men who warned him not to wear his uniform in public. A lynch mob killed him days later when he defied their orders. That uniform, or military service, was a bid for equal treatment under the law. Servicemen in the all-Black units like the 369th Infantry served with the hope that when they returned home they would have earned the rights to same freedoms White experienced.
The three states with the largest amount of African American lynchings from 1850 - 1929 were Georgia, Mississippi, and Texas -- states located in the "Deep South." In modern times, the deaths of unarmed Black men and women in officer involved shootings have been equated to lynching, which has occurred in the North as well as the South. The murders of Trayvon Martin, Breonna Taylor, and Ahmaud Arbery to name a few, have kept the merciless killings of Blacks at the forefront of socio-political thought. Not until 2021, over 60 years after Tills murder, with the victorious verdict in the death of George Floyd o in a nationally publicized case. It took over a 100 years before
ANTI-LYNCHING LEGISLATION
This bill specifies that an offense involving lynching is a hate crime act. A violator is subject to criminal penalties—a prison term, a fine, or both.
WHERE THE BILL STANDS
Ignoring the passage of this bill is an affront to the lynched Black servicemen and so called the patriots.
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