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Episode #2315
Update on 1898
Brown: In 1898 Wilmington, North Carolina sustained one of the most violent race riots in our state’s history. In the past few years several African-American political leaders have spearheaded efforts to raise reparations for the descendants of those hit and hurt hardest by the riots.
Today we are going to update you on the status of those efforts and what is next. Coming up on Black Issues Forum.
VO: Quality public television is made possible through the financial contributions of viewers like you who invite you to join them in supporting UNC-TV.
Brown: Good afternoon everyone and welcome to Black Issues Forum. I am Natalie Bullock Brown.
In 2000 the state General Assembly established the 1898 Wilmington Race Riot Commission, a 13-member group charged with developing a historical record of the events of 1898 and assessing the economic impact of the incident on not only African-Americans in North Carolina, but throughout the region. The two Wilmington-based legislators responsible for activating the commission are the late Senator Luther H. Jordan, and Representative Thomas E. Wright, who was recently convicted of and imprisoned for campaign contribution violations. Although the commission completed its mission in 2006, delivering a nearly 500-page report to the General Assembly, efforts to follow-through on the report have somewhat stalled in the wake of the death and imprisonment of the commission’s creators and staunchest supporters.
However, today we welcome two guests who are working hard to translate and enforce the spirit and letter of the commission’s report. In fact, one is executive director of our state NAACP which made the 1898 incident the centerpiece of its 64th annual conference. We will introduce and speak with both guests in a moment. But first producer Deborah Holt brings us this report about the NAACP’s 64th conference held in Wilmington.
[BEGIN VIDEO]
Holt: In October of 2007, hundreds gathered at the Wilmington convention center to attend the 64th annual convention of the North Carolina Conference NAACP. It was held in Wilmington on purpose.
Barber: We are not here because we dislike North Carolina. We are not here because we dislike America. We are not here because we dislike Wilmington. But we are here because you can’t get your present right if you don’t properly deal with your past.
Holt: Over the course of three days, many topics would be covered but the centerpiece was a symposium to highlight one of 14 points of the NAACP’s people’s agenda to redress the overthrow of the bi-racial 1898 Wilmington government known as the Wilmington Race Riot.
Barber: Riot is not a strong enough word. Terrorism, when you diabolically and deliberately plan a coup d’etat, you stage it through people who can speak, people who can write, and people who can riot, and you plan it and you carry out that plan with Gatlin guns and you run people into the swamps and you kill innocent people. That is what terrorism is. We cannot allow a legislature or anybody to just do these feel-good apologies. There must be substantive action.
Holt: The conference and symposium were significant not only because of the topic, but because of who was in attendance. Among those were many well-known public officials, historians, community leaders, and activists and provided special recognition for 11 descendants of African-Americans whose lives were dramatically changed by the 1898 coup d’etat.
F: My father should have been able to have walked across the street after school and have a biscuit and a cup of milk or some molasses or whatever from his grandparent’s table. But he wasn’t able to do that. And yes, I get angry.
Holt: Lula Miller Poe Wright is the granddaughter of Thomas C. Miller, who was a wealthy business owner before he was run out of town in 1898.
Wright: I think about how he had to leave Wilmington and go to—run out of town so to speak. And he was a great man, he ___ white and black, that is what I was told. And I really think we ought to be reparated….
Barber: Paid, that is how you can put it.
Wright: Yes, paid.
Holt: Dr. Lewin Manley, Jr. is the grandson of Alex Manly whose printing press was burned down during the 1898 incident. His grandfather was also forced to leave Wilmington.
Manley: My father wrote me and he would talk about his father losing the newspaper but he never mentioned a riot or a coup d’etat or anything like that so I often thought that maybe they lost it just because it couldn’t stand up on its own two feet, went bankrupt. But he just couldn’t discuss it. And I think Ellis Manley probably thought that he was responsible for all of the deaths there. But actually no matter what he wrote, it wouldn’t have made a difference because it was a coup, it was well planned, the people who were extremely evil people who put all this together. And unfortunately they are still out there. They also have their progeny.
Holt: The history of the 1898 Wilmington Race Riot, or coup d’etat as it is in interchangeably referred to, is not as well-known as might be expected. The convention events included a sober presentation of the facts by LaRae Umfleet, head researcher for the Wilmington Race Riot Commission.
Umfleet: This image has two X’s on it, I don’t know if you can see them. But those are where at least two people died. These images were taken the day of the violence but after the bodies had been moved. After the first shots at Fourth and Harnett, there was a running firefight in the city and if you were African-American you were a fair game target.
Moore: What happened in North Carolina in 1898, the only coup d’etat that has ever happened in the United States of America, where a duly-elected government was taken over by force is a story that cannot be hidden from our school children and from our society at large. And what we also need to do is to put that in its proper place in terms of history and policy and action going forward.
[END OF VIDEO]
Brown: Now I’d like to introduce our esteemed guests. They are Irv Joyner, a law professor at North Carolina Central University and vice-chair of the 1898 Wilmington Race Riot Commission. And Amina Turner, executive director of the North Carolina State NAACP which is using its clout to push the commission’s agenda. Welcome both of you to Black Issues Forum.
Joyner:Thanks for having us.
Brown: I want to start off by asking a question that I’d like both of you to respond to and that is since the release of the commission’s report, what progress has been made? Let’s start with you Professor Joyner?
Joyner: Well very little progress has been made thus far. We had a resolution from the North Carolina General Assembly basically acknowledging that the 1898 Wilmington Race Riot occurred and that there were losses and that it was due to efforts by the Democratic Party at that time and other right wing groups.
But other than that nothing has been done. A number of legislative initiatives began during the last session but absolutely nothing was done to move them forward other than the work of the NAACP in raising the issue, keeping the issue before the public and beginning to talk to legislators about the necessity of responding positively to what we were doing.
Brown: Just for the sake of our viewers, can you just briefly review the different initiatives that the report I guess put into place?
Joyner: Well a number of things we were seeking. One, because 1898 happened so long ago, in law there is a statute of limitations which prohibits people who were injured by those events from recovering anything for their losses. One of the bills would have set up a special statute of limitations that would allow family members of those persons harmed during that event to come forward and put a claim in to the state to seek redress for the losses that they suffered.
There was a bill to develop a monument, a museum, in the area to commemorate the event. There was a bill to create a documentary for educational purposes and to direct the state board of education to include information about the 1898 rebellion in text in the public school system and in our university system. And then there was an effort to try to develop an economic development program within the area of Wilmington that was affected by the 1898 rebellion. So those are some of the initiatives that were presented but not acted upon.
Brown: Gotcha. Ms. Turner, why was it important for the NAACP to hold its 64th conference in Wilmington, which is of course the site of the race riot?
Turner: Well Wilmington is historic in connection with the coup d’etat or the riot as most people refer to it in history, mainly because many of the descendants are still there as well as many of the historic sites are still there. In fact we held our press conference, bringing the conference, the state convention, NAACP state convention, to Wilmington at the very church where the first person was actual slain during that riot.
It is also important to NAACP because when we talk about justice and racial justice in particular, that we look at the impact of all of the various historic events that have taken place in North Carolina and say to ourselves, “Well how does that affect where we are today?” And when you look at history, North Carolina was not alone in terms of the number of cities and acts that took place that were similar in that many African-Americans were banished and run out of town. You know you can look in parts of Georgia and Ohio and other parts of our history nationally and see that.
But what was significant about Wilmington is the fact that we actually had an elected government with whites and blacks who were duly elected following the proper electoral process, knowing that we have just recently gone through that in the primary here in our state. It is significant to bring all that into play, knowing that these folks were blacks and whites elected to run the whole city and that whole area of Wilmington and to have their election turned over, you know, by a coup d’etat with the antics and deliberate tactics of the Democratic Party, so that is one of the reasons why we have to look at the past to see okay, how does that affect today? Because that is one of the reasons why it is truly significant to NAACP and to NAACPers across the state.
Brown: What is your take on the lack of progress, I guess, that is taking place in enforcing the commission’s report?
Turner: Well it is frustrating but I think one good thing that has come out of that is the HK on J coalition partners had their first march in February. We presented what we call one of the omnibus bills, racial justice act, which we included, addressing the redress issue of the Wilmington 1898 riot where we are saying we need to have reparations for the descendants who were directly affected. You know when you are talking about taking property, you are talking about interruption of wealth building. Particularly today when we are talking about economic development and its impact on the African-American community, we have to be concerned about building of wealth and then when that kind of interruption takes place, what kind of effect does it have? And it affects generations, not just one particular family. So that is why it is really critical to African-Americans and to any CP in general.
Brown: Speaking of the descendants, Professor Joyner I understand that you were in attendance at the conference, the NAACP conference and you interacted with some of the descendants of those who were directly impacted by the riots. What is their sentiment, what sort of things did they share with you if you are willing to share with us?
Joyner: Well you know it is interesting kind of proposition that they are dealing with. For a long time many of them did not know that they had people who were involved in the 1898 race riot, really race rebellion, not race riot. And so there was a discovery on their part that they had someone who was intimately involved in what occurred and they suffered loss. Along with that came the realization that there was an interruption of a wealth flow because these people typically were doing very well in the Wilmington at the time. They had obtained property and much of that property was not taken, destroyed or stolen but it did not pass down through the generations to benefit them, so there was some disappointment and hurt as a result of knowing that their fore parents had accumulated wealth and that they were not the beneficiary of it.
Instead other people in the city had come in to capitalize on that and they were benefited from the work of people, African-Americans mainly, in Wilmington at the time. So they were happy to learn about the involvement but they were saddened and angry at the discovery that once again they had been shafted. As family members they had been shafted. Not as a race of people. And clearly that did occur but more intimately than that, that they were shafted because there was someone in their family that had accumulated this property, they were the victims of this justice, and this injustice continue to affect them. So they were looking for some answers as to what they could do.
Them being disappointed by knowing that there was not a legal avenue open to them that would offer them any relief. So that is the kind of thing that we have to address now. We attempt to address through some of this legislation but also to let people know exactly what happened here in North Carolina.
Brown: Ms. Turner, I am interested to know whether or not the NAACP has experienced a groundswell of community support for the commission, for the report, if there is understanding in the community of how important this whole issue is?
Turner: I think so, particularly at the state convention. Number one it was a full auditorium, actually a couple of ballrooms full of people, young and even people who are seniors who are not from the Wilmington area and for many of them this was the first time that they even heard of this history because the history had been buried. And so it was really important since we were in Wilmington and trying to unearth the recommendations of the commission and then push forth our racial justice act regarding, which addressed this whole issue, we wanted to make sure that we could connect the dots for people.
So many folks were I think experiencing the pain even though their families were not directly affected, but just because they were first-time listeners and first-time witnesses to what this whole, all of this history meant. You know so even though we tend to think of history in terms of something you read about, but when it is living because you have the descendants and then you have historians and sociologists and other experts, even legal experts there to explain what all of this means, then it becomes real, even becomes personal even if you yourself are not the one directly affected.
Brown: Right. Professor Joyner, we mentioned earlier that the efforts to enforce the commission’s report have somewhat been stalled. Not much progress has been made. How much of that do you attribute to the loss of Senator Jordan and also of the conviction and imprisonment of Representative Wright who created the commission, was behind everything that the commission sought to do?
Joyner: The legal problems experienced by Representative Wright really knocked us off key because he was the pivotal person in the General Assembly moving this legislation. Members of the legislative black caucus relied upon him to kind of work this stuff through the various committees. When his legal problems began, then that stalled. None of the other legislators were in a position to pick it up until at the very end. They did come together to get this joint resolution out.
Now we did not expect that everything would be enacted in year one. So we knew it was going to take some time. And in a sense it is not fatal to us that we still have to come back to push for some more because it gives us an opportunity to educate the public, you know, to further let people know about all of the things that African-Americans were able to do in Wilmington, an integrated effort politically, economically, socially, and educationally that was successful in North Carolina, a model that others could have followed had it been successful.
So now we can go out and tell the story to more people to create a groundswell because we need support. We need support from around the state, from around the nation, of people who are indignant about, angered about what occurred in Wilmington, demanding that there be some positive results for that community and for the descendants of the people who suffered loss.
Brown: Ms. Turner, since the commission came out of the General Assembly basically, do you find that there are other legislators in spite of the loss of Senator Jordan and Representative Wright, that get it and are interested in helping the NAACP and other supporters to actually enact these suggestions from the commission?
Turner: Most of the leadership of the legislative black caucus lends its support to our effort. I wanted to add something to what Professor Joyner has already said relative to what the fusion politics of that period meant, you know the fact that you had African-Americans and you had European-Americans working together to run and lead a major city, a major sea port, because that is what Wilmington was and even is today. So we have not only a model of what good politics and good electoral process can lead to, but in terms of good race relations.
And in fact what we hope to do in terms of building a ground swell and informing the public as an organization in October when we have our next state convention we plan to have what we call a pilgrimage for justice where we will leave Wilmington and march from Wilmington to Raleigh. Our next state convention in October is in Raleigh so we are again trying to build that support and understanding and make the public aware of what the various issues are in connection with the Wilmington 1898 commission report as well as what we are trying to have the General Assembly to put forth to redress the various issues connected to the issue.
Brown: And is that, the pilgrimage, is that the brain child of—
Turner: Reverend Barber, yes it is, our state conference, Dr. William J. Barber.
Brown: So he is very behind, very much in support of the commission and the report?
Turner: That and then he also was so much—he wanted to make sure that all of us were aware of not only what that meant but also making sure that was a part of the HK on J agenda. Because you know we have 80 plus social justice and civil rights organizations from across the state that comprise the HK on J which is Historic Thousands on Jones Street, which took place, the inaugural event February of 2007 and then we had HK on J2 this past February and so we are keeping that issue alive as part of the HK on J agenda as well.
Brown: Great. Professor Joyner, from your perspective as vice chair of the commission that put out the report, what are next steps? What can be done to create the ground swell that you were speaking of earlier?
Joyner: Well we want to tell the story and we want to tell the story over and over again that you have a period in North Carolina history that people don’t know about where African-Americans and Whites who were formerly slave owners and slave masters and slaves were able to come together to create political harmony, working together in the General Assembly, because there were a number of African-Americans who served in the North Carolina General Assembly during that time, not only from Wilmington but from all over the eastern part of North Carolina. And up to 1898 there was that racial cooperation and it ended.
The deprivations educationally, politically, economically, and otherwise that African-Americans suffered in this state occurred after that, where African-Americans were run out of office. Now we begin to rebuild and to regain some of those things. So people need to know where we came from, where things were, what the possibilities were, and then to look at our situation now to make sure that the same things can’t happen as we move forward. So we want to talk to them about the story. We want to talk about strategies, you know, how do we correct the wrongs that have been done and how do we put people back in a position that they should have been in had there not been this breech, this injustice committed to them.
Then we want to try to put in place some devices within our legal system that will prevent the same thing from happening again. Because realistically it can happen again and there are people right now who are upset that there is this racial cooperation occurring within our political landscape and within the business community and socially and economically. There are people that are upset about it and there is no telling what might happen unless we can put something in place to stop gap, to prevent those things from occurring. So that is what we want to do as a part of the next step.
Brown: Great. Well I just want to thank both of you for being here with us, for your work on this issue and we really appreciate you sharing your expertise with us today. If you would like to get in touch with our guests or obtain a transcript of today’s show, visit us online at unctv.org/bif. When you visit be sure to give us your comments and program suggestions. You can also call us on the BIF line at 919-549-7167. Be sure to meet us right back here each week for more on the people and issues that concern you.
For Black Issues Forum I am Natalie Bullock Brown reminding you to be encouraged no matter what. Peace and blessings.
VO: Quality public television is made possible through the financial contributions of viewers like you who invite you to join them in supporting UNC-TV.
[END OF RECORDING]
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