After a week of rising clamor in the wake of the George Zimmerman acquittal, President Obama strode out onto the stage in the White House briefing room and delivered one of the most powerful and personal speeches about race
that the nation has ever seen from the occupant of the White House.
Speaking on the death of young Trayvon Martin, Obama said, “Trayvon
Martin could have been me 35 years ago.”
The president also blasted the Stand Your Ground law—which his
attorney general Eric Holder also criticized earlier in the week. Obama
said the country needed to focus more attention on improving the plight
of young black males.
Obama tried to explain to the nation why the African-American
community has reacted with such outrage and pain to Zimmerman’s
acquittal, putting the verdict in the context of the nation’s history of
racism and the difficulties black people still face in this country. It
was a moment that television commentators across the airwaves described
as “historic.” NBC’s Andrea Mitchell said his comments “gave me
chills.”
“You know, when Trayvon Martin was first shot, I said that this could
have been my son. Another way of saying that is Trayvon Martin could
have been me 35 years ago,” Obama said to a shocked press corps, which
hadn’t even been warned that the president would appear at the briefing.
“And when you think about why, in the African-American community at
least, there’s a lot of pain around what happened here, I think it’s
important to recognize that the African-American community is looking at
this issue through a set of experiences and a history that—that doesn’t
go away. There are very few African-American men in this country who
haven’t had the experience of being followed when they were shopping in a
department store. That includes me. And there are very few
African-American men who haven’t had the experience of walking across
the street and hearing the locks click on the doors of cars. That
happens to me, at least before I was a senator. There are very few
African-Americans who haven’t had the experience of getting on an
elevator and a woman clutching her purse nervously and holding her
breath until she had a chance to get off. That happens often.”
Obama said those sorts of experiences shape the black community’s
reaction to the Zimmerman verdict, in addition to the community’s
knowledge of the serious racial disparities in the application of
justice in the legal system. He said the black community is not naive
about the prevalence of black-on-black crime and the violence of many
black neighborhoods, and that black folks are aware of the historical
context that created these conditions. He said there’s a frustration
born from the knowledge that the Trayvon case would have gone very
differently if it were a white male teen instead of a black male.
The president then seemed to try to manage expectations as many
African-American activists, such as Rev. Al Sharpton and the NAACP, have
been calling on the federal government to file charges against
Zimmerman for violating Trayvon’s civil rights.
“Beyond protests or vigils, the question is, are there some concrete
things that we might be able to do?” he asked. “I know that Eric Holder
is reviewing what happened down there, but I think it’s important for
people to have some clear expectations here. Traditionally, these are
issues of state and local government — the criminal code. And law
enforcement has traditionally done it at the state and local levels, not
at the federal levels. That doesn’t mean, though, that as a nation, we
can’t do some things that I think would be productive.”
One of the things the president pointed out was the need for
increased law enforcement training to reduce the use of racial
profiling, which was a signature issue of his when he was in the
Illinois state senate.
Obama also took on the Stand Your Ground law that was such a
lightning rod in the Zimmerman case, using a deft but potentially
explosive hypothetical to highlight the racial problems inherent in
Stand Your Ground—a law on the books now in more than 30 states.
“I think it would be useful for us to examine some state and local
laws to see if it — if they are designed in such a way that they may
encourage the kinds of altercations and confrontations and tragedies
that we saw in the Florida case, rather than diffuse potential
altercations,” he said. “If we’re sending a message as a society in our
communities that someone who is armed potentially has the right to use
those firearms even if there’s a way for them to exit from a situation,
is that really going to be contributing to the kind of peace and
security and order that we’d like to see? And for those who resist that
idea that we should think about something like these ‘Stand Your Ground’
laws, I just ask people to consider if Trayvon Martin was of age and
armed, could he have stood his ground on that sidewalk? And do we
actually think that he would have been justified in shooting Mr.
Zimmerman, who had followed him in a car, because he felt
threatened? And if the answer to that question is at least ambiguous, it
seems to me that we might want to examine those kinds of laws.”
Describing it as a “long-term project,” the president said the nation
needed to focus on bolstering and reinforcing African-American
boys.”This is something that Michelle and I talk a lot about,” he said.
“There are a lot of kids out there who need help who are getting a lot
of negative reinforcement. And is there more that we can do to give them
the sense that their country cares about them and values them and is
willing to invest in them? You know, I’m not naive about the prospects
of some brand-new federal program. I’m not sure that that’s what we’re
talking about here. But I do recognize that as president, I’ve got some
convening power. And there are a lot of good programs that are being
done across the country on this front. And for us to be able to gather
together business leaders and local elected officials and clergy and
celebrities and athletes and figure out how are we doing a better job
helping young African-American men feel that they’re a full part of this
society and that — and that they’ve got pathways and avenues to succeed
— you know, I think that would be a pretty good outcome from what was
obviously a tragic situation. And we’re going to spend some time working
on that and thinking about that.”
Obama concluded by saying that the country has some soul-searching to
do, and that we shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that things are
improving.
“There has been talk about should we convene a conversation on race. I
haven’t seen that be particularly productive when politicians try to
organize conversations. They end up being stilted and politicized, and
folks are locked into the positions they already have,” he said. ”On
the other hand, in families and churches and workplaces, there’s a
possibility that people are a little bit more honest, and at least you
ask yourself your own questions about, am I wringing as much bias out of
myself as I can; am I judging people, as much as I can, based on not
the color of their skin but the content of their character? That would, I
think, be an appropriate exercise in the wake of this tragedy. And let
me just leave you with — with a final thought, that as difficult and
challenging as this whole episode has been for a lot of people, I don’t
want us to lose sight that things are getting better. Each successive
generation seems to be making progress in changing attitudes when it
comes to race. It doesn’t mean that we’re in a post-racial society. It
doesn’t mean that racism is eliminated. But you know, when I talk to
Malia and Sasha and I listen to their friends and I see them interact,
they’re better than we are. They’re better than we were on these issues.
And that’s true in every community that I’ve visited all across the
country.”
After his remarks, MSNBC host Melissa Harris-Perry, who is also a
political science professor at Tulane University, compared it to the
speech given by President Kennedy after Birmingham sheriff Bull Connor
turned the hoses and dogs on the marching children of Birmingham:
“But the part that’s completely unique, that has never happened
before, the part I’m not even sure we can capture how important it is,
is that the president of the United States, an African-American man, who
is both of those things at same time, stood there at the podium with
the official insignia of the White House behind him, and said the
history and the pain and the contemporary experiences of black people in
this country matter—they shape how they experience something like the
Zimmerman verdict and if we’re going to move forward as a nation, we
must acknowledge the realities of those experiences. Just that
recognition, of the humanity and experiences of black people, from the
president of the United States, is absolutely historic.”
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then, Vanessa has revealed that she is not pregnant at the moment.
