Wednesday, August 12, 2020

Symbols of the racist past still prevalent in the United States

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Syed Ahmed Uzair

Article Title

Symbols of the racist past still prevalent in the United States

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Global Views 360

Publication Date

August 12, 2020

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A person wearing Blackface

A person wearing Blackface | Source:  foundin_a_attic via Flickr | Source: Wikimedia

George Floyd’s recent death while in Police custody has sparked protests across the entire United States. While it did expose the way Black Americans are policed, it also initiated a much deeper conversation about the prevalent racism faced by Black Americans in almost all aspects of modern life.

Many symbols of the racist past still exist across the US, more so in the Southern states. The recent trigger of protests and the BLM movement has initiated a discussion about these symbols once again. While some argue that it is important to preserve these symbols owing to the American culture, the majority of the people seem to be agreeing that these are symbols of oppression and injustice.

Thomas D. Rice is pictured while performing his blackface role — Jim Crow | Source: Edward Williams Clay via Wikimedia

In the mid to late 19th century, white actors quite commonly employed the use of black grease paint to depict slaves and free blacks on stage. The technique commonly known as blackface was more than just facial makeup. Rather, it was used as a symbol for mocking the African-Americans as inferiors in every aspect of life.

Blackface seemed to have disappeared in the 1960s thanks to the Civil Rights Movement. It however reappeared in the 1980s on college campuses in the wake of steps taken to bring more African Americans to campus. An old yearbook picture from Langley School resurfaced recently revealing the then-principal and vice-principal dressed as whiteface and blackface for Halloween. The current leadership of the school have issued apologies stating that the incident should not have happened.

Despite a racist history surrounding blackface, a recent survey by Pew Research Centre revealed that nearly one-third of Americans surveyed did not find anything offensive in blackface being used at Halloween.

Newspaper ad for Aunt Jemima Buckwheat pancake mix, 1923 | Source: Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress

Aunt Jemima, a 130-year-old syrup and pancake mix brand owned by Quaker Oats depicts a black woman named Aunt Jemima who was originally dressed as a minstrel character. The company has earlier made tweaks to the picture of the black woman in response to the criticism it received for propagating a racial stereotype. In June 2020, Quaker Oats announced that the brand would be rejuvenated to feature a new name and image.

Image of Andrew Jackson, the seventh president of the United States | Source: Wikimedia

Andrew Jackson, the seventh US president and his family employed hundreds of enslaved people in building their wealth. However, to date, Jackson still haunts Black Americans with his presence on the twenty-dollar bills in the wallets of these Americans. The Trump administration’s decision to not replace the bill featuring Jackson with one that would feature abolitionist Harriet Tubman as proposed earlier does not help the nation’s troubled history with Racism.

Similar symbols of the US racist past exist across the entire country, starting from streets named after Confederate officers to congested highways specifically designed to ensure isolation of Black neighborhoods. Football and baseball games in the country still feature the national anthem penned by Francis Scott Key, a person who used his power as district attorney to prosecute Black men.

George Floyd’s death was the perfect trigger for all the anger and frustration against the systematic injustice that has been meted out to Black people. However, it also served well to initiate debates over the omnipresence of these racial symbols across the country that serve as memorials to slavery and white supremacy.

As many as 800 Confederate statues and monuments have been removed ever since the BLM protests erupted in the country. A few of these racial symbols in the US suffered the brunt of BLM protesters who defaced homages and toppled statues of founding fathers who had profited from slavery.

Those against the removal of these symbols argue that these men merely failed in morality due to the socio-political environment they inhabited. Alvita Akiboh, an assistant professor of history at the University of Michigan, however, disagrees with the notion. “Just because slavery was accepted among white elites or even the broader white population at the time does not mean it was accepted by everybody, because everybody includes Black people who were enslaved, indigenous people who were pushed off their lands in order to expand plantation slavery,” said Akiboh.

Others, including US President Donald Trump, have employed the notion of removing these symbols as the equivalent of “ripping American history and culture apart”. To this Akiboh voices her opinion saying that the majority of these symbols were erected decades after the civil-war conflict ended. She argues that they are merely “a reminder for Black and brown people to remember their place”.

As the BLM protests gain momentum and support globally the scrutiny of the racist symbols in the US shall increase manifold. With the government not willing to push for major reforms and removal of these racist symbols and an adamant public demanding an end to the systematic discrimination based on race, the road ahead for the recial relation in the US is a difficult and complicated one.

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February 4, 2021 4:38 PM

US Legislature: Senate and House of Representative

US Congress

Congress of the United States, the legislature of the United States of America is established under the Constitution of 1789. It is structurally separate from the executive and judicial branches of the government. The United States Senate is the upper House of the United States Congress, and the House of Representatives is the lower House of the United States Congress. Together, both these houses make up the legislature of the United States. Although the two chambers are separate for the most part, the House and Senate are equal partners in the legislative process, and the legislation cannot be acted without the consent of both chambers. Congress must assemble at least once in a year and must agree on the date of convening and adjourning. The decided time for convening, according to the Twentieth Amendment, is January 3. The House and the Senate vote the date for adjournment. Congress must also come together in a joint session to count the electoral votes for the President and the Vice President. 

United States Senate 

The United States Senate, the upper House of the United States Congress, was established in 1789 under the Constitution. Each state elects two senators for six years. One-third of the Senate membership expires every two years. It is hence also nicknamed as “the house that never dies”. The role of the Senate is to provide equal representation to each state regardless of their size and population. Washington, D.C. houses the chamber of the United States Senate. Election to the Senate was indirect up till 1913 and changed to direct election by the Seventeenth Amendment. The Senate shares responsibility with the House of Representatives for law-making within the United States of America. 

The Senate has exclusive powers which are not granted to the House of Representative. The powers include the authority to consent to treaties before giving it for consent, confirming the appointment of -- Cabinet secretaries, federal judges and executives, military officers, regulatory officials, ambassadors, and other federal uniformed officers. The Senate is also responsible for trying federal officials that have been impeached by the House.

The qualifications for Senators are as follows:

  1. They must be at least 30 years old. 
  2. They must have the citizenship of the United States of America for at least nine years.
  3. They must be an inhabitant of the state they are representing. 

House of Representatives

The House of Representatives is the lower House of the United States Congress which was established in 1789 by the Constitution of the United States. It shares equal responsibilities of law-making with the Senate. The House is designed to give a voice to people of every local voting region of America. Members of the House stand for reelection every two years. Each state is split into districts and each district votes for one representative. The number of districts depends on the population of each state. The candidate with the most number of votes wins the seat in the House, and the party with the most number of seats takes control.

The primary responsibility of the House is to pass federal legislation that affects the whole country. For the bill to become a law the Senate has to agree and the United States President has to finally sign it. The House, like the Senate, has special powers too. These include the power to initiate revenue bills, to impeach officials, and to elect the President in case there is no majority in the Electoral College.

The House is organised in the committee system, under which the membership is divided into specialised committees like committees for holding hearings, preparing bills for the consideration of the entire House, and regulating the House procedure. The member of the majority party chairs these committees. Almost all bills are first referred to the respective committee. There are approximately 20 permanent committees, each having subcommittees. 

The qualifications for members of the House are:

  1. They must be at least 25 years of age.
  2. They must be a U.S. citizen for at least seven years. 
  3. They do not need to reside in the constituency that he represents.

Articles that were referred to:

  1. https://www.whitehouse.gov/about-the-white-house/the-legislative-branch/#:~:text=The%20Senate%20maintains%20several%20powers,confirmation%20of%20the%20Vice%20President.
  2. https://www.britannica.com/topic/House-of-Representatives-United-States-government
  3. https://www.congress.gov/help/learn-about-the-legislative-process/how-our-laws-are-made
  4. https://courses.lumenlearning.com/boundless-politicalscience/chapter/the-nature-and-function-of-congress/
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