WEBVTT - Moving Forward by Looking Back 0:00:12.680 --> 0:00:15.640 If the US were to seriously tackle the racial wealth 0:00:15.680 --> 0:00:19.400 gap and all the injustices past and present that have 0:00:19.520 --> 0:00:23.800 led to today's economic inequalities, it might not actually start 0:00:23.840 --> 0:00:29.040 with preparations, but with something much simpler, a full reckoning 0:00:29.080 --> 0:00:33.199 of our history the truth. Truth commissions can be the 0:00:33.320 --> 0:00:38.559 starting point for much broader national reform and a national 0:00:38.600 --> 0:00:43.879 effort to deal with the enduring legacies of past violence 0:00:43.920 --> 0:00:47.479 and current violence. Kerry Wiggham is a professor at Binghamton 0:00:47.640 --> 0:00:52.360 University's Institute for Genocide and Mass Atrocity Prevention. He also 0:00:52.440 --> 0:00:56.200 runs a similar center at the Auschwitz Institute. He points 0:00:56.200 --> 0:00:59.760 out that truth commissions are a relatively new phenomenon, a 0:00:59.840 --> 0:01:04.080 lot newer than ideas about reparations or restitution. They're the 0:01:04.120 --> 0:01:08.080 first step and what scholars call transitional justice away for 0:01:08.160 --> 0:01:11.520 countries to deal with their own large scale human rights abuses. 0:01:12.000 --> 0:01:17.200 It's built on four different pillars. Truth is the first 0:01:17.280 --> 0:01:20.520 of those pillars, and it's often positioned as first because 0:01:21.760 --> 0:01:24.920 it becomes a sort of prerequisite for dealing with some 0:01:25.000 --> 0:01:29.560 of those other pillars, like justice and reparations and guaranteeing 0:01:29.720 --> 0:01:34.759 non recurrence. The first one happened in Argentina in four 0:01:34.920 --> 0:01:39.480 to investigate the quote disappearances of thousands of people, including 0:01:39.560 --> 0:01:44.800 children and infants, during the country's military dictatorship. It started 0:01:44.840 --> 0:01:50.040 where most truth commissions start. An independent body investigates what happened. 0:01:50.520 --> 0:01:53.600 It identifies the victims and all the forms of violence 0:01:53.640 --> 0:01:56.480 that occurred against them, and then it asked those harm 0:01:56.600 --> 0:02:00.640 to tell their stories. This is important because changes the 0:02:00.680 --> 0:02:04.960 historic record and often reveals atrocities perpetrators have tried to 0:02:05.040 --> 0:02:09.680 keep hidden. In the end, Argentina's Truth Commission led to 0:02:09.720 --> 0:02:13.440 a series of reforms. Truth commissions have since been used 0:02:13.480 --> 0:02:16.760 across Africa and Latin America, and in Eastern Europe and 0:02:16.800 --> 0:02:22.040 Southeast Asia. Some US lawmakers think America is long overdue. 0:02:23.080 --> 0:02:27.359 In February, Representative Barbara Lee and Senator Corey Booker reintroduced 0:02:27.360 --> 0:02:29.400 a bill that would set up a truth commission in 0:02:29.400 --> 0:02:34.440 the US. The resolution, if passed, would urge the establishment 0:02:34.480 --> 0:02:39.000 of United States Commission on Truth, Racial Healing, and Transformation. 0:02:40.080 --> 0:02:43.360 Here's Congresswomanly talking about the bill last summer during a 0:02:43.440 --> 0:02:48.000 virtual event. We call ours truth, Racial Healing, and Transformation, 0:02:48.080 --> 0:02:52.160 not reconciliation, because there's really nothing to reconcile. There's no 0:02:52.320 --> 0:02:55.639 no value in four hundred and one years of ago 0:02:55.919 --> 0:02:58.760 of a two d fifty plus years of slavery, and 0:02:58.800 --> 0:03:02.400 so we call it trail formation. I asked Carry about 0:03:02.440 --> 0:03:05.519 what a truth commission in the US could accomplish. There 0:03:05.639 --> 0:03:09.440 is still the reality that many white Americans have a 0:03:09.480 --> 0:03:17.320 difficult time understanding how slavery was directly connected to, for instance, 0:03:17.760 --> 0:03:22.920 mass incarceration and police brutality today. Or it could help 0:03:22.960 --> 0:03:26.800 explain how slavery is connected to today's racial wealth gap. 0:03:28.000 --> 0:03:31.160 But it's not an easy process and it won't magically 0:03:31.200 --> 0:03:34.519 fix all inequality, especially if it doesn't go deep enough. 0:03:35.120 --> 0:03:39.080 And that's not the only challenge. In the US. Even 0:03:39.120 --> 0:03:42.040 the idea of something like a truth commission faces a 0:03:42.040 --> 0:03:45.240 lot of resistance from people who don't want to dwell 0:03:45.280 --> 0:03:48.000 on the past. They say that it's so far in 0:03:48.040 --> 0:03:52.119 the past that having a truth commission will only highlight 0:03:52.760 --> 0:03:57.560 and and sustain the divisions that are already present, that 0:03:57.760 --> 0:04:00.920 really what we need to do is turn the page 0:04:01.760 --> 0:04:05.600 and look towards the future. The reality Carry says is 0:04:05.640 --> 0:04:08.120 that the people who are saying those things, who are 0:04:08.160 --> 0:04:11.280 eager to move on, they tend to be the people 0:04:11.520 --> 0:04:15.880 who have benefited throughout history and for them the status 0:04:15.960 --> 0:04:28.120 quo is working. The data shows that the median white 0:04:28.200 --> 0:04:32.040 family has ten times more wealth than the average black family. 0:04:32.400 --> 0:04:35.159 One of the drivers of that wealth gap is redlining. 0:04:35.560 --> 0:04:39.000 When it comes to understanding financial inequality in this country, 0:04:39.279 --> 0:04:43.159 economists often point to the absence of African American generational 0:04:43.160 --> 0:04:48.200 wealth see the Black mag Ota Plai the White mag Who. 0:04:49.400 --> 0:04:52.760 Many of the Bedrock policies, in fact, that ushered generations 0:04:52.800 --> 0:04:56.760 of Americans into the middle class were designed to exclude 0:04:57.400 --> 0:05:01.120 African Americans. It's much easier to integrate a lunch counter 0:05:01.560 --> 0:05:04.560 than it is to guarantee an annual income, for instance, 0:05:04.600 --> 0:05:08.159 to get rid of positive It's really intended as much 0:05:08.240 --> 0:05:10.400 to terrorize people in a physical sense as it is 0:05:10.480 --> 0:05:13.880 to kind of deprive them of the opportunity to gain 0:05:13.960 --> 0:05:17.680 equality through economic standing. It's a trend propelled not just 0:05:17.839 --> 0:05:21.480 by economic forces, but by white racism and local white 0:05:21.520 --> 0:05:33.320 political and economic power. Welcome back to the Paycheck. I'm 0:05:33.400 --> 0:05:36.680 Jackie Simmons and I am Rebecca Greenfield. This is our 0:05:36.800 --> 0:05:40.720 last episode this season. Our goal going into this was 0:05:40.839 --> 0:05:43.839 to understand a bit more about the racial wealth gap. 0:05:44.360 --> 0:05:47.200 It's been fifty years since the end of segregation in 0:05:47.320 --> 0:05:51.040 Jim Crow. Why has an economic inequality between black and 0:05:51.120 --> 0:05:54.160 white Americans budge at all? It brought us back to 0:05:54.240 --> 0:05:57.360 slavery and everything that grew out of that system. And 0:05:57.440 --> 0:06:01.000 the truth is that as a country, the United States 0:06:01.279 --> 0:06:04.280 has never really reckoned with slavery or any of the 0:06:04.400 --> 0:06:07.760 racist violence and oppression that followed. We have created a 0:06:07.920 --> 0:06:12.360 narrative of denial. We've created a narrative that says we're 0:06:12.400 --> 0:06:14.400 not going to talk about the mistakes we make. I 0:06:14.440 --> 0:06:17.120 think it's because we've become such a punitive society. We 0:06:17.160 --> 0:06:19.039 think if we own up to our mistakes, something bad 0:06:19.160 --> 0:06:20.760 is going to happen to us. We're gonna get punished. 0:06:20.800 --> 0:06:22.680 And I'm not doing these projects because I want to 0:06:22.720 --> 0:06:25.800 punish America. I want us to be liberated from the 0:06:26.080 --> 0:06:30.560 change that this history has created. That's Bryan Stevenson. He's 0:06:30.560 --> 0:06:33.320 a lawyer and the executive director of the Equal Justice 0:06:33.360 --> 0:06:38.160 Initiative in Montgomery, Alabama. In three years ago, this month, 0:06:38.760 --> 0:06:41.240 he opened the first memorial to the thousands of black 0:06:41.279 --> 0:06:44.240 Americans killed in racial terror lynchings from the end of 0:06:44.279 --> 0:06:47.680 the Civil War up to nineteen fifty. The museum and 0:06:47.760 --> 0:06:51.120 the memorial in Montgomery and the National Museum of African 0:06:51.160 --> 0:06:54.719 American History and Culture, which opened in ten in Washington, 0:06:54.839 --> 0:06:58.400 d c our steps toward correcting the historical record in 0:06:58.480 --> 0:07:03.680 the US, but also universities, media companies, and investment banks 0:07:04.000 --> 0:07:06.640 are increasingly owning up to the ways they participated in 0:07:07.160 --> 0:07:10.880 or benefited from the slave trade. Earlier this spring, the 0:07:11.000 --> 0:07:14.000 Virginia Supreme Court ruled that the city of Charlottesville can 0:07:14.040 --> 0:07:18.280 go ahead and remove statues of Confederate soldiers, an effort 0:07:18.320 --> 0:07:21.400 that's happening around the country. But there are plenty of 0:07:21.440 --> 0:07:24.239 people who choose to ignore this part of America's history 0:07:24.640 --> 0:07:27.480 and how it connects to the present. On the other hand, 0:07:28.280 --> 0:07:31.560 there's also people like my Bloomberg colleague, Claire Stuff. It's 0:07:31.600 --> 0:07:34.120 the easiest thing to do is not to say something. 0:07:34.480 --> 0:07:38.960 And I think a lot of what this country is 0:07:39.040 --> 0:07:41.720 going through and has been going through over and over 0:07:41.920 --> 0:07:47.040 and over again, often stems from the fact that white 0:07:47.080 --> 0:07:50.680 people are ignorant of their own actions and ignorant of 0:07:50.920 --> 0:07:55.760 their families past actions. Claire's white. She grew up in Chicago, 0:07:56.480 --> 0:07:58.880 but her parents were from the South, and they took 0:07:58.920 --> 0:08:01.640 her to visit relatives on a big plantation in Mississippi. 0:08:02.000 --> 0:08:06.480 Called Codsworth. If you've seen the movie The Help, well 0:08:07.040 --> 0:08:11.559 that's Codsworth. It was originally owned by a man named 0:08:11.880 --> 0:08:16.880 James Z. George, who was a U. S. Senator, colonel 0:08:16.960 --> 0:08:20.080 and the Confederate Army during the Civil War and also 0:08:20.280 --> 0:08:27.200 my great great great grandfather. Also he owned many slaves. 0:08:27.880 --> 0:08:31.120 Claire wanted to learn more about James E. George. Not 0:08:31.280 --> 0:08:34.200 only did he own slaves, he fought hard to preserve 0:08:34.240 --> 0:08:37.800 white supremacy even after the Civil War ended. She learned 0:08:37.840 --> 0:08:39.640 that he was a pioneer and crafting some of the 0:08:39.760 --> 0:08:43.520 very first Jim Crow era legislation that kept black people 0:08:43.559 --> 0:08:48.160 from voting. He also created the Understanding Clause, which required 0:08:48.200 --> 0:08:51.640 people to be able to read or understand the Constitution, 0:08:52.679 --> 0:08:56.240 that effectively removed tens of thousands of black people from 0:08:56.320 --> 0:08:59.960 voter rolls. Claire wrote about her journey in an essay 0:09:00.080 --> 0:09:03.880 for an online magazine called The delic Court Review. I 0:09:03.960 --> 0:09:05.719 wanted to talk to her about why she felt it 0:09:05.760 --> 0:09:08.319 was important to tell her family story and what it 0:09:08.400 --> 0:09:14.640 was like to reckon with their past. Hi, Claire, Hey, Jackie, 0:09:15.480 --> 0:09:18.439 Obviously I know you and we've been colleagues for for 0:09:18.679 --> 0:09:21.800 years now, but you know, until I read your story 0:09:22.160 --> 0:09:26.280 about your family's history and about Codsworth. I didn't really 0:09:26.360 --> 0:09:29.400 know that much about you or about your family in 0:09:29.800 --> 0:09:34.160 their history. Why did you decide to write about Coatsworth 0:09:34.240 --> 0:09:36.839 and what you called the two sides of Coatsworth in 0:09:36.920 --> 0:09:41.120 your peace? I think you have to understand just how 0:09:42.760 --> 0:09:48.480 unusual and rarit is for a family too still in 0:09:48.600 --> 0:09:52.520 present day own, and not just own, but live in 0:09:53.480 --> 0:09:57.240 a plantation that the same family has lived in since 0:09:57.280 --> 0:10:01.079 before the Civil War. So there's that. But then also, 0:10:01.640 --> 0:10:04.920 my grandmother died before I was born, and my middle 0:10:05.000 --> 0:10:07.719 name is her name. Her name was Vernon, which is 0:10:07.840 --> 0:10:13.839 also very unusual if you're a woman, and Colts was 0:10:13.920 --> 0:10:16.319 the only connection, aside from my name, that I had 0:10:16.400 --> 0:10:19.839 to her. But then as I started actually researching the 0:10:19.920 --> 0:10:23.120 past of who was James E. George? Who owned it? 0:10:23.280 --> 0:10:25.720 And what did he do? And what does it really 0:10:25.800 --> 0:10:29.839 mean to own slaves? That was when I realized that 0:10:30.840 --> 0:10:35.840 whatever feelings I have towards my grandmother and any living 0:10:35.880 --> 0:10:42.719 relatives is separate from how I feel about what my 0:10:42.880 --> 0:10:47.920 great great grandfather did d fifty sixty years ago. I'd 0:10:47.960 --> 0:10:52.400 like to know what are your first memories of Codsworth? 0:10:53.280 --> 0:10:55.120 So I knew that This was a house that my 0:10:55.200 --> 0:10:58.199 family had had for a really long time, and I 0:10:58.360 --> 0:11:03.240 remember thinking it was really cool. It was like this 0:11:03.440 --> 0:11:06.400 relic from the past. All the furniture was over a 0:11:06.520 --> 0:11:10.240 hundred years old, all the floorboards creaked. I could run 0:11:10.320 --> 0:11:15.240 around the grass, which wasn't the meticulously kept suburban lawns 0:11:15.320 --> 0:11:18.200 that I was used to. And I was really into 0:11:18.240 --> 0:11:20.120 horses when I was a kid, so I brought all 0:11:20.160 --> 0:11:22.800 my plastic horses and played with them in the front 0:11:22.880 --> 0:11:25.559 yard of Codsworth. The other memory that I have was 0:11:25.679 --> 0:11:32.360 that there was this small sort of rectangular shack behind 0:11:32.440 --> 0:11:36.040 the house and off to the side that I think 0:11:36.200 --> 0:11:40.360 is the last remaining structure that had been slaves quarters. 0:11:42.200 --> 0:11:45.360 And I wasn't allowed to go inside because it was 0:11:45.440 --> 0:11:50.520 structurally unsound and it was full of wasps nests. So 0:11:50.640 --> 0:11:53.000 I never went inside, and I could never really even 0:11:53.280 --> 0:11:56.319 peek inside because I couldn't get close enough to it. 0:11:57.320 --> 0:11:59.559 But I remember knowing that it was there. So you 0:11:59.679 --> 0:12:05.120 went back to Cotsworth with your dad in what was 0:12:05.160 --> 0:12:07.960 your biggest takeaway from that trip? It's interesting to visit 0:12:08.080 --> 0:12:11.000 something that you saw as a child and then revisited 0:12:11.080 --> 0:12:17.319 again as an adult, because things that seemed huge and 0:12:17.920 --> 0:12:25.160 almost unknowable, are as an adult probably much smaller and 0:12:25.440 --> 0:12:30.199 more easier to comprehend than when you're a kid, And 0:12:30.360 --> 0:12:35.360 so visiting it when I was young, I didn't really 0:12:35.440 --> 0:12:40.719 understand the context of coats Worth, and my dad and 0:12:40.800 --> 0:12:44.480 I went down there because I had started to become 0:12:44.600 --> 0:12:49.439 interested in writing about it and researching it, so I 0:12:50.920 --> 0:12:57.400 asked him if he would go with me. And that's 0:12:57.480 --> 0:13:02.360 when I realized that at what I had sort of 0:13:02.480 --> 0:13:07.040 romanticized as a child, or even or just focused on, 0:13:07.440 --> 0:13:11.079 you know, how big the house was, how expansive the 0:13:11.240 --> 0:13:13.920 land was, the fact that she had cows, it was 0:13:14.000 --> 0:13:20.520 really cool when I was six, was actually, in reality 0:13:20.640 --> 0:13:23.719 quite sad. It was a relic of the past in 0:13:23.840 --> 0:13:27.040 more ways than one. But then also looking at the 0:13:28.360 --> 0:13:37.319 the former slaves quarters, I realized how poignant it was 0:13:37.520 --> 0:13:40.320 that they were still there. I have to ask about 0:13:40.320 --> 0:13:44.199 the slave quarters. Did your family tell you about the 0:13:44.280 --> 0:13:46.480 slave quarters? Did they How much did they talk to 0:13:46.559 --> 0:13:50.360 you about that part of the plantation? I probably asked 0:13:50.400 --> 0:13:53.000 what it was when I was six. I don't remember, 0:13:53.800 --> 0:13:56.720 but I remember. I do know that when I returned 0:13:58.160 --> 0:14:02.199 as an adult, I new to look for it, so 0:14:02.360 --> 0:14:05.520 I must have known that it was there. How did 0:14:05.559 --> 0:14:09.440 you have a conversation about the use of that space? 0:14:09.800 --> 0:14:12.360 I mean, what did you give you an opportunity to 0:14:12.520 --> 0:14:16.440 talk with your family or your dad about what had 0:14:16.480 --> 0:14:20.680 happened there. The one thing that I have never fully 0:14:20.840 --> 0:14:27.960 understood about my family and Codsworth is the house and 0:14:28.280 --> 0:14:33.440 land is still meaningful to my family, even people who 0:14:33.760 --> 0:14:38.160 don't live there, but they don't like to talk about 0:14:40.800 --> 0:14:44.720 what it means to have owned a plantation in Mississippi 0:14:44.800 --> 0:14:50.480 before the Civil War. So while my dad and relatives 0:14:50.920 --> 0:14:56.240 never shied away from admitting that, yes, obviously my great 0:14:56.240 --> 0:14:59.640 great great grandfather owned slaves, they didn't know much beyond 0:14:59.720 --> 0:15:02.040 that because their parents never told them, and their parents 0:15:02.160 --> 0:15:05.120 never told them, and so they just left it at that, like, 0:15:05.400 --> 0:15:08.160 obviously that happened. But then the Civil War came along 0:15:08.520 --> 0:15:11.760 and then we didn't have slaves anymore the end, And 0:15:11.880 --> 0:15:16.280 I thought, well, I think there's probably much more to that. 0:15:22.400 --> 0:15:27.360 And when you fully appreciated James E. George's significance with 0:15:27.520 --> 0:15:32.320 regard to Mississippi politics and shaping the outcome of black 0:15:32.440 --> 0:15:37.200 lives at that point in our history, what kind of 0:15:37.280 --> 0:15:43.280 introspection did that provoke? In you about race in America 0:15:44.200 --> 0:15:48.360 and especially as it relates to black lives today. I'm 0:15:48.440 --> 0:15:52.440 less upset by my direct connection to this then I 0:15:52.600 --> 0:15:54.400 am by the fact that I didn't know about it. 0:15:55.000 --> 0:15:58.440 You know, when I was an elementary school in high school, 0:15:59.720 --> 0:16:02.600 every year in history class we would learn about the 0:16:02.640 --> 0:16:05.880 Civil War. Every year. I memorize the Gettysburg address in 0:16:05.960 --> 0:16:09.520 fifth grade, and I still haven't memorized. I think I've 0:16:09.600 --> 0:16:12.000 been to the battlefields. I've been to Gettysburg, I've been 0:16:12.040 --> 0:16:15.480 to Vicksburg. But I I don't think there's very much 0:16:15.480 --> 0:16:19.680 discussion among white people about white people's role in that. 0:16:21.560 --> 0:16:27.440 And I don't really understand why, Because if you claim 0:16:27.480 --> 0:16:29.480 to want to make things better, and if you claim 0:16:29.600 --> 0:16:31.520 to disagree with all the stuff that has happened in 0:16:31.560 --> 0:16:34.840 the past, you know why, why can't you talk about it? 0:16:35.840 --> 0:16:38.440 You have a passage about this in your essay. Could 0:16:38.480 --> 0:16:42.400 you read it? America has lurched and fits and starts 0:16:42.440 --> 0:16:46.360 towards equality, But with every inch gained comes one side's 0:16:46.360 --> 0:16:50.560 declaration that things are fine. Now, that's enough, but it's 0:16:50.560 --> 0:16:53.280 not enough. The effects of what men like Jay Z 0:16:53.400 --> 0:16:57.280 George did ripple through this country. Even now we encounter 0:16:57.400 --> 0:17:02.000 this truth again and again, but somehow we still managed 0:17:02.000 --> 0:17:05.600 to avoid facing it head on. I can't stop loving 0:17:05.640 --> 0:17:08.480 my family, and by extension, I'll always be fond of 0:17:08.520 --> 0:17:12.080 Coad's worth. But it's possible to care for something and 0:17:12.200 --> 0:17:16.840 know that what it stands for is deeply wrong. It's 0:17:16.880 --> 0:17:19.040 been a few years since you wrote that, does it 0:17:19.160 --> 0:17:23.399 still resonate? You know? I don't love my grandmother because 0:17:23.440 --> 0:17:25.760 she died before I was born, but my dad loved 0:17:25.760 --> 0:17:30.119 her loves her still probably, and she in turn loved 0:17:30.240 --> 0:17:33.200 her parents, who loved their parents. So by extension, you 0:17:33.280 --> 0:17:37.960 could say that there has been love lasting through the generations. 0:17:38.000 --> 0:17:40.920 And so someone that I'm connected to today is connected 0:17:41.000 --> 0:17:44.480 to someone is connected to someone who did love someone 0:17:44.560 --> 0:17:53.840 who owned slaves, And I think that is something that 0:17:53.880 --> 0:17:56.920 I've actually never really articulated before, and also something that 0:17:59.359 --> 0:18:03.399 I think is necessary for us to understand. There seems 0:18:03.440 --> 0:18:10.360 to be this feeling that in admitting your past wrongs 0:18:11.400 --> 0:18:17.720 here somehow admitting that everything about you in the past, 0:18:17.840 --> 0:18:20.520 or everything about your family in the past is bad 0:18:20.640 --> 0:18:26.040 and terrible. You did this amazing thing, Claire, where you 0:18:26.200 --> 0:18:30.520 sought out descendants of people who were enslaved at Codsworth, 0:18:31.280 --> 0:18:34.159 one of them agreed to meet you. What was that like? 0:18:34.800 --> 0:18:40.320 In hindsight, Great Carlos is a lovely human being. He's 0:18:41.080 --> 0:18:44.959 really nice, funny, warm, But in the act of meeting him, 0:18:45.040 --> 0:18:49.160 and beforehand, I was definitely nervous. I had never met 0:18:49.240 --> 0:18:55.360 anyone under the pretext of the fact that my great 0:18:55.400 --> 0:19:00.520 great great grandfather had enslaved his great grandfather. How do 0:19:00.560 --> 0:19:04.240 you start a conversation when that is the one fact 0:19:04.920 --> 0:19:09.000 binding you. Luckily, like I said, Carlos is nice and funny, 0:19:09.200 --> 0:19:12.960 and so he brought his wife Tie along and sort 0:19:12.960 --> 0:19:18.680 of diffused the initial awkwardness with warmth and humor, and 0:19:19.640 --> 0:19:22.959 we took it from there. One of you had suggested 0:19:23.160 --> 0:19:26.640 taking DNA tests after learning that you might be related 0:19:27.320 --> 0:19:30.600 through James E. George. What happened was I, when I 0:19:30.720 --> 0:19:37.920 was researching about jez George, I heard this rumor, and 0:19:38.000 --> 0:19:41.200 I first heard it from the historian, the professor who 0:19:41.240 --> 0:19:44.960 had written the one biography about him, and he told 0:19:45.000 --> 0:19:46.919 me that none of the white people he had ever 0:19:47.040 --> 0:19:49.119 interviewed had mentioned this, but he had heard it from 0:19:49.160 --> 0:19:51.440 a number of black people, and he had heard that 0:19:51.800 --> 0:19:55.159 Jay Z George had fathered children with women that he 0:19:55.280 --> 0:20:00.560 had enslaved and when I first heard that, I thought, okay, 0:20:01.720 --> 0:20:06.600 what do I do with that information? I can't ignore it, 0:20:07.600 --> 0:20:12.840 and I'm a journalist, so I'll just follow up on 0:20:12.960 --> 0:20:16.600 that rumor as I would if this were not my family, 0:20:16.720 --> 0:20:18.880 if it were someone else's family, How would I follow 0:20:19.000 --> 0:20:22.080 up on it? And the historians suggested that I reach 0:20:22.160 --> 0:20:24.800 out to this group that is called, I think the 0:20:25.000 --> 0:20:29.680 African American Genealogy Group of Carroll County, and they're on Facebook. 0:20:30.000 --> 0:20:34.280 So I messaged several people who were people with the 0:20:34.320 --> 0:20:39.320 last name George, so ostensibly former slaves of James C. 0:20:39.480 --> 0:20:45.199 George from quotes Worth, and I asked them if they 0:20:45.280 --> 0:20:47.680 had heard that rumor, and a number of them said 0:20:47.680 --> 0:20:52.480 that they had. And when I talked to Carlos, he 0:20:52.800 --> 0:20:57.720 said that while his immediate family had never talked about 0:20:57.720 --> 0:21:01.920 that necessarily, he had heard that rumor over time, and 0:21:02.080 --> 0:21:03.600 he said, you know, it would be great to be 0:21:03.640 --> 0:21:06.119 able to take a d DNA test and you know, 0:21:06.280 --> 0:21:07.960 put this room to rest one way or the other. 0:21:08.640 --> 0:21:13.320 And so I thought, all right, you know, all I 0:21:13.440 --> 0:21:17.960 can do is say yes. So we ordered DNA tests 0:21:18.000 --> 0:21:22.119 through twenty three and me and we took them and 0:21:22.760 --> 0:21:25.800 it turns out that we are not related. What did 0:21:25.840 --> 0:21:28.560 it feel like when you first learned that you weren't related? 0:21:28.600 --> 0:21:31.639 What was your first reaction. A lot of people have 0:21:31.720 --> 0:21:33.679 asked me that, and a lot of people have asked, 0:21:34.119 --> 0:21:39.040 weren't you relieved that this terrible thing hadn't happened? And 0:21:40.359 --> 0:21:44.639 in the sense that I am glad that I know 0:21:44.920 --> 0:21:50.160 that my great great grandfather didn't grape Joe George's mother, Yes, 0:21:50.240 --> 0:21:52.960 obviously I'm glad that that did not happen, but I'm 0:21:53.000 --> 0:21:56.680 well aware that I didn't answer the question fully. And 0:21:57.560 --> 0:22:01.000 also while we were waiting for the results was when 0:22:01.040 --> 0:22:03.920 I was doing more research and I learned about this 0:22:04.320 --> 0:22:10.360 understanding clause and his role in enshrining white supremacy in Mississippi. 0:22:12.480 --> 0:22:17.920 And so yeah, I guess that one answer is the 0:22:18.040 --> 0:22:22.200 easier answer, but I mean, it's hard to feel good 0:22:22.240 --> 0:22:26.600 about that knowing everything else. I will say that I 0:22:26.800 --> 0:22:29.280 took the DNA test without telling the rest of my family. 0:22:30.440 --> 0:22:34.520 I did that because if I told them before I 0:22:34.600 --> 0:22:37.920 took it, I wouldn't know what the answer was and 0:22:37.960 --> 0:22:39.920 I wouldn't know what to tell them. So I was 0:22:39.920 --> 0:22:41.680 going to wait until I had the results, so that 0:22:41.720 --> 0:22:45.000 I would only have to tell them once. So I 0:22:45.119 --> 0:22:49.719 told them, and because the result was that we weren't related, 0:22:50.080 --> 0:22:57.560 I think they were like, okay, that answers that. Yesterday 0:22:57.600 --> 0:23:00.359 and we were talking, you said that your family react 0:23:00.400 --> 0:23:04.040 to it in a way most people would react. Tell 0:23:04.080 --> 0:23:09.399 me more about that. Well, I assume they read it, 0:23:10.680 --> 0:23:13.880 but they've never said anything to me about it, which 0:23:13.960 --> 0:23:19.199 I take to mean they didn't hate it, but they 0:23:19.440 --> 0:23:22.160 may not have totally loved it. And I've also never 0:23:22.280 --> 0:23:27.360 asked them. It's a two way street, but it's out there, 0:23:28.000 --> 0:23:32.239 and I told it because I felt a responsibility too. 0:23:32.720 --> 0:23:38.439 And what do you say to white people who say, well, 0:23:38.480 --> 0:23:41.000 I never I don't have a direct connection to slavery. 0:23:41.200 --> 0:23:44.879 You know, my parents came here only in you know, 0:23:45.320 --> 0:23:47.800 year X and had nothing to do with it. And 0:23:47.840 --> 0:23:51.320 I've traced my past, so therefore I don't feel accountable. 0:23:52.000 --> 0:23:54.639 What do you what do you say to that? I 0:23:54.720 --> 0:23:57.520 think that's the easy answer. But I think if you 0:23:57.680 --> 0:24:01.040 only look at your family and that ends, if you're 0:24:01.080 --> 0:24:03.720 missing a lot. Right, I've lived my whole life in America. 0:24:04.359 --> 0:24:08.560 I would say that I have an above average understanding 0:24:09.160 --> 0:24:13.680 of American history, but only when I decided to sit 0:24:13.760 --> 0:24:17.960 down as a side project and really research reconstruction in 0:24:18.040 --> 0:24:21.760 my family's history. Did I really learn about this? Has 0:24:21.760 --> 0:24:26.720 anyone else in your family reckoned with this history at all? 0:24:27.280 --> 0:24:31.200 So you know, my dad is retired now and he 0:24:31.400 --> 0:24:33.960 lives in Florida, and one of the projects that he 0:24:34.080 --> 0:24:36.560 came up with to keep himself occupied during the pandemic 0:24:37.080 --> 0:24:41.359 was he is working on this book about his family. 0:24:41.840 --> 0:24:44.000 It's not going to be publicly published. It's like this 0:24:44.080 --> 0:24:47.560 book that he's putting together with pictures and anecdotes about 0:24:47.880 --> 0:24:49.920 this far, stretching as far back in history as he 0:24:50.000 --> 0:24:51.959 can and going sort of as wide as he can. 0:24:52.160 --> 0:24:54.600 He's including my mom's side of the family and my 0:24:54.680 --> 0:24:58.000 step mom, my husband's side of the family. And he'll 0:24:58.200 --> 0:25:01.920 publish it on snapfish or something like that and print 0:25:02.000 --> 0:25:05.040 five copies or something and give it to people for presents. 0:25:05.520 --> 0:25:09.000 Hopefully I'm not ruining future Christmas gifts for people, So 0:25:09.200 --> 0:25:12.119 just acts surprised when you open it. So he's been 0:25:12.119 --> 0:25:15.280 doing this, and he told me the other day we 0:25:15.359 --> 0:25:18.359 were talking um that he had just finished the page 0:25:18.440 --> 0:25:22.200 on James C. George and he said he had put 0:25:23.040 --> 0:25:28.800 in the information that I had found about this understanding 0:25:28.880 --> 0:25:31.800 clause and what he had done, but he wasn't really 0:25:31.840 --> 0:25:34.359 sure how he felt about it. And it's in there 0:25:34.440 --> 0:25:37.159 for now, but maybe if he needs to revise the 0:25:37.280 --> 0:25:40.520 book later, he would leave it out. And I said, 0:25:40.560 --> 0:25:44.280 I think he should keep it in. And I don't 0:25:44.320 --> 0:25:46.560 know what hell decide. I guess I'll find out when 0:25:46.600 --> 0:25:49.480 I opened my future Christmas present in a year or 0:25:49.560 --> 0:25:54.920 something like that. But he has thought about it at least, 0:25:55.520 --> 0:25:57.040 and I think it's a good sign that it's in 0:25:57.080 --> 0:26:00.399 the first draft. So you gave birth to your first 0:26:00.600 --> 0:26:05.760 child last year, Yeah, in a pandemic, little little Kate. Right, 0:26:07.760 --> 0:26:10.360 So how did all of this research into your family 0:26:11.160 --> 0:26:14.879 and to Codsworth make you think about the kind of 0:26:15.000 --> 0:26:19.159 conversations you're going to have with little Kate down the 0:26:19.280 --> 0:26:22.040 road that maybe your own family didn't have with you 0:26:22.680 --> 0:26:27.280 about these topics. I may not ever take her to Codsworth, 0:26:29.400 --> 0:26:32.680 or maybe I will, but it probably would be one time, 0:26:33.440 --> 0:26:38.360 one trip two we're all Mississippi to see where she's from. 0:26:39.440 --> 0:26:44.959 Maybe she'll be twelve or thirteen. Kate will grow up 0:26:45.280 --> 0:26:49.680 as a generation even further removed from this past than me, 0:26:50.760 --> 0:26:53.359 And in some ways that's how it should be. I 0:26:53.480 --> 0:26:56.359 think the only way we can move forward is to 0:26:56.400 --> 0:27:02.600 actually move forward. But I will tell her about her family, 0:27:02.760 --> 0:27:06.040 and when I tell her about who would now be 0:27:06.240 --> 0:27:09.520 her great grandmother's side of the family or her great 0:27:10.040 --> 0:27:13.760 great great great grandfather, I will tell her all of 0:27:13.840 --> 0:27:18.879 this and she'll grow up learning about it, and she 0:27:19.040 --> 0:27:23.280 won't have to spend, you know, six months, nine months 0:27:23.320 --> 0:27:33.320 of her life researching it to find out. Claire was 0:27:33.400 --> 0:27:35.560 able to learn a lot about her family's history going 0:27:35.640 --> 0:27:38.960 back centuries. That's something most people can't or won't do. 0:27:40.280 --> 0:27:43.000 When I think back to my family's story of land 0:27:43.080 --> 0:27:46.040