Please sign Washington's first slavery reparations study

Yahoo

14-05-2025

As a 28-year-old Black millennial, husband, minister and president of the Tacoma Branch NAACP, I'm writing you because today Washington state stands at an historic turning point.
The Legislature has passed Engrossed Substitute Senate Bill (ESSB) 5167, a $78 billion biennial budget bill which includes just $300,000 to fund Washington's first study on reparations for descendants of victims of U.S. chattel slavery. Gov. Bob Ferguson, we realize you possess line-item veto power, but please preserve this funding in your budget.
This funding creates the Charles Mitchell and George Washington Bush Study on Reparative Action, named in honor of two Black pioneers who faced pre- and post-civil war racism in the early Northwest. Charles Mitchell was a Black child who was enslaved in Washington territory and won his freedom by escaping to Canada in 1860, documenting slavery's early existence on Washington soil. George Washington Bush was one of the earliest permanent Black settlers in the Washington territory. This study will examine the impact of slavery on all Washington citizens and propose concrete recommendations to the governor, the legislature and the U.S. Congress.
This study is not just about history. This study is about our future. I stand with a new generation of young Washingtonians who do not want to just survive in life. We want to thrive!
We have witnessed the results of federal reparations for other ravaged communities. Japanese Americans received reparations in the 1980s for their World War II internment. Indigenous nations received reparations in the form of land settlements and restitution due to decades of broken treaties. Finally, the Luxembourg Agreements cemented Holocaust reparations which continue for Holocaust victims and their heirs to this day.
Yet Black Americans, whose ancestors endured 246 years of slavery and centuries of lost generational wealth, have only received short-lived government programs like affirmative action and diversity, equity and inclusion, which the current White House is blowtorching nearly every day.
Washington is not alone on this reparations journey. We join states like California, New York and Colorado, which are already undertaking the serious work of reparative justice.
We owe the funding of Washington's historic study to courageous leaders like Sen. Bob Hasegawa, State Rep. Chipalo Street and attorney and former House Majority Whip Jesse Wineberry, who in the 80s delivered reparations checks to Japanese survivors of World War II internment camps and returned to Olympia this year to testify in the House and Senate for the reparations study.
We thank community stakeholders like the NAACP, Washington Equity Now Alliance (WENA), Democrats for Diversity and Inclusion (DDI), Tacoma-Pierce County Black Collective, Seattle-King County African-American Reparations Committee (SAARC), American Renewal 1870, Community Passageways, National Council of Negro Women (NCNW), Olympia Mayor Dante Payne, Olympia City Council and others who raised their voices in Olympia to make this study possible.
Now, Gov. Ferguson, we need you to finish what the legislature has begun for three critical reasons:
Understanding Washington's projected $12-13 billion revenue shortfall, ESSB 5167 allows community stakeholders to raise non-state funding for this study through public, private and philanthropic partnerships.
Only the federal government, not the state, is expected to provide chattel slavery reparations.
The Republican controlled Congress recently reintroduced H.R. 4321 to penalize states that fund slavery reparations programs with the loss of federal funding. Should H.R. 4321 become federal law, Washington state will be prohibited from funding any future slavery reparations initiatives without jeopardizing billions of federal funding for our state. Therefore, please approve the Legislature's $300,000.00 funding now because this may be our state's last chance to fund any reparations programs.
As a man of faith, I cherish the biblical year of jubilee, which signifies a time for restoration with a renewed commitment to forgiveness and reconciliation.
Gov. Ferguson, in the spirit of jubilee, please sign Washington's first reparations study.
Rev. Malando D. Redeemer
Rev. Malando D. Redeemer is the president of the Tacoma branch of the NAACP. He is the youth and young adult pastor at Shiloh Baptist Church in Tacoma. He is also a former labor organizer and contract negotiator for SEIU Healthcare 1199NW and UFCW 3000, and a past fellow of The Martin Luther King Jr. Freedom Center and the Institute for Community Leadership.