Tomorrow, Saturday, June 22nd, the People’s Organization for Progress (P.O.P.) and the NJ Institute for Social Justice (NJISJ) will cohost the annual Juneteenth rally for reparations. The rally starts at 12 p.m. at the Lincoln Memorial, located at 12 Springfield Ave. in Newark.
Endorsements for the rally come from a coalition of activist organizations, including the People’s Organization For Progress (POP), New Jersey Institute For Social Justice, Ironbound Community Corporation, Salvation and Social Justice, Our Revolution NJ, West Orange for Humanity, Pal-Awda NY/NJ Palestinian Assembly for Liberation, Action Together New Jersey, Paterson Juneteenth Committee, National Action Network-Greater Newark Chapter, National Action Network-Brick City Chapter, Showing Up For Racial Justice (SURJ) NJ, and other organizations.
The annual march began several years ago to amplify the push for a NJ Reparations Bill, a law that would establish a commission to study how reparations should be developed based on New Jersey’s history with the slave trade and post slavery institutional racism.
The demonstration is being held to demand reparations for African Americans for the following:
- For the unpaid labor of our ancestors during centuries of enslavement in the United States
- For the suffering we endured as a result of the racist oppression and exploitation that grew out of slavery and continued in its aftermath.
- For the racial terror and lynching of the post Reconstruction era, the unjust system of peonage called sharecropping, the convict lease labor system, and the century of legalized apartheid known as Jim Crow segregation.
- For the racist violence, institutionalized racism, segregation, discrimination, inequality, mass incarceration, repression and gerrymandering that continues to this day which also have their roots in the enslavement of Black people
- We are marching to demand that President Biden sign an executive order to establish the national reparations commission called for in reparations legislation that has been stalled in Congress for decades.
- We continue to demand passage of the reparations legislation at the state and federal levels. We call upon the New Jersey State Legislature to pass and Gov. Murphy to sign into law A602 and S3164, which would establish a reparations task force for the state.
- POP urges the New Jersey Legislature to follow the example of the New York Legislature which passed a reparations bill and has established a state commission.
- We call on Congress to pass HR 40 and S40 which would establish a federal reparations commission. We ask the entire congressional delegation from New Jersey to become co-sponsors of these bills.
“Juneteenth and reparations were born at the same time, out of the same struggle, and for the same cause. If you talk about one you need to talk about the other,” Hamm said.
Speakers at the event will include activists and representatives of People’s Organization For Progress, New Jersey Institute For Social Justice, and other organizations that have endorsed the march.
For more information contact People’s Organization For Progress (973)801-0001.
Ande Richards wants to hear from New Jersey’s communities of color, people with disabilities, the LGBTQ+ communities, and those who feel underserved by traditional media. She may be reached at arichards@njadvancemedia.com.
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