A Lesson Deferred

 

Yes, I remember the celebrations for the Bicentennial. I was in high school. Yes, it felt so much better than what we are experiencing today. I’ve seen a lot of such sentiment online recently.

But what I don’t remember from 1976 were all the things that I didn’t see. I was a white teenager in an upper-middle class community. I attended an integrated high school that had been integrated through busing and, in four years, there were only two Black students in my “academic” classes. 

We were in the same building but were still in many ways completely separated.

I knew about the Civil Rights Movement and believed in equal rights for everyone but had precious little opportunity to interact with people who didn’t look like me or live like me. I knew that some people were probably racists but had no understanding of continuing racist systems - - how racism was deeply embedded into the law, and financial systems, and even in schools. 

I was raised by nice white liberals to be a nice white liberal and in my ignorance I celebrated the Bicentennial of the United States of America. I don’t regret the happy memories I have. I regret thinking that my experience was everyone’s experience and that we could all celebrate the same way.

I remember watching live footage of Arthur Fiedler conducting the Boston Pops at the Esplanade as the crowd practically vibrated with joy during “Stars and Stripes Forever.” Going out on Long Island Sound with my boyfriend’s family to watch the fireworks from their boat and catching glimpses of the visiting Tall Ships. Believing that we were celebrating some kind of experiment which had pledged to do good for its people and in the world. Believing that, although imperfect, we had kept that promise. 

I believed we all had the same freedoms. I was wrong.

Knowing the truth does not make me happier. It does make me care so much more about wanting my country to be what it ought to be. A Democratic free society is a lie if we don’t require it to be free for everyone. If we say that there is such a thing as “inhumane treatment” then that means that everyone must be treated humanely. 

There’s no possible off-ramp or convenient footnote for acting as though some people are more equal than others or for excusing cruelty as long as it happens to someone else. 

Make no mistake, the most patriotic, the most American people in our community are the ones we see every day insisting that all are welcome, all must be treated humanely, and all must be free.

And so I have to hold that knowledge and that heartache inside me along with the golden memories of 1976. I can’t say, “It was so much better then,” if what I mean is that it was better for me. 

I want to see America be what she says she is 
and I consider it part of my responsibility to do that. 
It's a kind of patriotism.

- - Rev. Dr. Pauli Murray

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