HJ0090eng 101ST GENERAL ASSEMBLY

HJ0090 Engrossed LRB101 14844 MST 64020 r

HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION 90

WHEREAS, The United States' history as a symbol of democracy, freedom, and "home of exiles" is brandished around the world; and

WHEREAS, The legacy of our Nation's African-descended people and indigenous peoples has resounded as an echoing dissonance in its "symphony of brotherhood" throughout its history; and

WHEREAS, The legacy of African American struggles for civil, political, and human rights is interwoven in the fabric of democracy and freedom of the United States; and

WHEREAS, Millions of Africans and their descendants were enslaved in the United States, from the original 13 North American colonies until the abolition of slavery in 1865 with the 13th Amendment to the Constitution to "slavery by another name" under the twin regimes of racial economic and social authoritarianism, called Jim Crow, and domestic terrorism; and

WHEREAS, The aggregate value of enslaved African Americans at the time of Emancipation, measured in 2019 dollars, was more than 13 trillion dollars, which is a meager percentage of the unpaid wealth that they produced for the United States' slave-based economy; and

WHEREAS, The gendered racism of the United States' system of slavery made the productive and reproductive intrinsic value of enslaved African American women an incalculable source of the United States' global economic power; and

WHEREAS, Africans forced into slavery, brutalized, humiliated, dehumanized, and subjected to the indignity of being stripped of their names and heritage makes the reparations due to African Americans necessary but insufficient as the United States' payment on the debt of African American slavery, peonage, and expropriation of Black asset wealth through fraudulent mortgages like Chicago's notorious "contract buyers" schemes; and

WHEREAS, African American families were torn apart when family members were sold off, endured further separation and deprivation under Jim Crow, but sought freedom and economic opportunities in the Great Migration from the South to northern Midwest states like Illinois; and

WHEREAS, The system of hereditary racial slavery that commenced not long after "the 1619 year of no return" provided the foundation of the system of structural racism, inequality, and white supremacy that became woven into the social fabric of the United States; and

WHEREAS, So embedded in the United States' social, political, economic, religious, and cultural landscape was the system of African American subjugation that it took the apocalypse of the American Civil War to rid the Nation of its "original sin"; and

WHEREAS, The State of Illinois assumes a special place in the history and memorialization of "the 1619 day of no return" because of the role that President Abraham Lincoln played as Commander-in-Chief in defeating the armed revolt of the slave power of the southern Confederacy against American democracy and African American freedom; and

WHEREAS, It took the powerful working of the United States' democratic electoral system, propelled by the movement of African American slaves following the North Star to freedom in solidarity with their White and free Black allies in the abolitionist movement, to elect and re-elect Abraham Lincoln to carry out the historic task of ridding the United States of slavery; and

WHEREAS, The great challenge to our experiment in democracy that we face today gives us further reason to memorialize the Black struggle for freedom that recommitted the United States to its democratic ideals, adding the Civil War Amendments (13th, 14th, and 15th) to the Constitution; and

WHEREAS, Illinois has never evinced the same care and consideration for its Black exiles from Africa that it has for its White exiles from Europe; and

WHEREAS, Every positive step that Illinois has taken toward racial justice and equality has been reversed by backward legislative steps that have made Black freedom struggles in Illinois continuous to this day; and

WHEREAS, The 1908 Springfield Race Riot in the State's capital and seat of the people's representatives was the catalyst for the formation of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP); and

WHEREAS, The 1917 East St. Louis race riot demonstrated the tangled history of race, class, and economics that victimized African Americans who were newly arrived to Illinois from the South; and

WHEREAS, Springfield and East St. Louis also reflected a new Black assertiveness, a "New Negro", that culminated in the "Red Summer of 1919" Chicago Race Riot, whose 100th anniversary is also memorialized with this resolution; and

WHEREAS, The history of Illinois' modern system of racial segregation, heroically countered by the democratic struggles of the State's African American communities, calls upon all Illinois legislators to prioritize the State's legislative agenda around policies and realistic funding appropriations aimed at addressing the interminable legacy of racial inequities in African American education, housing, labor market outcomes, transportation marginalization, business inequalities, healthcare disparities, and political decision-making disempowerment; and

WHEREAS, The State of Illinois also boasts numerous racial justice moments throughout its 20th century political history that have impacted both the State's and the United States' history, including the election of Abraham Lincoln, the election of Harold Washington as the first Black Mayor of the City of Chicago, the election of Barack Obama as the first Black President of the United States, the election of Illinois' first Black Woman Lieutenant Governor, the election of the first Black Woman State Representative of Illinois' 103rd District, representing the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, the appointment of the first Black Chancellor of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, and the election in Chicago of the first Black LGBTQ Mayor of any major city in the United States; therefore, be it

RESOLVED, BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE ONE HUNDRED FIRST GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, THE SENATE CONCURRING HEREIN, that we solemnly observe the 1619 African Year of No Return by observing the Illinois recognition of the 2019 Year of Return Project resolution; and be it further

RESOLVED, That we urge recognition of Illinois' vibrant history of African American political struggles for democracy and freedom that have widened the scope and deepened the State's and the United States' commitment to democracy and racial justice; and be it further

RESOLVED, That we urge adequate appropriations for investigations, research, publication, and a website to represent Illinois' Black contributions to widening and deepening the State's and the United States' commitment to racial justice in memorializing the 1619-2019 Year of Return; and be it further

RESOLVED, That we urge adequate appropriations for the development of a comprehensive legislative agenda of policies and racial justice legislation to engage the State's African American communities in an urgent discussion of their vital issues and challenges to memorialize the 1619-2019 Year of Return.