Sonya Massey should still be alive

By David W. Marshall

(Trice Edney Wire.) – In many ways, our country has changed, but it has not changed. When the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, informally known as the National Lynching Memorial, opened in Montgomery, Alabama, it was to commemorate the black victims of lynchings in the United States. Its focus was to acknowledge past racial terrorism and advocate for social justice throughout our country. It stands symbolically on a high spot overlooking the city, about a mile from the state Capitol and the city’s plethora of Confederate statues.

The powerful museum explains lynchings as a direct legacy of slavery and a means of enforcing white supremacy. Lynchings often involved amputations, mutilations, torture, and castration. Bodies were publicly lifted and displayed in plain sight in an effort to intimidate and traumatize Black communities. The shedding of innocent blood is their legacy, tolerated and often aided by law enforcement and elected officials. Exhibits explore a consistent history of violence and control over Black Americans. More than 4,400 Black people were killed in racist terror lynchings between 1877 and 1950. Their names are commemorated with their names engraved on more than 800 monuments—one for each county where a lynching occurred. While these monuments confront the shameful history of racist terror, they also remind us that this legacy of fear and trauma continues today through the unjust killings of Black people by law enforcement.

George Wallace was once the governor of Alabama. His empty words would eventually turn deadly. He openly provoked violence in the South, inspiring people to subvert their personal feelings of resentment and anger into violent actions. Many of Wallace’s speeches were rallying cries that indirectly incited acts of domestic terror, intimidation, and even murder. The same year as his infamous “segregation now” speech, Wallace said in a newspaper interview that he believed Alabama needed “a few first-class funerals” to stop racial integration. A week later, four young girls were killed and more than 20 others were injured in a bombing on the 16^e Street Baptist Church in downtown Birmingham. Martin Luther King later informed Wallace that “the blood of four little children… is on your hands. Your irresponsible and misguided actions have created an atmosphere in Birmingham and Alabama that has led to ongoing violence and now murder.”

Wallace changed, but he didn’t change. In his case, Wallace was shot as part of an assassination attempt in Maryland during his presidential campaign, leaving him permanently paralyzed. Being confined to a wheelchair can humble a person. Ultimately, everyone is held accountable for their actions. A remorseful Wallace met with several civil rights activists and addressed black congregations to personally ask for forgiveness. During a speech at a black church in Montgomery, Wallace demonstrated that a man can change his behavior. “I think I understand some of the pain that black people have had to endure,” he said. “I know that I contributed to that pain, and all I can ask for is forgiveness.” In Wallace’s public campaign for forgiveness, John Lewis said that he could never forget the hatred Wallace unleashed and his “political opportunism,” but that he could forgive him. “George Wallace should be remembered for his ability to change,” Lewis wrote years later in The New York Times.And we are better as a nation because of our ability to forgive and to recognize that our political leaders are human and largely a reflection of the social currents in the river of history.” Forgiveness helps address personal and communal trauma, but did Wallace go far enough?

History shows that Wallace, who once had Ku Klux Khan members as advisors, went to the black community for forgiveness. It is not clear what message a repentant Wallace had for the white church and community. When Wallace went to black congregations for forgiveness, did he return to the white congregation with a message of racial reconciliation? Did he ask forgiveness from the white church and community for perpetuating their racial hatred of blacks for his own political gain? Did he challenge the white power structure to change? The oppressed can forgive, but can the oppressor repent? Forgiveness by members of one community is only part of the equation if we are to see a true end to America’s legacy of lynchings. Forgiveness is really the second part. The first and crucial half is the repentance of specific members of the white church and community who continue to perpetuate this legacy of white supremacy and the lack of value for black life. Wallace changed, but he did not change enough to boldly correct his colleagues. Today, the black community continues to pay a high price as a community because whites fail to boldly confront their counterparts. This unchecked legacy of lynchings is one of the root causes behind our problem of police misconduct.

For the hanged and the beaten. For the shot, the drowned and the burned. For the tortured, the tormented and the terrorized. For those the rule of law has failed us. We will remember. William Donnegan was a shoemaker and sometime conductor on the Underground Railroad. During the Springfield Massacre of 1908, a white mob tried unsuccessfully to lynch Donnegan and left him for dead. Police later cut him down from a tree in front of his home. He was taken to the hospital where he later died of his wounds. In July 2024, Sonya Massey was shot by police in her home over a pot of hot water. Massey was a descendant of William Donnegan. She, like any concerned citizen, called the police out of fear of an intruder. As we make the generational connection, Sonya Massey and William Donnegan died in the same St. John’s hospital 116 years apart. Two lives cut short by a senseless attack. Things change, but they don’t change.