Welcome to my blog – Still Dreaming, Still Climbing Toward Justice. This title is inspired by the rousing speech of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., given on August 28, 1963 at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. In this speech, Dr. King outlined the promises made by the United States to free slaves and entitle all “men” to liberty and the pursuit of happiness. He talked about his dreams of how these promises might come to pass, while recognizing that they had not yet been fulfilled for people of color. “Still Dreaming…” is an acknowledgement that even today, in 2024, Black and Brown people are still striving toward these rights. This is my story of the start of my journey to becoming a racial justice attorney in pursuit of a path to liberty and happiness for Black and Brown people.
I will never forget the day my father suddenly burst into the front door of our home and yelled, “Gwen, the Board voted to let one Black man and one woman on the Board!” I was probably about 10 years old, but I remember thinking, “That’s a thing”? I hadn’t known until that moment that there was actually a policy that only allowed white men to be members of the Board that managed our all-Black apartment complex.
My mother and father immediately went into tactical mode. My father was a maintenance man for the property, so he knew most of the people living there. My mother had created a neighborhood youth group called “The Sophistikids,” so she was also well known. They quickly started making phone calls to other residents of the property. They went household to household, holding meetings that resembled the organizing efforts of the Civil Rights era.
The neighborhood collectively decided to endorse my father and a business-savvy woman (the only Black attorney many of us had ever encountered besides Claire Huxtable) for those spots. The Board fought vehemently because its intention had been that only one Board member would be Black and one a woman, not a Black woman and a Black man. The community’s efforts prevailed, and both were elected to the Board.
My father was now able to select and hire his own maintenance crew. Among those he hired were my brother, a cousin and some other teenagers from the area. Some white Board members, however, who had previously reserved all of the jobs for their family members and friends started to complain that “the Blacks” were taking their jobs. The Board responded by finding ways to disqualify the majority of Black workers with arbitrary rules that allowed them to reclaim the jobs for themselves.
VICTORY!!!
The excitement throughout the community was palpable. Did we know that the two “minorities” would be outvoted on almost everything? Of course! Still, the prospect of finally having a voice in how we were managed felt liberating. We actually started seeing meaningful changes.
EYES WIDE OPEN
This was my first cognitive introduction to SYSTEMIC racism. I only recently realized how formative this experience was in developing my affinity toward advocating for historically- disadvantaged people.
CONTINUED RACIAL DIVISION
Fast forward to 2024… there is still a lack of representation of oppressed communities in positions of power to impact racist policies and traditions. We continue to see the same battles to keep economic and social advantages concentrated in white communities with the lingering sense that non-whites are “stealing” the benefits that should be reserved for “whites only.”
This is why I became a racial justice attorney. I want to make change that lets communities of color see meaningful advancements. Although it sometimes feels that the resistance to racial justice is relentless, there remain many of us who are STILL DREAMING of a reality in which the need for a racial justice attorney will be a thing of the past.
