America’s Unfulfilled Promise of Equality Under Law

One of the United States’ most preeminent founding documents, the Declaration of Independence, promises that “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” Ironically, in 2013 the United States became the world leader, with the highest incarceration rate, a whopping 716 per 100,000 of the national population. America is also number one with the largest prison population globally. While Blacks only make up roughly 12% of the U.S. population, they represent 39% of the prison population. Instead of being a champion for human rights, we have become “a graveyard of human rights”. This observation was made by no less than the dictatorship of North Korea.

“Let America be America again.

Let it be the dream it used to be.

Let it be the pioneer on the plain

Seeking a home where he himself is free.

(America never was America to me.)”

– Langston Hughes, Let America Be America Again

The powerful, the rich in our recently established oligarchy look down from their lofty seats and tell us that we are equal. That we should be satisfied with what we have. Our “equals” who rule over us love us so much that they burden us with debt and low paying jobs, if we have any at all, to make sure we remain their debtors. Have you not noticed that the people less likely to be victims of discrimination or racism are the first to tell you that the two don’t exist? They are usually white men in positions of power and hierarchy atop their totem pole. In our bloody 238-year history we have had forty-four Presidents, but how many of them were women? How many of them were minorities?

“Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed—

Let it be that great strong land of love

Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme

That any man be crushed by one above.

(It never was America to me.)”

– Langston Hughes, Let America Be America Again

They tell us we are equal when our kids are shot down, choked and maimed to death in the streets without recourse. They maintain we are their equals though our boys are not given the same chance at an education and our girls get left behind. They tell us that we are they equal when our fathers, brothers and sons look at us from behind irons bars for the same non-violent crimes that their kids get pardoned for. What ever became of the promise we were so faithfully promised? America maintains its prominence in income inequality while the cost of tuition has tripled since the 1980s. Where is the evidence of this supposed equality?

‘O, let my land be a land where Liberty

Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath,

But opportunity is real, and life is free

Equality is in the air we breathe.

(There’s never been equality for me

Nor freedom in this “homeland of the free.”)’

“I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,

I am the Negro bearing slavery’s scars.

I am the red man driven from the land

I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek—

And finding only the same old stupid plan

Of dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.”

– Langston Hughes, Let America Be America Again

Race shouldn’t still be an issue in America so long after our evolution, but racism not only exists in America; it is as old as Methuselah and more vicious and venomous than the most venomous snake. This poisonous hatred has left too many families fatherless and so many mothers without sons. To borrow the unanswered questions from Bob Marley, “How many more will have to suffer? How many more will have to die?”

“I am the young man, full of strength and hope,

Tangled in that ancient endless chain

Of profit, power, gain, of grab the land!

Of grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need!

Of work the men! Of take the pay!

Of owning everything for one’s own greed!”

– Langston Hughes, Let America Be America Again

America is an unfulfilled promise, sitting on her potential. We have traded in reason for bullets of fear. There is little justice for us in life or in death, but they tell us to stick to the script, “You have a black president, what more do you want?” We must never endorse any type of discrimination, and we must work tirelessly to make America equal, not in theory but in reality. People are rightfully fed up, we have had enough and it is too late in our history to be writing these sad tales. We cannot continue to “turn the TV off and hope it goes away”, as one person was overheard saying about the most recent protests, following the failure of grand juries to indict police officers who used excessive force. Instead, we should talk to our children about our history so it is never repeated, because when we stuff our heads in the sand we not only risk looking like ostriches but we also leave the rest of our bodies exposed.