So it’s not just history….

 

• When I was two, the Supreme Court ruled that all public schools couldn’t keep me out because of my race.  Until then, state laws and practices allowed that. 

 

• When I was four, the Supreme Court ruled that I didn’t have to sit in segregated public transportation.  Until then, state laws and practices allowed that.

 

• When I was eight, the Supreme Court ruled that terminals and buses that were part of interstate travel couldn’t restrict me to a separate area.  Until then, state laws and practices allowed that. 

 

• When I was 10, the Supreme Court ruled that if I chose to go to college and met qualifications, a state institution of higher education couldn’t keep me from attending.  Until then, state laws and practices allowed that. 

 

• When I was 12, Congress and the President passed legislation outlawing discrimination against me in public places and institutions.  Until then, state laws and practices allowed that. 

 

• When I was 13, Congress and the President passed legislation intending to ensure I could not be barred from voting when I was older.  Until then state laws and practices allowed that. 

 

• When I was 15, the Supreme Court ruled that I couldn’t be prevented from marrying someone outside of my race.  Until then, state laws and practices allowed that. 

 

• When I was 16, Congress and the President passed legislation prohibiting anyone from keeping me from living where I wanted to live.  Until then, that could happen. 

 

• When I was 21, the Supreme Court ruled that the women in my life could make decisions about their bodies without government interference.  Until then, state laws and practices allowed that. 

 

• When I was 22, Congress and the President passed legislation that allowed my wife to open a bank account without my permission.  Until then, she couldn’t with many banks. 

• When I was 26, the Supreme Court ruled that providing remedy for past racial discrimination could create an unfair impact on White people.  Until then, state and local government and institutions could work unrestricted toward fairness. 

•  When I was 38, Congress and the President passed legislation that ensured I couldn’t be discriminated against if I became disabled.  Until then, state laws and practices allowed that. 

 

• When I was 48, the Supreme Court ruled that corporations have rights equal to me as an individual, and the ruling opened the doors of unchecked campaign spending.  Until then, I had rights as an individual and corporations did not. 

•  When I was 61, the Supreme Court struck down key provisions of the voting rights act that had ensured my ability to vote in all states.  From 1965 until then, states were held accountable for providing voting opportunities to all citizens. 

•  When I was 63, the Supreme Court ruled that same-sex marriage was legal in all states.  Until then, state laws and practices allowed discrimination against my friends and family who weren’t heterosexual. 

•  When I was 70, the Supreme Court overturned its prior ruling and removed federal protections for women who sought the right to make medical decisions with their physicians and families.  At that point, an almost-50-year right for my female friends and family disappeared. 

 

These events aren’t history; they’re my life.  They shaped how I experience and live in the world around me.  If you or your progenitors experienced these events without them personally impacting you, you most likely see the world differently than I do. 

 

I’m not citing the laws and rulings here.  That’s intentional.  The above list comes from the impacts of legal rulings or laws.  To be clear, my point is that these events weren’t just legal and historical markers; they remain milestones in how I and others have been allowed to live.  You may not have lived when you personally were prohibited from attending a school or marrying someone outside of a specific race.  I have.  Without the court rulings and laws that provided change, I would’ve had a different life.  It’s not just me.  It’s millions of others. 

 

I can hear someone responding, “But that was the past.  You can’t live in the past.”  Well, no, it’s not my past.  Throughout all the years above, at every age I cite, people told me because of what happened that year, the problems were in the past.  Saying that again now repeats that as if it’s now somehow magically true that injustice and inequity were previously resolved.  That wasn’t true at any time in the past, and it’s not true now. 

 

The list above records a continuing struggle for equity and justice.  For example, merely 20 years after declaring a need to repair the damaging legacy of “separate but equal” in its 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision, the 1974 Supreme Court ruled that maybe remedies shouldn’t go too far in its Bakke decision.  By 2023, the court decided the nation no longer needed remedies for past discriminations in education – despite clear evidence that inequities persist.  Also recently, the court rescinded women’s rights that were in place for almost 50 years prior.  Coping with those backlash moments has been part of this experience for me. 

 

This hasn’t been, nor will it be, a linear path of change toward justice and equity for all.  It also hasn’t been one law or court ruling that magically made problems disappear.  That was the stark lesson of Reconstruction after the Civil War when the retrenchment was swift and violent.  That’s a lesson that continues.  For every step of progress there’s a counterforce trying to drag the nation backwards and erase that progress.  We’re in one of those moments now. 

 

So it seems important to remember that changes in laws, executive orders, and court rulings aren’t abstractions.  They’re about the lives of real people – like me.  A luta continua.