Exodus, reparations, and a speech we should remember
Once again, the epic drama of slavery and freedom is upon us. No, I’m not referring to Ferguson, although others have written extensively on links there to the nation’s history of bondage, legal violence, and avoidance of justice. While others protest, this weekend millions of moviegoers will behold Exodus: Gods and Kings. “Let my people go” will square off against law and order. The fish will die; so will the first born males. The Red Sea will separate, for a time, and then its crashing waters will destroy an army.
Exodus has been with Americans since the nation’s birth. During the American Revolution, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, and Benjamin Franklin advised the creation of a national seal to feature an image of the Israelites crossing the Red Sea. One century later in the 1870s, southern African Americans who fled the South were called “Exodusters.” In the 1950s, Cecil DeMille’s Ten Commandments featured a brawny Charlton Heston as Moses and a sultry Anne Baxter as Nefertiti. Since 1973, the film has aired every year on Easter Sunday. During the civil rights crusades, Exodus rhetoric animated the prophetic calls of Martin Luther King Jr. and many others.
There is an Exodus speech from United States history that has been forgotten. Long before James Forman stormed churches demanding funds in the 1960s or Ta-Nehisi Coates recently invoked the Bible for reparations, this man called for more than freedom. He extolled reparations as a corollary to righteousness. The speech did not come from an African American or a poor person or someone on the margins of society. It came from a white American congressman. You’ve seen the speaker cinematically depicted. In Steven Spielberg’s Lincoln, he was played brilliantly by Tommy Lee Jones.
