It’s an ambivalent time of year. Some flowering trees are weeping their last petals to the ground even as they exuberantly sprout tender new leaves. Other trees are shifting from their first tremulous green to darker hues; many trees are expressing pastel versions of their future fall colors before their full green shades settle in. The first flushes of early tulips, forsythia, quince have faded, but now the heady scent of lilacs and viburnum vibrates in the air. The weather has shifted from too cool to eat on the porch to too hot to be in the garden midday, all in the space of a week. Spring is not yet done, but summer is not yet begun. We try to find balance amid the fluctuations.
This is not a time to be ambivalent about our nation’s state, however. The list of outrageous and illegal actions by our government is longer each day: illegal war; illegal killing of civilians on land and water; gross mistakes that are creating havoc not only with our national economy but around the world; phenomenal graft and corruption including blatant stock and investment moves based on inside information; continued attacks on immigrants and neighbors without due process; fantastical expenditures for vanity projects costing taxpayers billions; a new slush fund to reward convicted felons at taxpayer expense. The list grows and grows. Most recent has been the blatant attack on voting rights through both gerrymandering and removal of protections against other forms of voter suppression.
Growing up in the Deep South — North Carolina, then Georgia, and finally Mississippi — I witnessed the endemic tension as people tried to ignore or hide their history. I met kind and friendly people who also clearly believed Black people were not equivalent human beings. The Civil Rights Movement subdued some overt bias; the killings especially of the three young civil rights workers in 1964 — like the killings of white protestors in Minnesota 61 years later — shocked enough people to quieten some violent talk and behavior. But the sentiments lay there, nurtured by 100 years of post-Civil War resistance to reconstruction.
When I excitedly prepared to attend college in New England, my mother shocked me: “It won’t be any different.” She explained: “Look who’s in charge of the Senate — Eastland and Stennis” (Senators from Mississippi who held powerful roles in the U.S. Congress along with many other southern politicians). Of course Boston was soon rocked by violent protests against “busing.” I remember Louise Day Hicks signaling her supporters with veiled comments in her high little-girl voice: “You know where I stand.”
So, what does this have to do with us now, some might think. Why does suppression of Black votes matter? Because this is a test to see how far the government can go to cement its power and control over our country and society. Every rule broken without challenge, every law ignored or bent, every step taken toward silencing and intimidating people, lays another brick in the sidewalk toward oppression.
I didn’t go to Selma for the new civil rights march launched mid-May. Instead I attended the Day of Remembrance at Great Falls. The drums echoed our heartbeats; the wooden flute was both soothing and plaintive. Somehow Strong Eagle was able to produce two tones at once, a feat apparently only accomplished by the wood thrush.
Chief Roger Longtoe offered a welcome chant, then a calling-in song — summoning the ancestors. We could hear the footsteps of the past approaching.
Speaker after speaker detailed the atrocities of the Great Falls Massacre, but also its context — voided treaties, broken agreements, litanies of betrayal. Only if we face the truth, said more than one speaker, can we work to heal, to be sure such violence is never repeated. Bravely, speakers recounted the multi-generational impact of this history on their families. A reminder that our own governmental structure was inspired by the Iroquois echoed right into this moment, when the Constitution is daily ignored and distorted.
We walked to the fire being tended for prayer offerings. I was moved to touch a nearby huge tree stump — a witness tree? Crumbling the bit of tobacco into the fire, I wished for these two great streams — this Native American awakening, the arousal of the Civil Rights Movement — to merge with the developing national resistance movement, not to dilute or obscure any component but to strengthen all in unambivalent power. If we are brave enough to face the truth, we will find the better path.
Judy Wagner lives in Northfield.