Statement of
Marc H. Morial President and CEO National Urban League
Before the
Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Human Rights
On
“The State of Civil and Human Rights in the United States”
December 9, 2014
Chairman Durbin, Ranking Member Cruz, members of the Subcommittee, we accept your invitation to offer the National Urban League’s perspective and experience on the direction that this country is headed with respect to civil and human rights.
The convergence of the ongoing epidemic of tragic, unjust killings of African Americans at the hands of out-of-control police and the utter miscarriage of justice by our justice system; the decimation of the Voting Rights Act (VRA) by the U.S. Supreme Court’s Shelby County v. Holder decision that removed the ability to provide additional protection to voters in states, counties and cities with a history of discrimination; the spate of voter ID and voter suppression laws spearheaded by the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) in states across the country; the disproportionate mass incarceration of people of color; and the dismal economic conditions that plague urban communities across America have placed our nation in a state of emergency that is reawakening the cause of justice in our Nation. We demand national leadership at all levels of government for immediate, solutions-based action. Not just talk – we demand action and NOW!
Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice Systems are Broken – Especially for African Americans
The recent litany of cases involving the use of excessive police force against unarmed African Americans is only the tip of the iceberg. They are the result of systemic failures within our law enforcement system and the subsequent prosecutorial process that are in dire and urgent need of immediate reform. One cannot begin to express the total outrage in the Black, as well as White, Latino and Asian communities, surrounding the following senseless deaths that have occurred since 2012:
- Tamir Rice – 12-year-old boy shot on November 22, 2014 at a Cleveland, OH recreation center by rookie police officer Timothy Loehmann; video shows Loehmann fired at Rice within two seconds after the patrol car he was riding in pulled up next to the boy, who was playing with a toy gun, and that it took four minutes for officers to administer first-aid to the child after he was shot; Tamir died from his wounds the following day. (Nov. 23)
- Akai Gurley – 28-year-old unarmed father who was shot and killed on November 20, 2014 by rookie NYPD officer Peter Liang in an unlit housing-project stairwell in Brooklyn; Gurley has been called a “total innocent” by NYPD Commissioner Bill Bratton, who called the shooting “accidental”; Gurley’s death has been ruled a homicide by the medical examiner’s office.
- Michael Brown – unarmed teenager shot at least six times and killed on August 9, 2014 in Ferguson, Missouri by Officer Darren Wilson (whom the grand jury failed to indict).
- John Crawford III – 22-year-old shot and killed on August 5, 2014 by police in a Beavercreek, OH Walmart store after picking up an air rifle off a store shelf and carrying it in the store (grand jury decided in September to not indict the officers).
- Eric Garner – unarmed 43-year-old father and husband killed on July 17, 2014 in Staten Island, NY after being put in an illegal chokehold by NYPD Officer Daniel Pantaleo during an arrest for selling untaxed cigarettes (no indictment by grand jury despite a video and the coroner’s report that ruled his death a homicide).
- Marlene Pinnock – 51-year-old homeless and mentally ill great-grandmother who was violently beaten on July 1, 2014 by California Highway Patrol officer Daniel L. Andrew along Interstate 10, west of downtown Los Angeles, after an attempted arrest for walking along the freeway.
- Trayvon Martin – the 2012 killing of unarmed 17-year old Trayvon Martin from Miami Gardens, Florida, by George Zimmerman, a neighborhood watch volunteer, in Sanford, Florida (who was subsequently acquitted in 2013).
Click here to read the full statement from Marc H. Morial on "The State of Civil and Human Rights in the United States".
