White, a former Wisconsin securities commissioner and founding director of the ABA Center for Human Rights, serves on the board of Lawyers Defending American Democracy.
Former President Donald Trump, the son of an immigrant mother and descendant of an immigrant grandfather, recently questioned the “blackness” of Vice President Kamala Harris. He did so despite the fact that race is a superficial concept based on characteristics such as skin color, facial features, and other physical characteristics. As a scientific concept it was thoroughly exposed.
For most of American history, the term “colored” varied from state to state in terms of the law, with nonsensical characterizations such as the one-drop rule, the one-eighth rule, and a number of other perverse permutations. These laws were used to deny people of color the rights and privileges primarily available to white male Christians. In most cases, the discrimination was directed against all “colored” people, not just former slaves. Before 1960, this description also applied to darker-skinned South Asians.
The laws were used to deny people of color access to privileges such as toilets, restaurants, voting, marriage, jobs, health care, and housing. The main enforcement body was white citizens, who decided for themselves which privileges the colored people were allowed to enjoy.
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I suspect it was no coincidence that Nikki Haley’s father received his professorship in biology at Voorhees College, a HBCU in Denmark, SC, than, for example, at Clemson University.
Now, in 2024, 60 years after the passage of the Civil Rights Act, we must unfortunately remind Americans, based on the statements of a presidential candidate, that skin color is a terribly unreliable indicator of so-called racial origin. Millions of Americans are multiracial, finding their “place” in more than one ethnic group. Ethnicity is distinct from race and tends to reflect shared cultural experiences, traditions, language, dialect, and national origin.
In the UK, people of colour generally consider themselves to be of Jamaican, Trinidadian, Bahamian, Ghanaian or Nigerian descent, for example. They also often have contact with their specific ethnic communities. Indians of Asian descent often identify not only with their country of origin, but also with their diverse ethnic, regional or religious heritage.
While people of color in the United States may be familiar with their family history and ethnicity, until the 1960s, Americans of color tended to live in segregated communities. It didn’t matter if you were Caribbean, Nigerian, Fijian, Native American, or South Asian—if the so-called white business and government community perceived you as being of color, then you were most likely part of America’s communities of color, with violent intent if necessary.
The diversity of these segregated communities fostered an intellectual, musical and cultural drive that resulted in a rich cultural spectrum that shapes American culture today. American literature, poetry, cuisine, jazz, blues, reggae, salsa and rock and roll could not exist without the impact of these influences and their contributions.
Black culture in America during segregation accepted virtually anyone who was not considered white. It provided a haven for those the former president rejected as businessmen, colleagues, and tenants. Racial segregation persisted regardless of whether someone was a doctor, scientist, lawyer, or Ph.D.
In the American black community, Asians from India were generally welcomed because the new country was creating a potpourri of people with dark skin. It is in this context that the former president’s attempt to create divisions must be seen. between black professional journalists and the Vice President was so insidiously offensive.
Instead of discussing fundamental policy issues or answering journalists’ questions, Trump attacked both the journalists and the vice president’s ethnic and cultural background. Any educated African American will tell you that it is truly foolish to argue with an Alpha Kappa Alpha, let alone an AKA graduate of Howard University, about her black credibility. Harris made a very conscious decision to attend an HBCU while still in high school. Given her background — e.g., her mother’s connection to the University of California, Berkeley, and her father’s position at Stanford — I am convinced that this was not her only option — it was her conscious choice. What the former president knew about her ethnic identity is completely irrelevant.
We must not return to the times when people of color were not allowed to participate in social, economic and political life, to a time when academic, economic and social advancement was based not on talent and ability but on race.
It’s hard to understand Trump’s motives. Was this a completely misguided attempt to drive a political wedge between people of color in America, or has he simply ignored black votes and is attacking the vice president to remind white Christian voters that Harris is black, foreign, and a woman? Whatever his motives, this attempt to divide the wounds of the past rather than heal them is dangerous, especially for someone who may lead America as president again.
Trump would be better advised to focus on the policy differences between himself and Kamala Harris rather than relying on his misogynistic, racist and xenophobic rhetoric.
Hopefully the Americans will demand this too.
