Category: Uncategorized

Originally published in the Cincinnati Enquirer, July 20, 2020 https://amp.cincinnati.com/amp/5468151002

The news that Congressman John Lewis, my hero and friend, had passed away on Friday at the age of 80 literally knocked me to my knees. Maybe it’s that I’m still working through the grief of losing my father, Judge Nathaniel Jones, six months ago. Perhaps it’s the deadly pandemic endlessly stalking, taunting and trapping us. Or, it could be the deepening sense of national and personal dread created by a president with too much power and no conscience, unconstrained by politicians with too few principles and no courage. Or, more likely, it’s all of this and more.

It’s just too much, I thought. Too much.

But then I heard my father’s voice reminding me to stay focused.

“You think this is too much?” the good judge would have told me. “Imagine how John Lewis felt when he was beaten on the Edmund Pettus Bridge just for marching for the right to vote. He didn’t think that was ‘too much.’ He didn’t let that stop him. You don’t honor him by giving up fighting for what he believed in just because he died.”

Tributes abound for John Lewis, and he deserves every one. He was not only a civil rights icon but a truly good man. He stood his ground and spoke blunt, uncomfortable truths, often shaking with fire and passion, but he never gave in to anger or bitterness. He treated everyone – whether they were a janitor, a shy schoolchild approaching for an autograph, or a constituent seeking help – with the same courtesy and kindness he accorded his congressional colleagues and the president of the United States.

I will remember John Lewis for his humanity. I will remember his tenacity and refusal to give up, even when carrying on surely felt like just too much. I will remember he showed us that the way to a brighter future is not with bellicose promises to “make America great again,” but with quiet determination to help our nation to do better.

But what touched me most about Congressman Lewis were his unyielding sense of wonder and his ability to find joy everywhere. I once ran into him in the airport and as we walked through the terminal, he excitedly told me about an event he had just attended and how encouraged he was by the young people who participated.

“Stephanie, it was unbelievable!” he exclaimed in that way he had, as if he were describing his first taste of ice cream. “I wish you could have seen it. It was so inspiring!”

And despite his achievements and accolades, he could still be amazed that people he admired were in awe of him.

Several years ago, while I was in South Africa helping prepare for former president Bill Clinton’s visit to the Mandela Foundation, Nelson Mandela’s staff allowed me to work in his office. (I know, right?). I sat at the great man’s desk, looked around and noticed the books on his shelf closest to his desk, the books President Mandela obviously cared about and referenced regularly. One of those books was John Lewis’ “Walking with the Wind.” I took a photo of it and sent it to the congressman. The next time I saw him, Congressman Lewis put his hand on his heart, shook his head and said, “When I saw the picture, I couldn’t believe it! Nelson Mandela has my book in his office!”

In 2016, Congressman Lewis spoke at the U.S. Department of Transportation, where I was deputy chief of staff, about the inter-connection between transportation and civil rights. During the program, he noted that Martin Luther King had taught him that “when you believe in something, you have to stand up for it. You have to speak up and fight for it.”

“Get in the way,” he told us that day. “Get in good trouble. Persist. Insist. Make a little noise.”

The loss of several of our civil rights lions so close together – John Lewis and Rev. C.T. Vivian on the same day and Marian Spencer, Rev. Joseph Lowery, Elijah Cummings, Judge Nathaniel Jones, and others in the last year – in this time of turmoil is knocking us to our knees. But we must get up, just like John Lewis did, and keep getting into good trouble.

We must get in the way of oppression and police brutality. Persist in our fight against voter suppression and for full voting rights. Insist that minorities, women, immigrants, the poor, and the disabled be treated with dignity and respect and equality.

We can honor John Lewis by voting in November and in every election. And we need to keep making noise, loud and strong enough for our political leaders to hear us until they have no choice but to act. Tell them it’s not enough to simply say nice things about John Lewis on Twitter for a day and then turn their backs on everything he stood for once the flags return to full staff.

First and foremost, call your senators and demand they support full restoration of the Voting Rights Act as John Lewis called for to his dying breath by passing the Voting Rights Advancement Act, which was approved by the House but has been sitting on Mitch McConnell’s desk for more than eight months. (And, while they’re at it, they can rename the bill for him, too.)

That’s the very least we can do to honor John Lewis for everything he has done for this country and for each of us who live in it.

Today, we mourn the loss of this remarkable man who gave his all to the very end. But beginning tomorrow, let us stand up and answer John Lewis’ call to persist, insist, make a little noise, and get into the best kind of trouble.

Published in the Cincinnati Enquirer, June 19, 2020 https://www.cincinnati.com/story/opinion/2020/06/19/opinion-can-you-support-trump-and-not-bigot/3209123001/

Some of my Republican friends are quick to tell me how much they’re repulsed by Donald Trump, yet they continue to support him anyway because they like some of his policies. When I note that they’re supporting the darling of white supremacy, they insist this doesn’t mean they condone racism or that they themselves are racist – and they take great offense that I or anyone else would think otherwise because, after all, “You don’t know what’s in my heart.”

I usually just shake my head and change the subject at that point because I don’t want to say what I’m really thinking for fear that it could hurt our friendship.

But no more. From now on, whenever anyone tries to convince me that a vote for Trump has nothing to do with their views on race, this will be my response:

You’re right. I may not know what’s in your heart. But I can see what you do, and I can see whom you’re doing it with. And I can see that when you support the candidate of white supremacy, you are aligning yourself with white supremacists, adding weight and power to their racism, even if you are not personally racist yourself.

When you vote, whether in person or by mail, no one will sort out the “racist Trump” votes from the “not racist Trump” votes. If you vote for Trump, your vote will go into the same pile with those cast by voters who support Trump because of, not in spite of, his racism, xenophobia and malevolence. And when the voting’s done and the counting starts, your vote will be counted right along with theirs, and the tabulators couldn’t care less what’s in your heart. All they’ll see is that your ballot for Trump looks exactly like all the other ballots for Trump, and they’ll simply mark you down as one more vote for the white supremacists’ candidate.

And, regardless how much you decry his ugly words and deeds, your vote for Trump makes you complicit in everything he says and does, even the parts you don’t like. Your support expands what might otherwise be an impotent sliver of support into the critical mass he needs to maintain the power to continue injecting his racism and cruelty into government policy and threatening the rights and well-being of millions of your fellow Americans – including me. 

So, my friend, if you choose to vote for Trump in November, please don’t be offended if you’re mistaken for a racist, even if you’re not. When you align yourself with racists, it’s hard to tell you apart from them, regardless what may be in your heart, because to those of us over here on the right side of history, you all look alike.

When we were little girls, my sister and I were visiting our grandparents in Los Angeles when the 1965 Watts uprising broke out. Our grandparents, who lived in the Crenshaw area a few miles from the uprising, of course, kept us at home and I later learned they had packed up the car and were prepared to evacuate the city on moments’ notice if the violence got within a few blocks of their home.

When the violence quelled, Pop Pop drove us through Watts to look at the damage and try to explain to us what had happened and why. My starkest memory of that day was the sight of dusty, dark green military trucks filled with armed, helmeted soldiers in full combat gear driving through the streets. I was puzzled and frightened by what I saw. But our grandfather, as usual, was calm and reassuring so I knew we’d be ok.

Today, military trucks with armed soldiers drove through my Washington, DC neighborhood – much closer to my house than the distance my grandfather decreed would trigger our evacuation. I feel just as puzzled and frightened by this as I felt when I saw the same thing as a small girl a continent away and a lifetime ago. But although I am now just a few years younger than Pop Pop was then, I don’t feel nearly as unafraid as he seemed.

I just realized that he probably felt as uncertain and off-balance as I do now.

And I don’t know what to do with any of this.

I’m sure I’m not the only one at a loss …

Published in the Cincinnati Enquirer, February 4, 2020
https://www.cincinnati.com/story/opinion/2020/02/04/opinion-if-you-want-honor-judge-jones-stand-right-side-history/4645815002/

When I was a little girl, I was certain my daddy was a giant, especially when he scooped me into his arms and lifted me up so that I could touch the ceiling. As I grew older, I was surprised to discover that he wasn’t as gigantic as I thought, standing at just five feet nine.

But after he died last week at 93, surrounded by his family, age and illness having whittled an inch or two from his height and dozens of pounds from his frame, I was reminded that Nathaniel Raphael Jones was indeed a giant, after all.

God blessed my father in many ways and gave him one last, beautiful gift: a sweet, peaceful end to this life.

From his beloved 91-year-old baby sister who came to kiss her big brother one last time, to the grandchildren who gathered to comfort their “Gramps,” to the law clerks who’d become federal judges and cabinet secretaries and major figures in the legal and business fields but dropped everything to rush back to Cincinnati to say thank you to, as one described him, the “best first boss any lawyer could have,” to the young woman who’d lived next door to him as a toddler, and now sat quietly by his bedside in his final days, to the Cincinnatians who took time off of work to pay their last respects to the man who’d saved them from death row, helped them write a resume, opened their eyes to the need to remedy racism and discrimination, exposed them to new people and fresh ideas, taught them to knot a necktie, or simply lent an empathetic ear when they needed it most – it was clear that Nathaniel Jones touched the soul of the human community.

My father spoke softly, smiled and laughed often, and moved gracefully in the world, but he was a fierce and fearless man. He was a fervently pro-choice, feminist, LGBTQ ally, who always stood with labor, fought voter suppression, spoke up for the homeless and disadvantaged and marginalized, who believed that black lives matter, and wanted America not to build walls but to set a bigger table.

The Good Judge was slow to anger and hated no one. But bullies infuriated him, and he loathed seeing anyone picked on. He was gratified by the progress we’ve made as a nation in the 70 years since he first “answered the call” to become a civil rights lawyer. But the ugly turn our country has taken in recent years broke his heart. And, as his strength ebbed in recent months, he was profoundly sad that he would not live long enough to see the America he so loved bend the arc of the moral universe back toward justice. But he had faith that we eventually will … because he showed us how.

Since his death, our family has been overwhelmed and comforted by beautiful tributes and expressions of sympathy. But while words bring us solace, they are fleeting and will soon disappear into the wind unless they are anchored with action. And we can do that by answering his call.

If you really want to honor my father, please don’t wax eloquent about how wonderful and inspirational he was, and then empower people and advance policies that undermine his life’s work.

If you admire Nathaniel Jones for being a civil rights icon, follow his lead by actually protecting civil rights and voting rights, not make yourself complicit in tearing them down.

If you want to emulate The Good Judge, fight for social justice and speak up for those whose voices we can’t hear. Don’t remain silent while the powerful abuse the powerless. Don’t go along with what you know (or should know) is wrong because you think there’s some political or financial advantage in it for you.

If you respected this man, please reach out and lend a hand to people who need help. Encourage a young person to see beyond their horizons. Volunteer for organizations that strengthen lives and build communities. Soften your tongue. Brighten the corner where you are.

If you want to pay tribute to Judge Jones, please register and vote in every election.

If you truly want to claim my father’s legacy, please stand with him on the right side of history.

Because, in the end, while professional accomplishments are all well and good, what really matters is how we treat others, what we stand for, how we move through the world.

My brilliant, kind, funny father, with his keen, gentle eyes, calm voice, and unshakable commitment to justice and decency, has slipped the bonds of earth. But the life he led and the lessons he taught will forever be etched into the history and heart of this city, country and the world.

Nathaniel Jones was great because he was good. He was successful because he was kind. And he was a giant because he never looked down on anyone, but instead lifted us all so we could touch the sky.

Brooklyn Dodgers from left, Pee Wee Reese, Jackie Robinson and Preacher Roe in 1952. (Photo: AP file photo)

“(Opposing players) were abusing Reese very viciously because he was playing on the team with me … They were calling him some very vile names and every one bounced off Pee Wee and hit me like a machine-gun bullet. Pee Wee kind of sensed the sort of hopeless, dead feeling in me and came over and stood beside me for a while. He didn’t say a word but he looked over at the chaps who were yelling at me and just stared. He was standing by me, I can tell you that. Slowly the jibes died down … and then there was nothing but quiet from them. It was wonderful the way this little guy did it. I will never forget it.” – Jackie Robinson

Our cultural history is graced with goosebumps-inducing stories of white athletes supporting their black teammates in the face of racial cruelty. Some white players refused en masse to stay in segregated hotels or patronize “whites only” restaurants that refused service to their black colleagues. Some, like Pee Wee Reese, showed quiet but powerful support, sometimes just by standing next to their teammate and eloquently staring down and shaming those who tried to demean them.

Sadly, last week we saw white players on the Boston Red Sox take a different approach: They all decided to go to the White House to stand and laugh and celebrate with the man whose racial insults, stoking of divisions, and immoral neglect of the American citizens of Puerto Rico are so offensive to their black and Hispanic teammates that they could not bring themselves to participate. It is disgraceful that, when faced with the choice, not one of these white players had the courage or decency to skip that spectacle, if only to show solidarity with their teammates who felt unwelcome at the White House.

But while this divide we witnessed was higher profile than most, it is not uncommon in the new world into which we’ve descended. Many minorities in today’s America feel similar feelings of isolation and abandonment at the hands of our white friends and colleagues who’ve decided to cast their lot with a racial demagogue, regardless of what we think or say or how passionately we’ve begged them not to.

I’m a Democrat with many Republican friends and colleagues. I’ve always taken great joy and pleasure in our friendships as, I assume, have they. We’ve often had vigorous, even heated, but good-natured political debates that frequently find us reaching common ground because, in the end, we always wanted what was best for the country and each other.

Or, so I thought.

Lately, some of my friends have shocked me into a sense of betrayal. I now avoid political discussions with them, not because we might disagree, but because I fear they’ll once again remind me that they don’t truly share the principles they’ve always espoused. And knowing that they’ll again show me that they believe and are consciously and willingly doing things to actively undermine these principles fills me with dread, frustration, and sadness.

I stay away from these discussions because I am too tempted to risk rupturing our increasingly fragile friendships by speaking the painful truth to them: “How can you look at me, a black woman, your friend, and tell me that, knowing that this man insults, demeans and rejects me and people like me at every opportunity, demonizes immigrants, encourages, embraces and is revered by racists and Nazis, treats women like objects, lies so consistently that we can’t keep up, spouts off like a bullying, ignorant child (in language and tone that should embarrass and disgust any decent person), is trampling the Constitution in our faces, is giving lifetime appointments to racist judges committed to undoing every principle you claim to stand for, and after seeing everything that he has shown us in the last two years, you not only don’t regret putting him in office, you still support him?”

You may not realize it, but what you’re really showing me is that some things – be it your financial interests or something else – are more important to you than my well-being, the safety and security of my community, and the principles you supposedly hold dear. You’re tacitly admitting that your expressed commitment to equality, justice and decency has limits and can be balanced out against and outweighed by other interests that you deem more important to the point that you will tolerate and give power to a belligerent, bigoted tyrant in order to attain them.

While I don’t have much in common with 20-something-year-old Major League Baseball players of color, I do share their pain. And not just me; millions of us feel the anguish that comes with watching our friends refuse to support us and unabashedly align with the very persons who are doing us harm.

On the other hand, while I wasn’t around to witness Pee Wee Reese’s quietly eloquent gesture of grace, decency, and camaraderie, I understand what it must have meant to Jackie Robinson to have his teammate step out of his comfort zone and stand by him. I wish more of my contemporaries had the courage to do the same.

The players who taunted Jackie Robinson and Pee Wee Reese 72 years ago, and the men who offered no support to them are long gone and, for the most part, lost to history. And I suspect that when we look back on these trembling times, we will find the people who should and do know better – our friends who turned their backs on us in exchange for a trip to the White House or a tax cut – will be similarly and deservedly relegated to the wrong side of history.

But we will remember and honor those who, like Pee Wee Reese, stand with their friends so that we can face down intolerance and speak up for what’s right and good, together.

“History will have to record that the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence of the good people.” – Dr. Martin Luther King

Originally Published in the Cincinnati Enquirer

https://www.cincinnati.com/story/opinion/2019/05/17/opinion-athletes-like-pee-wee-reese-stand-against-racial-division-and-unity/3697881002/

“President Trump will not diminish my truth.” – Jennifer Willoughby

When I was a law professor, one of my colleagues stopped by my office to chat and the conversation eventually turned to trade policy. He got very worked up and began to aggressively rant about how “those goddamned Japs” were supposedly taking advantage of us. I told him that his comments were offensive, but he didn’t care and, instead kept repeating the epithet. So I ended the discussion and invited him out of my office.

As the youngest and only non-tenured faculty member, I wasn’t sure how to handle this obnoxious display of racism by a senior, tenured professor. So I shared the encounter with a tenured faculty member whom I trusted. She promised to discreetly raise the issue with the dean.

A couple of weeks later, during a faculty meeting, the dean said “I don’t want to name any names, but it’s been brought to my attention that a faculty member has complaining that a colleague used the word [gesturing with air quotes] Jap.”

My heart skipped as I thought, “Oh, my God! I was heard! Yay!”

And then he continued:

“I want to remind everybody that we’re not the thought police. Everybody has a right to his opinion and going around whining and snitching on people behind their backs just because they said something that rubs us the wrong way undermines collegiality. I suggest that we grow up and stop trying to cause trouble.”

In other words, racism and racist language by a law professor weren’t the problem. The people who object to it are the problem. And the man who wielded enormous power over my position and future made sure that he put me on notice and on blast that, a white male faculty member had every right to spout racist views, but the women who didn’t like it had better shut up about it.

While being offended by a person’s language isn’t even in the same galaxy as being beaten by a spouse, I imagine that Jennifer Willoughby and Colbie Hodlerness, the ex-wives of disgraced former White House Staff Secretary Rob Porter, must have experienced feelings that were similar, albeit exponentially more acute than mine that day, when they heard Donald Trump blow off Porter’s reprehensible and criminal behavior:

“Oh, good! The President of the United States now knows that Rob is an abuser and he’ll finally be called out at last. Thank God!”

“Wait. What?”

Jennifer and Colbie refused to be cowed by the bully-in-chief, who used his position and pulpit to effusively praise her batterer and tacitly remind his victims and other similarly situated women that not only does he not believe them, but he sees their abuser as the victim and they as the problem who should be blamed, shamed and then told to shut up and go away.

They refused to crawl back into the shadows. Instead, they said, “Oh, HELL no!”, and then raised their voice even louder.

“I want to assure you my truth has not been diminished,” Jennifer Willoughby declared. “I own my story and now that I have been compelled to share it, I’m not willing to cover it up for anyone.

Keep speaking your truth, ladies. We hear you. You’re making a difference.

Thank you.

Here we go, again. A prominent man is caught behaving like a pig and women are expected to step up and lead the denunciations against him

And, in the most recent case of this – producer Harvey Weinstein – this charge is being led by many of the very people who not only looked the other way when America’s predator-in-chief bragged about his behavior, they ELECTED him President of the United States. But as sure as day follows night, they still have the nerve to name-check women – and one woman, in particular – for not “speaking up.” Never mind that just a few weeks ago, they spent considerable energy and airtime telling that particular woman her views are irrelevant, she needs to be quiet, and exit stage left. But, suddenly, they’re waiting with bated breath for her pronouncement following the earth-shattering news that that there’s sexual harassment in Hollywood.

But aside from the political posturing, the demand that women – any woman – “denounce” sexual harassment exposes the double standard and patriarchy that help to form the very foundation of sexual harassment itself

Women don’t need to be instructed by foolish talking heads and opportunistic politicians to “denounce” sexual harassment and those who inflict it on us. We spend our lives not only denouncing, but experiencing, navigating, trying to avoid and being harmed by sexual predators. But the only time folks seem to want to hear from us about it is immediately after the fact, usually when the predator is a liberal or support liberal causes, and only for a very limited period of time. Once the news cycle ends or, God forbid, we try to suggest ways to PREVENT this behavior in the future, we’re either ignored or attacked (“Are you still harping THAT?”).

And yet, despite this, we persist. But it’s time for some other folk – you know, MEN – to step up and say and do more than tapping us on the shoulder and telling us. “Wow, did you see what he did? That’s pretty bad. You better say something.”

Stop lecturing us about how we should respond to sexual predation and slamming us for deciding For ourselves when we’re going to do it. It’s time for YOU to step up and say something and, better yet, DO something about it. And if you don’t have the desire or the courage to fight with us against your brethren, then your opinion about how we choose to fight  is irrelevant, you need to be quiet, and exit stage left.

I read Dick Gregory’s book “Nigger” (yes, that’s what it’s called) when I was in 7th grade. It was deep, funny and filled with so much wisdom that I actually wrote down parts I wanted to remember in a spiral notebook. The notebook is long gone, but I still remember many of Mr. Gregory’s lessons and comments from the book.

The Dedication read: “To Mama: Wherever you are, from now on whenever you hear anyone say the word ‘Nigger,’ you’ll know they’re advertising my book.”

“If I pick up this book and call it a bicycle, is the book crazy? No, I am. So if someone calls you out of your name, they’re ignorant, not you.”

I had many opportunities over the years to spend time with Mr. Gregory and we always had some interesting conversations. He was unfailingly friendly, approachable, insightful, funny and committed – even if he sometimes went around the bend with some of his more bizarre conspiracy theories.

For example, when I was a student at Tuskegee Institute, Mr. Gregory gave a lecture to the student body and made some allegations I thought were a little weird. Afterward, I went up to him to ask him about it and we got into a good-natured back and forth. Because people were waiting to talk to him, he told me to call him at his hotel later to continue the conversation. And sure enough, 90 minutes later, I found myself in the second floor phone booth of Adams Hall women dorm arguing with Dick Gregory about whether the CIA had killed John Lennon.

Dick Gregory was a good man, a passionate activist, a tireless advocate and a keen-eyed, sharp-witted observer of human nature and the society we inhabit. I’m sad to learn of his passing, but grateful that I had the chance to engage with him. I just wish I’d told him how much I’d learned from him when it really mattered.

So, Mr. Gregory, wherever you are, please know that you were an inspiration and a teacher to me. And now you probably know which one of us was right about John Lennon.