The following MLK Weekend Essay is a reprint of an April 4, 2008 essay.

I’m thinking about times more than forty years ago when I sang, “We Shall Overcome.” I’m remembering how I felt when I sang it, holding hands, swaying, anticipation in the air. I loved the idea of walking hand in hand, black and white together, and at the same time there was always a tension, a tightness in my jaw and in the pit of my stomach, the presence of fear. The song’s purpose was to get ready to do what had to be done. I’m committed to nonviolence, I recall thinking, but there are those who are not. They shot James Meredith, and lynched Emmitt Till, and burned Greyhound buses, and unlike me, they don’t want me to be safe. Uncertainty about what will happen tightens my jaw, while my heart commits me to the cause.

Remembering these fears rekindles my old thoughts. I remember the policemen in the church parking lot writing down the license plate numbers as if it were the Appalachin Crime Convention. My mind flashes from people sitting in a restaurant who stop eating to stare and sneer, to the incomprehensible Mississippi Sovereignty Commission, to the repeated, threatening phone calls, to kids on a school bus yelling hate names through the windows, to the Klan and the police, and wondering how they were different. I think about the person who ran over my dog.

This is a straightforward and important request.

The Friends Committee on National Legislation, a Quaker-based and widely respected Washington lobby for peace and justice, is asking for letters to President Obama and our Congresspersons urging the U.S. government to immediately act to grant Temporary Protected Status to the 30,000 Haitian immigrants presently facing deportation.  That means that attempts to deport Haitians back to their ravaged country would be halted.

The Friends Committee has made this easy.  Just click here and follow the instructions.

Let compassion guide us on this.

Updated: 1/14/10, 1:40 pm ET: There is in place an informal halt to deportations.  It was announced late yesterday by DHS.  It does not grant Temporary Protected Status. Because this issue may continue into the far future, Temporary Protected Status would be an extra measure of security which will allow Haitians to remain at large and work without fear of detention and accumulate funds to send to relatives who are in desperate need.

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simulposted at The Dream Antilles and dailyKos

Please donate to Haiti Relief through Doctors Without Borders

This essay was first printed in The Dream Antilles on March 23, 2008.  I’m republishing it here, because it might help in putting the horrific events in Haiti in perspective.

This morning’s NY Times has an extremely strange story about Haiti.  The premise is that things are now so bad in Haiti, that some Haitians wish they still had Papa Doc or Baby Doc Duvalier back as their military despot:

But Victor Planess, who works at the National Cemetery here, has a soft spot for Mr. Duvalier, the man known as Papa Doc. Standing graveside the other day, Mr. Planess reminisced about what he considered the good old days of Mr. Duvalier and his son, Jean-Claude, who together ruled Haiti from 1957 to 1986.

“I’d rather have Papa Doc here than all those guys,” Mr. Planess said, gesturing toward the presidential palace down the street. “I would have had a better life if they were still around.”

Mr. Planess, 53, who complains that hunger has become so much a part of his life that his stomach does not even growl anymore, is not alone in his nostalgia for Haiti’s dictatorial past. Other Haitians speak longingly of the security that existed then as well as the lack of garbage in the streets, the lower food prices and the scholarships for overseas study.

Haiti may have made significant strides since President René Préval, elected in 2006, became the latest leader to pass through the revolving door of Haitian politics. But the changes he has pushed have been incremental, not fast enough for many down-and-out Haitians.

The article is worth reading in its entirety, primarily because of its conceit that Haiti, seething on one end of the island of Hispaniola in the midst of the US sphere of influence in the Caribbean, has developed its present dystopia all by its lonesome self, without any assistance worth mentioning from its gigantic hemispheric neighbor, the United States.

Cell Block D, Alcatraz

If Dostoevsky was right, that “the degree of civilization in a society can be judged by entering its prisons,” the United States has ceased to be civilized.  When a country imprisons more than 2 million people, and when it manages to be torturing more than 20,000 of those prisoners through long term solitary confinement, something is wrong.  Very, very wrong.  And remarkably, the torture is thoroughly overlooked.

Torturing?  Yes.  Not waterboarding. Not stress positions.  No. I’m talking about long term, unrelenting solitary confinement.  Solitary confinement not for days, but for years, even for decades.  Solitary confinement that literally drives prisoners crazy.  Solitary confinement that is torture plain and simple.

Join me in Special Housing.

Taipei 101

Yesterday’s news of the opening of the world’s tallest building phallic symbol was a pun fest.  The New York Times, for example, had as a headline, “Dubai Opens a Tower to Beat All.”  The Dubai Tower, it seems, is 2,717 feet tall.  It is far taller than any of the other really tall buildings phallic symbols in the world, including the one in China Taipei, Taipei 101.

All of this, of course, begs the question as to why Dubai, which apparently cannot pay its debts and is teetering on the abyss of financial collapse, decided to build this gigantic monument to itself.  Maybe its name should be changed from Burj Khalifa to the Ego Tower or Narcissus 101:

The glittering celebration may have been an attempt by Dubai’s ruler, Sheik Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum, to shift the focus from Dubai’s current economic troubles to a future filled with more promise.

All the same, the tower’s success by no means signals a recovery in Dubai’s beaten-down real estate market, where prices have collapsed by as much as 50 percent and many developers are having trouble finding occupants for their buildings… snip

At a time when several of Dubai’s newly built office towers stand empty, [the big one] is 90 percent sold, according to the building’s developer, Emaar Properties.

Can you believe that?  Lying about one’s size and performance apparently goes with the territory.  Even yesterday there were whispers that the building was empty, that it wasn’t as hot as it was claimed to be.

And what about the US?  Doesn’t the US need to have the world’s tallest monument to Priapus?  Apparently, 1 World Trade Center proceeds apace, but it is about 1,000 feet shorter than Burj Khalifa.  What a huge disappointment.  Can the US face up to this embarrassing Erecting Dysfunction?  Isn’t there some kind of architectural Cialis or Viagra to grow this project?

All of this begs the real question.  What kind of sign of the Apocalypse is it that humans are building gigantic, expensive, unneeded phallic symbols rather than feeding those who are starving and caring for those who need medical care?  How many schools, hospitals, clinics and libraries could be built instead of these awful, unnecessary buildings?  How many hungry people could be fed, how many sick people could receive care and medicine?  Couldn’t these resources be better spent developing systems to keeping humans from broiling or drowning on this planet?

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simulposted at The Dream Antilles

(This is a short story by Luis Ramirez, who was executed in Texas on 10/20/05. My thanks to Abe Bonowitz for this story. The story doesn’t require any commentary. It’s a gift to all of you for the Holidays, Christmas, Chanukah, Kwanzaa, New Year’s, Solstice, whatever holiday, if any, you celebrate.)

By Luis Ramirez #999309

I’m about the share with you a story who’s telling is long past due. It’s a familiar story to most of you reading this from death row. And now it’s one that all of you in “free world ” may benefit from. This is the story of my first day on the row.

I came here in May of 1999. The exact date is something that I can’t recall. I do remember arriving in the afternoon. I was placed in a cell on H-20 wing over at the Ellis Unit in Huntsville, TX. A tsunami of emotions and thoughts were going through my mind at the time. I remember the only things in the cell were a mattress, pillow, a couple of sheets, a pillow case, a roll of toilet paper, and a blanket. I remember sitting there, utterly lost.

The first person I met there was Napolean Beasley. Back then, death row prisoners still worked. His job at the time was to clean up the wing and help serve during meal times. He was walking around sweeping the pod in these ridiculous looking rubber boots. He came up to the bars on my cell and asked me if I was new. I told him that I had just arrived on death row. He asked what my name is. I told him, not seeing any harm in it. He then stepped back where he could see all three tiers. He hollered at everyone, “There’s a new man here. He just drove up. His name is Luis Ramirez.” When he did that, I didn’t know what to make of it at first. I thought I had made some kind of mistake. You see, like most of you, I was of the impression that everyone on death row was evil. I thought I would find hundreds of “Hannibal Lecters” in here. And now, they all knew my name. I thought “Oh well,” that’s strike one. I was sure that they would soon begin

harassing me. This is what happens in the movies after all.

Well, that’s not what happened . After supper was served, Napolean was once again sweeping the floors. As he passed my cell, he swept a brown paper bag into it. I asked him “What’s this?” He said for me to look inside and continued on his way. Man, I didn’t know what to expect. I was certain it was something bad. Curiosity did get the best of me though. I carefully opened the bag. What I found was the last thing I ever expected to find on death row, and everything I needed. The bag contained some stamps, envelopes, notepad, pen, soap, shampoo, toothpaste, tooth brush, a pastry, a soda, and a couple of Ramen noodles. I remember asking Napolean where this came from.

He told me that everyone had pitched in. That they knew that I didn’t have anything and that it may be a while before I could get them. I asked him to find out who had contributed. I wanted to pay them back. He said, “It’s not like that. Just remember the next time you see someone come here like you. You pitch in something.”

I sat there on my bunk with my brown paper bag of goodies, and thought about what had just happened to me. The last things I expected to find on death row was kindness and generosity. They knew what I needed and they took it upon themselves to meet those needs. They did this without any expectation of reimbursement or compensation. They did this for a stranger, not a known friend. I don’t know what they felt when they committed this act of incredible kindness. I only know that like them, twelve “good people” had deemed me beyond redemption. The only remedy that these “good people” could offer us is death. Somehow what these “good people” saw and what I was seeing didn’t add up. How could these men, who just showed me so much humanity, be considered the “worst of the worst.”

Ever since Napolean was executed, for a crime he committed as a teen, I’ve wanted to share this story with his family. I would like for them to know that their son was a good man. One who I will never forget. I want for them to know how sorry I am that we as a society failed them and him. I still find it ridiculous that we as a people feel that we cannot teach or love our young properly. I’m appalled at the idea that a teen is beyond redemption, that the only solution that we can offer is death. It’s tragic that this is being pointed out to the “good people” by one of the “worst of the worst”. God help us all.

What’s in the brown paper bag? I found caring, kindness, love, humanity, and compassion of a scale that I’ve never seen the “good people” in the free world show towards one another.

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simulposted at The Dream Antilles

It’s that time of the year when I step back from my keyboard, post my usual, bilingual Happy Holidays message at my blog, and shuffle off for a week or so for an end-of-the-year break.

So this is a good time to wish all of you Happy Holidays and a healthy and prosperous New Year.  Won’t it be great to have 2009 in our rear view mirror?

This is a time of year when I want particularly to remember all of those in the US who are imprisoned.  There are about 2 million people incarcerated.  My work in real life is being a criminal defense lawyer. I’ve done this work for more than thirty years, and I’m passionate about it (that is the subject of an upcoming essay in 2010 about Gideon v. Wainwright and me).  Sometimes I fail; sometimes my clients go to prison.  Some go for very, very long periods of time.  My clients who have been convicted and imprisoned, I have discovered, are not much different from me.  But their lives are far harder. The prison walls keep them in while they serve their time, but the walls also keep me and you out, isolating those who are locked up and making it likely, unless they are our immediate family or close friends, that we might forget that they are imprisoned.  Many who are locked up are estranged from their families, and if they’re not, they might be far away from them geographically.  So this time of year increases their suffering. There can, it turns out, be extreme loneliness even in the midst of complete, institutional lack of privacy.  And suffering can be increased even by monotony. Anyway, particularly at this time of year, I hope that we can pause for just a moment and remember those who are behind the walls.  And that they are just like us.  And wish for them happiness and a cessation of their suffering.

I’m thankful that every year there are stories like this one.  I wish there were more stories like this.

When I first moved to Columbia County, New York, about 25 miles southeast of Albany, in the foothills of the Berkshires, evening sunsets were spectacular.  And there were dozens of bats zooming through the dim light feasting on insects.  There were two primary kinds of bats: big brown bats ones and little brown bats.  I considered putting up a bat house, but never did.  The bats seemed to be thriving quite well without one, thank you.  But in the summer of 2007 I began to notice that there were fewer bats.  And in summer, 2008 even fewer.  And this past summer hardly any.  What I was witnessing was the bat population dying out.  It was being ravaged by disease.

Today, the Times Union brought the details of this bad news about the bats:

It’s a reason for optimism in the long battle to end State Killing.  The New York Times editorial today called for the abolition of the death penalty.  I applaud.  The abolition of state killing should be a mainstream, American idea.

The Times is angry and points out the obvious about the change in Ohio from 3-drug state killing to 1-drug state killing:

This is what passes for progress in the application of the death penalty: Kenneth Biros, a convicted murderer, was put to death in Ohio last week with one drug, instead of the more common three-drug cocktail. It took executioners 30 minutes to find a vein for the needle, compared with the two hours spent hunting for a vein on the last prisoner Ohio tried to kill, Romell Broom. Technicians tried about 18 times to get the needle into Mr. Broom’s arms and legs before they gave up trying to kill him. Mr. Biros was jabbed only a few times in each arm.

The Times gets quickly from the barbarism of the Biro and Broom executions to the main point:

The larger problem, however, is that changing a lethal-injection method is simply an attempt, as Justice Harry Blackmun put it, to “tinker with the machinery of death.” No matter how it is done, for the state to put someone to death is inherently barbaric.

It has also become clear – particularly since DNA evidence has become more common – how unreliable the system is. Since 1973, 139 people have been released from death row because of evidence that they were innocent, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.

An untold number of innocent people have also, quite likely, been put to death. Earlier this year, a fire expert hired by the state of Texas issued a report that cast tremendous doubt on whether a fatal fire – for which Cameron Todd Willingham was executed in 2004 – was arson at all. Until his execution, Mr. Willingham protested his innocence.

Most states still have capital punishment, and the Obama administration has so far shown a troubling commitment to it, pursuing federal capital cases even in states that do not themselves have the death penalty.

The Times conclusion:

Earlier this year, New Mexico repealed its death penalty, joining 14 other states – and the District of Columbia – that do not allow it. That is the way to eliminate the inevitable problems with executions.

Put another way, abolition is the answer to the lingering horror of state killing.  Abolition cannot happen soon enough.

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simulposted at The Dream Antilles