New York City is considering paying reparations to the descendants of slaves under new plans approved by the City Council.
The proposals, which are aimed at acknowledging and addressing the impact of slavery in New York City, are yet to be signed into law by Democratic Mayor Eric Adams.
According to the City Council, New York City had one of the highest rates of slave ownership in the country during the 1700s, before abolishing it in 1872.
However, businesses across the city, including the predecessors of some modern banks, continued to benefit financially from the slave trade up until 1866 with the lawmakers behind the proposals noting that the harms caused by the institution are still felt by Black Americans today.
One of the proposals would also require the city to install a sign on Wall Street in Manhattan to mark the site of New York’s first slave market which operated between 1711 and 1762.
Public Advocate Jumaane Williams said: ‘The wealth of Wall Street banks was built on the backs of the human beings sold on that very spot, and we have a moral obligation to accurately acknowledge not only this slave market’s tragic history, the pain of enslaved people in our city, and the role slavery had in New York’s economy, one which has echoed painfully across generations’.
Council Member Farah Louis, a Democrat who sponsored one of the bills, told the City Council on Thursday: ‘The reparations movement is often misunderstood as merely a call for compensation’.
She added that systemic forms of oppression still affected Black Americans today, including through the underfunding of crucial services in predominantly black neighbourhoods.
‘Does that mean we are going to hand everyone a check? No,’ Louis said, reports The New York Times.
‘But starting the conversation is the most important part.’
City Hall signalled the mayor’s support in a statement calling the legislation ‘another crucial step towards addressing systemic inequities, fostering reconciliation, and creating a more just and equitable future for all New Yorkers.’
However, not all city council members were on board with the new bill.
Joseph Borelli, the Republican minority leader of the city council, who represents Staten Island, criticized the plans.
‘I bear no responsibility for slavery,’ Borelli said.
‘Unless someone could explain to me why I should bear some individual and societal guilt through my taxes, I’m going to be opposed.’
The new bills would direct the city’s Commission on Racial Equity to suggest remedies to the legacy of slavery, including reparations. It would also create a truth and reconciliation process to establish historical facts about slavery in the state.
The commission would work with the existing state commission, which is also considering the possibility of reparations.
