Harvard corporate henchman Henry Louis Gates' attempt to absolve Europeans of blame for slavery is easily dismissed as an absurdity. But honest activists on the Black Left disagree on the debt that is owed to African Americans. Some think reparations are a diversion. Others hold that "the debt is inseparable from the fabric of the African American past and present."

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"The debt is real and broadly affirmed by African Americans."

There is little dignity or prospect of illumination in arguing with the likes of Harvard's Henry Louis Gates on the merits of reparations for African Americans (or for continental Africans). Corporate academic assassins, like corporate lawyers, are paid to do harm and spread confusion for their clients' benefit, not to advance the cause of justice, or even simple rationality. Gates' assertion that continental Africans, rather than Europeans and Euro-Americans, owe a debt to the formerly enslaved American diaspora, is a pollution of the public discourse designed to slime the very existence of an outstanding social debt for slavery and Jim Crow. He attempts to confer both Harvard cachet and Black skin credibility to an argument long favored by barroom whites stationed well below Gates' in the social order: that "they" (Blacks) are undeserving beasts who sold "themselves" into bondage.

This is the low-life level to which Gates tried to take the reparations discussion with his April 23 New York Times op-ed piece. Since then, a number of able-minded writers, scholars and activists have held their noses and gotten down-and-dirty with the noxious Gates. He has repeatedly been exposed as a peddler of "moral and intellectual absurdity," in the words of anti-racist writer Tim Wise. Gates has (once again) confirmed that he is an intellectual fraud and white man's puppet.

But, wrestling in the cesspool with Gates, a mercenary for the enemy, is not the same as holding a respectful discussion with comrades and allies who oppose demands for reparations as bad strategy, diversionary, or a magnet for hustlers.

"Gates attempts to confer both Harvard cachet and Black skin credibility to an argument long favored by barroom whites."

Gates has given anti-reparations Blacks a bad name. His stench should not be allowed to hover over an issue that many activists hold dear and strong majorities of Black people support, but about which honest people may disagree.

I support reparations. That is, I believe African Americans are owed a debt for ancestral slavery and Jim Crow and for contemporary racism and the gross inequities that are the legacy of slavery. That the debt is incalculable does not mean it doesn't exist, or is irrelevant. On the contrary, the debt is inseparable from the fabric of the African American past and present. It demands to be paid. But in what form, under what conditions, is for a self-determining people to decide in the course of struggle. There is no model for redress of the crimes that created the United States of America.

Adolph Reed, the renowned activist and University of Pennsylvania political science professor, is one of my favorite political thinkers. Prof. Reed believes Blacks should not demand reparations, for reasons he outlined in the December, 2000 issue of The Progressive magazine. The article, "On Reparations," remains among the most coherent rejections of reparations by a progressive Black activist/scholar.

Reed was responding to a resurgence of reparations fervor, that had taken the issue beyond what he dismissed as "politically marginal, nationalist circles" into the main streams of African American political thought, partially on the success of former TransAfrica executive director and founder Randall Robinson's book, The Debt: What America Owes to Blacks, published in January, 2000.

"Dr. Reed opposes reparations because it is a "nonstarter in American politics.'"

Reed is, naturally, well versed in the rationales for reparations and is in general agreement on the same set of facts wielded by reparations proponents: that the United States was built on the backs of slaves, and that the U.S. government has been complicit in virtually every aspect of the crimes against the progeny of the slaves. "Still," he wrote, "I imagined that the reparations talk wouldevaporate because it seemed so clearly a political dead end."

Dr. Reed opposes reparations because it is a "nonstarter in American politics." He fears that, with support for affirmative action "eroded significantly"reparations raises the ante on compensatory policy exponentially."

In other words, if the white folks are backing away from affirmative action reparations' weak sister what makes Blacks think they'll agree to even stronger medicine? To which many of us would reply: It's not about bargaining with white folks, it's about organizing Black folks for struggle, putting our people in motion and changing the relationships of power. The debt is real and broadly affirmed by African Americans. So what if only a sliver of whites recognize The Debt? How can one speak of social transformation without taking The Debt into consideration, especially when around 7 out of 10 Blacks favor the principle of government-paid reparations or at least they did from 2000 to 2005, as documented by Black political demographer Dr. Michael Dawson.

"A Unifying Metaphor"

Dr. Reed attributes reparations' appeal "partly as a unifying metaphor that expresses the historical linkage of what conventional racial liberalism construes as separate, isolated moments of injustice. This is an important corrective, though it's one that can easily occur without the call for reparations."

Reed doesn't explain what would substitute for a pro-reparations narrative which is based, after all, on historical facts not in serious dispute among Black progressives and one wonders why activists should go to extraordinary lengths to conceal the overarching presence of The Debt. Is it just to avoid upsetting white people, only about 3 percent of which support reparations to Blacks, according to Dr. Dawson?

Reparations obsession can be escapist, said Reed. "The frame also appeals to lawyers, economists and other people who like to play intellectual parlor games, in as much as calculation of the extent of economic and social costs of slavery and racial injustice to their victims across generations can consume endless energy, discussion and professional expertise."

As one who has become mired in at least one marathon night of calculations in search of an understanding of the enormity of The Debt/crime, I can attest that Dr. Reed has a point. But I suspect Dr. Reed finds reparations in general a diversion from what he considers to be more promising political pursuits.

"One wonders why activists should go to extraordinary lengths to conceal the overarching presence of The Debt."

The reparations narrative can also be an effective framework to engage young (and not so young) people in basic economic, social and history studies provided that the facilitators actually know something about political economy and history.

Dr. Reed critiques reparations by posing problems that could only occur if the battle for settlement of The Debt were already won:

"Indeed, the question of material compensation [for Black Americans] opens a plethora oftechnical issues. Should payments go to individuals or to some presumably representative corporate entity? If the former, who qualifies as a recipient? Would descendents of people who had been enslaved elsewhere (for instance, Brazil or the Caribbean) be eligible? And what of those no longer legally black people with slave ancestors? As a friend of mine has suggested, these issues could produce a lively trade for genealogists, DNA testers and other such quacks, and already some seem to be rising to the opportunity."

Of course, some of Reed's questions are more suitable as jumping off points for Dave Chappelle comedy skits than the real world. Nobody is proposing sorting out potential recipients of some Big Payout to Blacks anytime in the foreseeable future. Indeed, who says what form resolution of The Debt will take? That is to be determined by people in motion over the course of struggle under circumstances that we can only imagine.

Reed is venting sarcasm. His "technical issues" over eligibility for reparations can only be worked out in the course of movement-building. It is enough that close to 40 million African Americans know who they are, that 70 percent of them believe they are owed reparations by the government, and that The Debt is, in fact, owed.

Who's in Charge?

When The Debt question is finally resolved, Reed asks, what "entity" will act as the repository for the reparations money? "How can its representativeness and accountabilitybe determined? If the body is a development fund, who would control it and how would the decision be made?"

Although it seems a sensible question, the answer Reed wants would require foreknowledge of the kind and scope of movement that could compel the state to settle its Debt to Black America. It would also presuppose the ability to predict the political complexion and relative strength of the government the movement would be interacting with. And who says the "movement" might not be part of the government? Where is it written that reparations will be in cash, or commodities (Dave Chappelle's cheese)? Why not reparations through a share of real societal power in a nation in which Capital has finally been brought low?

Any Black movement that could demand a settlement of The Debt that would satisfy the bulk of African Americans would, of necessity, have evolved organizational structures sufficiently representative to command their constituents' allegiance and respect which would be quite enough to satisfy real-world standards of accountability.

Adolph Reed need not worry about Reverends Jesse and Al and the "usual suspects" forming a reparations "entity" to steal Black people's government debt settlements any time soon. They would first have to build a movement, before they could begin looting a task that is clearly beyond their skill set.

In his 2000 article, Dr. Reed challenged Randall Robinson's suggestion that "philanthropic agencies" handle distribution of reparations resources. Which ones? "This talk," wrote Reed, "presumes a coherent, knowable black agenda that can be determined outside of democratic, participatory processes among those in whose names decisions are to be made and resources allocated."

Reed is at least partially correct on this score. The entire reparations scenario presumes a far higher level of Black organization and unity around a broadly understood agenda than exists, today. Until this higher level of Black organization is attained, there will be no possibility of reparations, or mammouth reparations scams, or even botched reparations distributions.

"Where is it written that reparations will be in cash?"

On the other hand, a Black social movement that is strong enough to force the state to grant reparations would, by definition, have no problem identifying popular needs to be addressed through reparations resources, since an important task of movements is to identify areas of need and organize accordingly.

We see that one of the problems with reparations discussions is that they often seem to presume that the payback, the settlement in whatever form can be achieved in the absence of a Black movement far deeper and stronger (and smarter) than any we have yet experienced and, certainly, a much-weakened capitalist class. Of course, the same can be said of Dr. Reed's vision of "broad solidarity across race, gender and other identities around shared concerns of daily life." Achieving the full expression of those words presumes a "coherent, knowable," shared political agenda among a rainbow of organizations and constituencies, an ideal that has proven even more elusive than Black unity in U.S. history.

Reed is on to something when he critiques the tendency of some reparations proponents to dwell on symbolic issues such as Black "monuments and statuary," but the same applies to petty bourgeois Black elements that oppose reparations. He strains to rhetorically link reparations folks with calls for public apologies for slavery. But the fact is, based on political demographer Michael Dawson's data, 80 percent of Blacks would have liked such an apology from George Bush's government.

Reed questions whether Black people will "mobilize around earlier generations' grievances to pursue current objectives." Earlier grievances? That Black folks' current grievances are rooted in earlier grievances is a rather well understood concept among African Americans. Whatever holds Black people back from mobilizing in their own immediate interest, it's not the feeling that they're being asked to fight old people's battles.

Cultural Nationalists

Dr. Reed is right about those "narrow" and "cultural nationalists" virtually all of whom call for reparations who think Black folks are most in need of "moral and psychological repair": "psychobabble" solutions, instead of real-world strategies. But that has nothing inherently to do with the concept of reparations, which is rooted in the material world of economic consequences and hard data, not squishy romanticism.

"I know that many activists who have taken up the cause of reparations otherwise hold and enact a politics quite at odds with the limitations that I've described here," wrote Reed, granting that not all reparations supporters are "narrow" nationalists or aspiring "brokers." But then he comes quite close to labeling the whole crowd as opportunists. "To some extent, I suspect their involvement stems from an old reflex of attempting to locate a progressive kernel in the nationalist sensibility. It certainly is an expression of a generally admirable commitment to go where people seem to be moving. But we must ask: What people? And where can this motion go? And we must be prepared to recognize what can be only a political dead end -- or worse."

"Dr. Reed seems to view Black people's belief that they are entitled to reparations as an unfortunate state of affairs."

Thus we see that Dr. Reed considers all manifestations of Black nationalism the belief that African Americans have become a nation within a nation during their sojourn in North America, and have the right to group self-determination as essentially empty of progressive content, "or worse." In accusing reparations supporters of going "where people seem to be moving" he appears to deny that these activists sincerely believe that demands for reparations are both legitimate and necessary to build a Black movement. Dr. Reed also seems to view Black people's belief that they are entitled to reparations as an unfortunate state of affairs that might impede efforts to forge "broad solidarity across race, gender and other identities" as if the two visions are mutually exclusive.

Despite the seriousness of differences over reparations on the Black Left, conscientious activists can work around them. Not so with Henry Louis Gates. He works for the other side.

BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com.

Authors Website: www.BlackAgendaReport.com

Authors Bio:

Glen Ford is aveteran of Black radio, television, print and Internet news and commentary. He is executive editor of BlackAgendaReport.com and was co-founder of BlackCommentator.com.