[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 4 (Wednesday, January 8, 2020)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E10]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




         RECOGNIZING THE CENTENNIAL OF THE ELAINE RACE MASSACRE

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                          HON. J. FRENCH HILL

                              of arkansas

                    in the house of representatives

                       Wednesday, January 8, 2020

  Mr. HILL of Arkansas. Madam Speaker, one-hundred years ago, soldiers, 
returned from the European front in WWI were committed to benefitting 
from the opportunity and liberty they secured at great risk and 
sacrifice to themselves. Many took that commitment to autonomy and 
freedom home to the small towns, communities, and homesteads where 
families and livelihoods remained. One-hundred years ago, few eyes were 
turned toward a small agrarian community in Northeast Arkansas, where 
black sharecroppers, spurred in part by the tales of opportunity and 
liberty spun by these returning patriots, dared to discuss fair pay for 
their crops. To this day, the accounts of the tragic loss of life that 
took place during the Elaine Massacre, when white mobs killed more than 
100 African Americans, remains widely unknown.
  In September, I had the opportunity to attend the dedication of a 
memorial to the victims of the 1919 Elaine Massacre. I also had the 
distinct pleasure of meeting the Honorable Brian Miller, U.S. District 
Judge and nephew of Leroy Johnston, WWI veteran, Purple Heart 
recipient, and murder victim during the Elaine Massacre. I would like 
to include in the Record Judge Miller's remarks from the ceremony.

            The Elaine Massacre Memorial Dedication Ceremony

 Court Square Park, 350 Perry Street, Helena, Arkansas, September 29, 
                                 2019.

                        (By Judge Brian Miller)

       One-hundred years ago, on September the 30th of 1919, on 
     this block, Phillips County's civic, political, and economic 
     leaders settled in for a night at the Helena Opera House, 
     which used to stand on this block.
       One-hundred years ago, on the same night, three men met at 
     the Phillips County Courthouse and drove down to Hoop Spur 
     Church. They went to Hoop Spur Church to check on a meeting 
     of black sharecroppers who were attempting to unionize. And 
     those people were unionizing so that they could be paid 
     fairly. The three men left from that courthouse across the 
     street from this block.
       While the black sharecroppers fought for fair pay, the 
     black business class in Helena built movie theaters and 
     cathedrals. They owned rental property. They ran small 
     businesses. They practiced medicine on Walnut Street, which 
     runs on the west side of this block.
       While the black business class ran their businesses on 
     Walnut Street, the white business class owned banks, movie 
     theaters, restaurants, and retail stores on Cherry Street, 
     which is that street that runs on the east side of this 
     block. Two sides of this block.
       And although there was a wide divide between the black and 
     white business classes, there was an even greater divide 
     between the black business class and the black sharecroppers 
     meeting at Hoop Spur that night.
       The 30 miles that separated this block and Walnut Street 
     from Hoop Spur might as well have been a million miles, 
     because there was nothing holding together the black business 
     class and the sharecroppers meeting at Hoop Spur that night, 
     except for shared history and black skin.
       But what neither group could have imagined happened 100 
     years ago. The three men who left the courthouse across the 
     street from this block fired shots into the Hoop Spur Church. 
     And shots were fired out of the church, and a white man was 
     killed.
       A posse formed in that courthouse across the street from 
     this block, and mob violence ensued. When the dust settled, 
     five white men were killed, and more than 100 black people 
     were killed. Estimates have gone as much as 800, but most 
     historians have settled on about 200. And the mob raged on.
       More than 100 black people were arrested and brought to the 
     Phillips County Jail across the street from this block. Those 
     men were brutally beaten and tortured in that jail across the 
     street from this block. And the mob gathered.
       Right here on this block, right where you sit, the mob 
     gathered and chanted and screamed for death. And 12 men were 
     given sham trials in that courthouse across the street from 
     this block and sentenced to die across the street from this 
     block.
       But Judge Jacob Trieber stayed those executions in the old 
     federal courthouse that once stood on that corner across the 
     street from this block.
       Now, after 100 years, we return. And where do we return? We 
     return to this block. We return not to relive 1919. We return 
     to this block to remember and honor those who were killed. We 
     return in hope. We return to this block with an earnest 
     yearning for redemption. We return to this block with an 
     earnest yearning for reconciliation.
       Those of us who failed to take up the cause of the 
     sharecroppers seek redemption for failing to help those less 
     fortunate than ourselves. And those of us who joined the mob 
     or contributed to the slaughter of the sharecroppers seek 
     redemption for doing the unthinkable.
       And all of us, whether we are the descendants of the mob, 
     whether we are the descendants of those who were killed by 
     the mob, or whether we are just people of good will, seek 
     reconciliation with one another.
       We return to this block on this day and at this time to 
     face the reality that we stand on the shoulders of our 
     ancestors. We all love our ancestors and we all respect them. 
     But we also accept the reality that they were not perfect. We 
     understand that they were human beings. We understand that 
     they were susceptible to human frailty.
       Because of this, we return to this block to announce that 
     we will be vigilant not to repeat their mistakes. We return 
     to this block to forgive one another, and to ask for 
     forgiveness. We return to this block to accept that 
     forgiveness and to allow ourselves to be redeemed.
       And this, the Elaine Massacre Memorial, forever stands as a 
     reminder of why we have returned to this block. Every time we 
     feel angry, every time we feel embittered, every time we feel 
     slighted, every time we feel divisive, and every time we feel 
     guilty, we will see that monument and we will remember the 
     nightmare that all of those emotions will bring.
       And we will remember this day and how we feel at this 
     moment, and we will recommit ourselves to loving and 
     respecting one another, even when we disagree.

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