Calls for reparations have long been heard in Massachusetts. Thirty-six years ago, the state’s first black state senator, Bill Owens, introduced a bill to pay reparations to the descendants of enslaved African-Americans based on the economic benefits the state gained from the slave trade.
Though Owens did not live to see it, Massachusetts and many of its towns and cities have begun to reflect on their role in slavery and consider whether they should provide some form of reparations. Amherst established a $2 million “reparations bank” funded by the town’s marijuana tax. Boston, Cambridge, and Northampton have established commissions to acknowledge past harms and study reparations. The Boston Reparations Task Force, appointed by Mayor Michelle Wu, has contracted with scholars to document the city’s historical actions and how they contributed to racial disparities. There have also been efforts at the state level, with Senator Liz Miranda introducing a bill to convene a statewide task force to study reparations.
But reparations at the state, local, and national levels have been hindered by a lack of well-documented models for how governments might compensate for other kinds of harm. Our new study, published June 19 in the Russell Sage Foundation’s Journal of Social Science, fills this gap. Not only is the United States involved in securing reparations for Holocaust survivors and Japanese Americans who were imprisoned without trial during World War II, but the federal government is paying what we call “reparations” to hundreds of categories of victims who suffered primarily non-racial harm.
These include personal injuries, illnesses, diseases, economic losses, exposure to toxins, disasters, and other suffering. There are federal compensation programs for coal miners suffering from lung disease, farmers suffering from crop failures, fishermen facing depleted fish stocks, workers whose companies have gone bankrupt, victims of terrorism, wrongful convictions, and natural disasters, individuals exposed to nuclear radiation, veterans, descendants of Native Americans who were denied an income from their land, people harmed by pesticides, toxins, vaccines, and medical devices, workers who have lost their jobs because of U.S. trade agreements, and many others.
Our study reveals five federal lessons relevant to state and local efforts: First, governments often decide that the nation as a whole would be better off if they compensated individuals for specific losses or hardships they suffered through no fault of their own, and laws enabling such compensation programs cite this norm as justification for providing funding.
Second, it is important to let victims tell their stories. For example, beginning in the 1940s, hundreds of thousands of people in Nevada and other western states were exposed to radioactive contamination from the U.S. nuclear testing program. Many suffered health problems from drinking, eating or inhaling high levels of radiation.
Half a century later, Congress held local hearings to allow residents to speak about the harm done to their lost relatives. The hearings acknowledged the suffering of the victims and enabled federal legislation that paid $33 billion to some 200,000 survivors and heirs. Having heard the stories of Americans harmed by nuclear weapons tests in the 1940s, America needs to hear the stories of black Americans harmed by conventional weapons in the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921.
Third, there is precedent for compensating the descendants of those wronged. For example, since 2009, the United States has paid partial reparations to 500,000 sixth- and seventh-generation descendants of Native American tribes whose land rights (e.g., grazing, mining, and timber revenues) were stolen or squandered by the Department of the Interior in the 19th century. Although this amount is nowhere near the total amount owed, this precedent is relevant for assessing the racial harm to black descendants of land theft, victims of racist violence, and black veterans who were denied housing.
Fourth, governments use a variety of methods to finance compensation, including excise taxes, dedicated trust funds, subsidized insurance, mandatory funds, and discretionary funds. For example, over $5 billion in compensation for victims of vaccine injuries and deaths is funded by imposing an excise tax of 75 cents per dose of vaccine on pharmaceutical companies. This shows that compensation can be paid, not just written by check.
Fifth, governments can administer complex programs. The federal government can design coverage, determine eligibility, structure different types of benefits to meet different needs, and amend and update the law as needed. Our research uncovered a number of well-administered programs that could serve as models for future coverage programs.
The wealth gap between black and white households is currently estimated at $14 trillion, due in large part to a long history of often violent discriminatory policies, from slavery to convict leasing, the denial of GI Bill benefits to millions of black World War II and Korean War veterans, and continued discrimination in housing, health care, education, criminal justice and other areas.
These damages are too great for state or local governments to compensate alone. As Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis wrote, states are “laboratories of democracy.” The state and local experiment in Massachusetts may give Congress the momentum to finally pass H.R. 40, a bill that has been pending since 1989. The bill would establish a national commission to study reparations for black Americans. The effort there would be modeled after the implementation of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Linda J. Bilmes is a former Under Secretary of Commerce and a member of the United Nations Committee of Experts on Public Administration. Cornell William Brooks is a former president and CEO of the NAACP, a national civil rights attorney, and a fourth-generation clergyman. Both are professors at the Harvard Kennedy School.
