Submitted by Dr.

Mutulu Shakur, Michael Covington, Ali Gibran, on behalf of the

Georgia State Black Studies Department (Dr. Akinyele 0. Umoja)
As a result of America’s crime[s] against humanity, regardless of the direct or in
direct victimization, we as a people suffer and will continue to do so until the
re is psychological, economical, educational, and monetary atonement. It is impe
rative that as a nation we reap the benefits of the blood, sweat, and tears that
our ancestors poured into this land. The perpetrators of these crimes have yet
to embrace our claim for reparations or even acknowledge it as a crime in and of
itself. Therefore, if we are to be students of history (which we are), it will
take a strategic conspiracy, secretly and overtly, to apply espionage and sacrif
ice in bringing the defendants of these crimes into negotiation.
We are conscious that legal, political, and moral persuasion, collectively, repr
esents the utopia of opportunities to rectify these crime[s]. However, within ou
r strategic approach towards reparations, we must filter out the opportunist, ne
o-colonist, apologist, and the immediate gratification seeker. The appropriation
of reparations must have a long term objective and not be viewed as a quick pay
day, only to have the long sought after compensation returned to the hands of th
e perpetrators, leaving our people worse off than before and without merit for f
uture claims.
The inclusion of the multitude of talent, intellectually, diplomatically, econom
ically, of the African Diaspora, on a national and international theater, is ess
ential to the comprehensive context of our victory.
Most importantly, the only true super power, which is the mass of a people on on
e accord, must be firmly entrenched in the justness for reparations, the benefit
s of reparations, the hope for reparations, and the ultimate demand for reparati
ons. Then and only then will these crime[s] against humanity be rectified.
Introduction
It is important that the reparation formation have full understanding of the sig
nificance of the three Seminole Wars. These wars are hidden in the history of th
e African’s struggle for freedom in North America. In this context, the Anti Slave
ry Struggle.
The conflict/war between the American Government and the Seminole Nation set the
stage for the first International Treaty between the U.S. and a foreign nation.
A true legal and political study of these wars would reveal this government’s his
torical role in the violation of international law from its inception. Even more
so, its use of international law to force other nation[s] to diminish our stand
ard as human beings to property is in legal standing. The predicate acts of a co
nspiracy that makes the government clearly a defendant in any pursuit of judicia
l remedy for compensation for our suffering.
The United States Government must become a defendant because of the courageous s
truggle of our ancestors, who fought waves of wars against this conspiracy that
we now recognize. The forty five years of those sacrifices are viewed not as reb
ellion and revolt, but wars of the classical character of wars of the 19th centu
ry. The Seminole Wars were fought and initiated by this government on behalf of
slave holders and businessmen of the south for the economic commerce to enhance
the wealth of this government. So it logically follows why our struggle for repa
rations on a legal front demands inclusion of the United States Government as a
defendant.
The Gabriel Prosser Revolt, the Nat Turner Revolt, the John Brown Revolt are dis
tinguished from the three Seminole Wars, though, they parallel the same time lin
e. However, these revolts are deemed internal conflicts subject to domestic law
and remedies and the Seminole Wars are considered by their nature international
conflicts, requiring the application of international law to its resolution. Thi
s also factors in a basis to hold this government as a conspirator which amassed
economic superiority over the world at the cost of our suffering, which was a g
rave violation of human rights history.
Because the issues surrounding reparations affects the entire New African nation
, including prisoners, we at U.S. Penitentiary Atlanta offer the following:
(1)
The push for reparation must be a deliberate action in which all the various exp
eriences of N’COBRA, the Minister Louis Farrakhan, Conrad Worrell, et. al., must b
e structured so that the whole represents a holistic view. In particular, we mus
t focus on all viable regional strategies. Also, it is equally important that we
stress active engagement through top-down organizational schemes where power is
centralized. Such an approach would allow us to make better use of our extended
networks, ultimately granting us the capacity to fight on different fronts simu
ltaneously. We must adopt a strategy where operation is on a level where we can
compete for our rights in court, while influencing Congress from a philosophical
standpoint of slavery being a crime against humanity that bears their remedial
consideration. Additionally, centralized power could better assist in the organi
zing of ideas needed to educate the masses because it is vital that there be onl
y one ideology. Due to the many dimensions and identities of various groups vyin
g for reparations, the masses have been subjected to discordant viewpoints, furt
her enhancing the divide and conquer potential of a disorderly house where the m
asses rank and choose, which in turn, destroys the natural and normal channels o
f cooperative unity.
(2)
The crime[s] against humanity that resulted in the capture, enslavement and brut
ality of the African people has no other parallel. Our struggle is global. These
crimes have shaped the worldview of modern civilization and even governs the ex
periences and expectations of all citizens worldwide today. Unaware of this hist
orical reality, African people have been unable to recognize the unique characte
r of their contributions (albeit forced) to the global economy. As long as we ar
e ignorant of the central role our enslavement has played in the awesome wizardr
y of present day technology, we will continue to be easily manipulated. We have
been systematically “Bamboozled” so that we cannot accept our self-alienation from t
he rest of the human family as the rule of law. Another significant cost of our
social and political debilitation is that we, as a people, have yet to realize t
he prohibited price tag of thinking logically. Slavery, with its related violenc
e and brutality, is a crime against humanity whose very nature insists that the
matter be decided in international court (i.e. the World Court). If, as a matter
of principle, the United States Congress, the court system, or corporate americ
a, either individually or collectively, address and remedy our injustices, then
this would be accepted as a first step towards adjusting their national debt to
us. If not, we should demand redress in the global and international arena.
(3)
The crimes against humanity inflicted upon African people changed the course of
human existence. Therefore, the resolution of this crime will have global implic
ations. It has always been fashionable for the government to delude us with the
belief that slavery ended in 1865. In contrast, we deny this institutionalized f
allacy. In this country, slavery is virtually synonymous with inner city living.
The same symptoms that made plantation life such a horror are still intact in t
he urban environment; therefore, slavery continues today. And it will continue t
o enjoy a perpetual shelf life as long as oppression and inequality are the ingr
ained expression of this country’s natural character. As long as nothing is done t
o reverse the misery and suffering of people of color, or to correct the vision
of the greedy, shortsighted leaders who initiate the politics that circumvent ou
r economical, educational, political, social, and human rights, then slavery wil
l continue as an elaborate system to break the universal spirit of people of col
or. In brief, how can slavery have received a proper burial when the people supp
osedly emancipated by its death still have every facet of their existence domina
ted and controlled by an ideological, spiritual, and educational body that demea
ns them? How can any people not be deemed slaves when they have been taught to o
ffer unquestioning obedience and subservience to a government that has emotional
ly crippled them? Historically, any people who have been trained to be dependent
are slaves. In this country, urban slavery is the organized racketeering of the
state.
(4)
Where there exists any crime, especially a crime against humanity, in a period w
here no domestic law existed, to remedy such crime, international law must be us
ed. We contend that the formalized internment of the Japanese during World War I
I, though inhumane, does not rise to the standard of gross inhumanity inflicted
upon African people during the horrific centuries of slavery. So, the formalized
redress of Komosotus is not applicable. In fact, we believe that the legal obje
ctives of the Japanese remedy would denigrate the human suffering of the African
Holocaust. To focus our energy on “Komosotus-type” remedies would only divert our a
ttention from the international aspects of our claims, thus allowing our enemies
to preempt our duty to present our case before an international court. We must
understand the full dimension of our claim for reparations. It will be that much
easier for the U.S. Courts to label the terms and conditions of our remedy. As
the injured party, African people must decide how they want their demands for re
parations to be perceived instead of trying to evaluate our plight, which has no
parallel, to that of another people. It is not equal terms with Komosotus that
we are seeking, but superior ones. The reparations that we seek are for genocide
, not internment.
(5)
Post official slavery didn’t end in 1865. In fact, the conditions of slavery and t
he continued acts of genocide, as interpreted and developed in international law
still exist today. To be successful we must cease and desist from contentment w
ith piece-meal solutions. We must search for absolutes. However, in order to rea
ch this level of accomplishment, we must recognize what laws infringe upon our a
utonomy. If people of color are to understand the nature of their current condit
ion in this country, then we must realize that long before we even know what was
occurring, the government was initiating domestic law and policy that violated
international law. This is nothing new. The practice dates back to the New York
Treaty of 1785-1789, which was a law (signed by George Washington) to circumvent
the international law against the transportation of slaves. By mutual agreement
with Congress and the Supreme Court, this law was the legal cement that helped
prevent us from gaining our autonomy and human dignity buy superceding our class
ification as “humans,” instead declaring that we were property. This law doomed our
future well being because to one degree or another property was mere cargo which
could be sold, transferred or bought at the owner’s discretion. This act was the
first legal endorsement against our ethnic identity. Yet, others were to follow,
most definitely the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments. Sadly, people of colo
r have made an industry of not being able to recognize the “our side” and the “enemy s
ide” of the laws in this country, and for that reason we applaud the external auth
ority of the Constitution and lesser laws that impose restraints upon us. In bri
ef, we envisioned enjoying security and racial fulfillment, via the Thirteenth a
nd Fourteenth Amendments. But rather than being ethnocentric (centered around ou
r ethnic being) these laws were egocentric (an attempt to relieve white guilt).
In any event, these amendments conjured up a picture of us that had nothing to d
o with our self image as newly freed men. We wanted rights. We got privileges.
(6)
For reasons that need to be fully developed, we have discovered through a variet
y of studies that there is sufficient evidence to establish that slavery, via ge
netics, is the hereditary basis for the physical and social conditions of our pe
ople. Due to the knowledge of genetics it can no longer be held that descendants
of slaves were not directly harmed by the ravages of slavery. In the same way t
hat our collective gene pool contained a gene that made us less susceptible to m
alaria during slavery, our ancestors soaked up all the knowledge of how to be a
slave and as a conditioning mechanism to ensure our survival, the information wa
s encoded in the structure of our ancestors DNA, performing its function of fitt
ing us for survival in an environment where it would have been impossible to exi
st without the proper coping devices. So the death of our ancestors does not vin
dicate the slave masters because the gene of slavery still exists within us and
our thoughts, ideas and attitudes clearly demonstrate this. Because our desires
and fears are so closely related to the mindset of our ancestors, we still promo
te an image that is not compatible with our pre-slavery heritage. Having learned
how to internalize slavery has only tended to make us more adept at playing the
games of slaves and slave masters. We have become neurotic in that all our soci
ally motivated behavior is premised upon our powerlessness. Our social and polit
ical inadequacies compel us to beg. We engage in this self-condemning behavior b
ecause our sense of purpose has been diluted by the environmental DNA we inherit
ed from our ancestors.
(7)
It is imperative that we take an in-depth look at the economic gap between “US” and “T
HEM.” In this way, we will get a grand view of the intimate relationship that weds
corporate america to the big government. If we are to take responsibility for o
ur future, we must grasp the fundamental fact that our bondage represented the u
ltimate quick-fix solution to this country’s laws of economics, and every time we
act without reference to America’s national addiction to slave labor, we doom our
own experiment with seeking justice. The government has aggressively promoted an
d supported corporate thievery, encouraging it by lax laws and regulations that
allow big businesses to generate enormous profits at the expense of the people a
nd the environment. So, to ignore that the government and corporate media are a
team would be like trying to fit a square peg in a round hole. We can better pre
pare ourselves to confront both our traditional enemies, the government, and our
non-traditional enemies, big businesses, by understanding that the long odds we
face in gaining economic parity has political consequences, that the system was
designed to induce our failure and hence our dependency. What we must realize i
s that by being unaware, we acquire boundaries which not only limit us economica
lly, but which also circumscribe what we can become as a people. Because from th
e issues that we’ve faced in this country, the public institutions most willing to
crush our efforts have been the government and corporate america. Why? Because
time and time again, no matter how far back in the history of our affairs in thi
s country, you will find that the devilish partnership of corporate america and
the government have intentionally stifled us. When it comes to us, the very natu
re of their complicity forced them to unite against us.
(8)
This commercial pact between government and big businesses can actually be trace
d back to the beginning of the slave trade, and it was not merely the merchants
involved in the Royal Africa Company whose charter states:
We hereby for us, our heirs and successors grant unto the same Royal Africa Comp
any of England… That it shall and may be lawful to… set to the sea such as many ship
s as shall be thought fitting… for the buying, selling, bartering, and exchanging
of, for or with any gold, silver, negroes, slaves… witness the King at Westminster
the seven and twentieth day of September 1672.
Now, what must be remembered is that many of the so mentioned heirs ended up in
America. In 1651, Samuel Vassall, a major shareholder in the Guinea Company, was
one of the main founders of Massachusetts. He also combined with Lord Berkeley
to develop Virginia. In fact, when a group of businessmen called the Royal Adven
turers were granted a license on the slave trade for a thousand years, the list
of investors included four members of the Royal family, two Dukes, a Marquis, fi
ve Earls, and seven Knights. For them the traffic in blacks was a treasure hunt.
Most of the persons involved in the various slave trading companies came to own
land in America, thus, now having two major investments to protect, so that by
the 1700s, slavery was a nationalized industry. When the treaty of Utrecht was s
igned in 1713, it gave the British government the greatest commercial prize of a
ll times: the contract to import slaves to the Spanish West Indies. However, the
British government sold the contract to the South Sea Company. What this demons
trates is that international law has never mattered when it came to people of co
lor. Governments bought and sold the contract to import slaves as convenience di
ctated, never opposed by international law. The same is true today. The governme
nt and corporate america are twin evils, albeit, the most powerful forces in our
path for self-determination, and we seek new innovative strategies by which to
confront them. International law, as shown by the United Nations, is impotent in
the face of a super power, so how can we depend on international law when it ca
nnot defend its own principles. We must struggle in the trenches, in the streets
, and then on to the high heavens if we are to succeed, all the while rememberin
g that we are alone.
(9)
The Treaty of New York is thus an example of how, as Joseph Singer has argued, “[t
]he history of the United States law, from the beginning of the nation to the pr
esent, is premised on the use of sovereign power to allocate property rights in
ways that discriminated—and continue to discriminate—against the original inhabitant
s of the land.” However, this first treaty did more than impose the white settlers’
system of land ownership on the Creeks, it also imposed on the Creek settlers ra
cial hierarchy and laws that defined people as property. The Treaty provided tha
t the Creeks were to “deliver, as soon as practicable… all citizens of the United St
ates, white inhabitants or negroes, who are now prisoners in any part of said na
tion.” The United States interpreted this to mean that the Creeks not only had to
return fugitive slaves, but were supposed to capture Black Seminoles, many of wh
om had been free for generations, and turn them over to the United States to be
enslaved. This Treaty illustrates a pattern which has continued to the present d
ay, i.e., the use of international law by the United States to enforce its parti
cular system of property rights, a system inextricably related to the maintenanc
e of racial hierarchy. This symposium focuses on the intersection of critical ra
ce theory, which endeavors to analyze the influence of race and racism in the le
gal system, and international law. Although these bodies of law and theory are u
sually regarded as separate disciplines, when we look at race and racism in Amer
ican law and the relationship of our government and domestic legal system to int
ernational law—how we shape and promote, as well as disregard, the global rule of
law—we see that these two areas not only intersect, but have been inextricably rel
ated throughout U.S. history. The United States government was formed to protect
and promote the interests of a relatively small group of people. This was accom
plished in part by the creation of a system of laws particularly favorable to pr
operty interests, and by defining “property” under the law to include human beings.
The emergence of “race” and racism in the United States must be understood in the co
ntext of an economic system heavily dependent on slave labor. One cannot underst
and the United States Constitution without knowing that it owes its existence to
the elaborate protections of slavery built into it. Similarly, to understand th
e United States’ complex and contradictory relationship to international law, it i
s important to know that many of the first encounters with international law, in
cluding the first treaties, wars and violations of other nations’ sovereignty, wer
e rooted in a determination to protect the institution of slavery and the econom
ic interests of slaveholders.
The Seminole Nation is an Indian tribe formed after the European conquest
of American and composed of both Native Americans and African peoples. Some memb
ers of the Seminole Nation are descended from escaped African slaves who resided
among several Native American groups living in what is now Florida. These Nativ
e American groups, along with the Africans living among them, became known as th
e Seminoles.
Pressured by powerful slaveholding interests, the United States government attem
pted, with considerable success, to build protections for slavery into internati
onal law. Beginning with the new nation’s first treaty, U.S. agents tried to negot
iate international agreements requiring other sovereign nations—the Creeks and Sem
inoles, as well as Britain, Spain and later Mexico—to capture black Seminoles and
turn them over to U.S. agents who would enslave or re-enslave them. In treaties
with these nations, the U.S. included indemnification for lost property, and the
n tried to enforce a definition of “property” which included both people who had esc
aped from slavery, and those who, by virtue of their African heritage, were pres
umed under U.S. law to be slaves. Under this interpretation of the law, if anoth
er nation gave sanctuary to people fleeing slavery, it owed the United Stares mo
ney, as if its citizens had stolen horses or ships. The United States engaged in
three wars against the Seminoles (1st—1818-1823; 2nd—1835-1842; 3rd—1855-1858). Each
was, as commanding General Jesup said of the second Seminole War, “a negro war,” not
because the Indians happened to have Black allies who fought with them, but bec
ause the U.S. government was fighting people of African descent to preserve the
institution of slavery. Tens of millions of federal dollars and thousands of liv
es were lost trying to keep Florida from becoming a safe haven for fugitive slav
es and, in the process, allowing military forces to engage in profitable venture
s of slave-catching and piracy.
(10)
The National Bar Association Magazine summarized the case:
According to the complaint [in Davis v. the United States], the plaintiffs… are Es
telusti Seminoles, descendants of Black fugitives who fled plantations in the so
uth and in the Caribbean to join secessionists from the Creek, Micco-suckee, and
other Native American [nations]. Together these African American and Native Ame
rican people settled in Florida in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and f
ormed the Seminole Nation… [I]n the 1820s and 30s, after bitter warfare against th
e U.S. government, the Seminoles, including the Estelusti, were deprived of thei
r lands and sent to what is now Oklahoma. In 1990, the United States government
provided some $56 million in compensation for this land taking.
International law, formerly known as the Law of Nations, is a component of this
nation’s domestic law, enforceable in federal courts. Independent of the Acts of C
ongress, Justice Marshall said, an Act of Congress ought never to be construed t
o violate the Law of Nations. If any other possible construction remains, intern
ational law is part of “our” law and must be ascertained and administered by the Cou
rt of Justice of the appropriate jurisdiction as often as the question of rights
are relevant.
(11)
If forced to prove the survivors direct causation, we, in a scientific presentat
ion, can show through genetic testing that lack of certain enzymes can be found
in children who have abusive parents, they will have an emotional reaction, whic
h demonstrates a lack to control anger. Clearly, there are other prevailing medi
cal phenomena that point to hereditary traits, ills associated with emotion and
physical contradictions. The search for DNA markers for disease would be realist
ic to prove direct causation. We should understand the potential political philo
sophy of DNA genetics. When pushed to prove a crime against humanity, of such pr
oportion, we must at least review science theory on both sides, such as James Wa
tson, Dr. Francis Wesling, Jewel Pookrum, and Naim Akbar. The Japanese American
precedent for reparations, legislation in cases such as Komosotus, which has the
potential of becoming standard in civil law, which is a proposition we must rej
ect as not applicable as outlined in the Natsu Taylor Suito essay on race and pr
operty in international RICO Act (Racketeering, Influenced and Corrupt Organizat
ion Act), 18 USC 1961. Slave owners and others who profited from chattel slavery
and its racist Jim Crow offspring constitute a continuing criminal enterprise.
The kingpins of slavery used profits derived from their crimes against humanity
to invest in “legitimate” businesses, not unlike the mafia. Acts considered racketee
ring under RICO are many and include kidnapping, theft and obstruction of justic
e. Under RICO, an economic or other identifiable goal is required. Slavery, Jim
Crow, lynching, convict leasing, etc. all conceivably fall under the rubric of r
acketeering acts. There are many wealthy American corporations whose economic ro
ots are embedded in the blood and suffering of slaves. There is much American we
alth steeped in the ideology and practice of white supremacy. Any group of indiv
iduals associated or who acquire, conduct or participate in an enterprise, throu
gh a pattern of racketeering activity, are subject to criminal and/or civil pros
ecution under RICO. A finding of guilt subjects them to enormous forfeitures and
civil remedies, including monetary awards of triple the amount of damages claim
ed. Power and wealth derived from slavery and its legacy form the basis for crim
inal and civil liability under RICO. It is time for the estates of the original
American racketeers to be held accountable for their crimes against humanity and
for their descendants to pay up.
When the United States government manipulates its laws and treaties in order to
further an horrendous, illegal activity such as slavery, for the purpose of bene
fiting economically and financially from said illegality, they become co-conspir
ators.
Conclusion
The incidents of September 11, 2001, place international issues at our doorstep.
As more African Americans, as well as, so called White America, come to acknowl
edge the impact of international policies on their lives, morally, as well as pr
incipally, the legal and political strategist of the reparation movement must fa
miliarizes themselves with the past and present international norms of human rig
hts, intellectual property rights and law to gather the historical, social and l
egal impact so that we may be better able to prove in the World Court that the U
nited States government initiated conspiracies to manipulate international law f
rom its inception. Their primary objectives to continue the dehumanization of ou
r ancestors for the purpose of commerce and racial superiority, are a violation
of past and present law.
We look forward to the struggle intensifying. We understand that we can learn a
lot from the Jewish struggle for land, just as we can learn from the horrors of
the genocide of the indigenous native people in America. We will continue to pur
sue our responsibility for healing within our own nation by self-criticism, prev
enting horizontal aggression, self-hate, and self-destruction. We must be able t
o reach a higher spiritual plane.
STIFF RESISTANCE
Atlanta, Georgia July, 2003
Dr. Mutulu Shakur (83205-012)
P.O. Box 474701
Des Moines, Iowa
USA 50947-0001