HJ0008 102ND GENERAL ASSEMBLY

HJ0008 LRB102 03846 MST 13860 r

HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION

WHEREAS, Pent-up frustrations, including bad policing practices, a flawed justice system, unscrupulous consumer credit practices, poor or inadequate housing, high unemployment, voter suppression, and other culturally embedded forms of racial discrimination boiled over in many poor African American neighborhoods during the mid- to late-1960s, setting off riots that rampaged out of control from block to block; the burning, battering and ransacking of property and raging crowds created chaos in which some neighborhood residents and law enforcement operatives endured shockingly random injuries or deaths; and

WHEREAS, Many Americans blamed the riots on outside agitators or young Black men, who represented the largest and most visible group of rioters; however, the Kerner Commission turned those assumptions upside-down in March of 1968, declaring it was white racism, not Black anger, that turned the key that unlocked urban American turmoil; and

WHEREAS, As a result, The National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders, known as the Kerner Commission after its chair, then-Governor Otto Kerner Jr. of Illinois, was formed; it was an 11-member Presidential Commission established by President Lyndon B. Johnson in Executive Order 11365 to investigate the causes of the 1967 race riots in the United States and to provide recommendations for the future; and

WHEREAS, The Kerner Commission found that poverty and institutional racism were driving inner city violence and proposed aggressive government spending to provide equal opportunities to African Americans; the report was rushed into print by Bantam Books, and the 708-page report became a best-seller, selling 740,000 copies in a few weeks; and

WHEREAS, To mark the 30th anniversary of the Kerner Report, the Eisenhower Foundation in 1998 sponsored two complementary reports, The Millennium Breach and Locked in the Poorhouse; The Millennium Breach, coauthored by former senator and commission member Fred R. Harris, found the racial divide had grown in the subsequent years with inner city unemployment at crisis levels; The Millennium Breach found that for most of the decade that followed the Kerner Report, the U.S. made progress on the principal fronts detailed in the report, which were race, poverty, and inner cities; then progress stopped and in some ways reversed, due to a series of economic shocks and trends and the government's own action and inaction; and

WHEREAS, African American poverty remains a critical issue today; in 1969, about one-third of Blacks lived below the poverty line; by 2016, that number had dropped to 22 percent as a significant number of African Americans moved into the middle class with a boost from 1960s legislation; however, the percentage of Blacks living in poverty is still more than twice as high as the percentage of whites; a lack of opportunity has been shown to increase drug abuse, unemployment, poverty, violence, and other negative factors within a community; and

WHEREAS, Blacks now have a louder voice in government, yet poverty and disenfranchisement remain; notwithstanding the Kerner Commission's optimism about potential change, there have been only scattered efforts over the last 50 years to end the United States' racial divide or to address the racial component of poverty in the U.S.; and

WHEREAS, Now more than ever, it is obvious that we need to rebuild these economies in urban areas which have been fostered by racial discrimination; to accomplish this, we can replicate a successful rebuilding plan from our country's history; and

WHEREAS, In the wake of World War II, Secretary of State George C. Marshall proposed a comprehensive plan to rebuild the economies and spirits of Western Europe in 1947; as part of this plan, the U.S. gave $13 billion in aid to 16 European nations; this aid included shipping food, staples, fuel, and machinery, rebuilding war-devastated regions, removing trade barriers, and investing in an industrial capacity; and

WHEREAS, Due to what became known as the Marshall Plan, European economies experienced unprecedented growth from 1948 to 1952, postwar poverty and starvation disappeared, and standards of living increased remarkably; and

WHEREAS, Former National Urban League President John Jacobs often spoke of the need for a new domestic Marshall Plan, championing the idea that we could rebuild urban areas in the U.S. the same way we rebuilt entire nations abroad; and

WHEREAS, African Americans in the City of Chicago are disproportionately affected by both the violence and the poverty in the city, particularly on the West and South sides; African Americans make up approximately a third of the city's population; despite this, they have consistently accounted for more than 70 percent of homicide victims for decades; due to pre-existing inequalities such as segregation, financial disparities, lack of access to a good education, lost wages, lost homes, lost inheritances, lack of access to testing and treatment, and other issues, the current COVID-19 pandemic has disproportionately hurt African Americans, especially in Chicago; and

WHEREAS, Across the nation and in our State, a comprehensive and targeted economic recovery plan is necessary to revitalize and to help elevate the African American population; this new plan must provide federal, state, local tax credits, and other enhancements to encourage businesses to relocate to these struggling communities in order to foster economic vitality; therefore, be it

RESOLVED, BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE ONE HUNDRED SECOND GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, THE SENATE CONCURRING HEREIN, that we urge the Illinois General Assembly and the United States Congress to explore a new, domestic investment plan to promote economic growth and recovery in targeted African American communities; and be it further

RESOLVED, That suitable copies of this resolution be sent to the Mayor of Chicago, the President of the Cook County Board, all members of the Chicago City Council, the Governor of Illinois, all members of the Illinois General Assembly, the President of the United States, the U.S. Senate Majority Leader, the U.S. Senate Minority Leader, the U.S. Speaker of the House, the U.S. House of Representatives Minority Leader, and all members of the Illinois Congressional Delegation.