By Terry Manning
In journalism, we are taught to avoid absolutes.
“It’s the biggest!”
“It’s the best!”
“It’s the first!”
Tallest. Oldest. Strongest. Says who?
It’s like calling our professional sports leagues’ top teams “world champion” even though no franchises from outside the United States are represented in the tournaments that produce the victors. At least the World Cup actually has teams from all over the world.
But my personal lesson in avoiding absolutes started earlier than that, sometime in ninth grade, I think. As student body president, I sometimes got to help raise and lower the flag in front of the school, and I regularly got to lead the student body in a morning recital of the Pledge of Allegiance.
One morning, I was summoned by a teacher who stood me in the hallway outside her classroom and asked me to recite the pledge in front of her. Confused, I began, “I pledge allegiance … to the flag … of the United States of America…”
She interrupted: “Start over.”
“I pledge allegiance … to the flag …”
“There it is!” She exclaimed. “‘Tooda.’”
I looked at her, not understanding.
“You pronounce ‘the’ when you say ‘of the United States’ but at the beginning you say ‘tooda flag.’ It’s not ‘tooda.’ You need to slow down and say it correctly. People will think you are uneducated if you don’t pronounce it correctly.”
I thanked her and subsequently made an effort to say, “to the flag,” but my growing problem with the pledge wasn’t pronouncing “tooda,” it was with saying “with liberty and justice for all.” Because I didn’t believe it. And I believe it less now than I did then.
When some people say “all,” it includes only themselves and people they want it to include. It doesn’t actually apply to “all” people. And even in the ninth grade, I knew that.
When I was in the library perusing old news magazines, I would become fixated on stories and photos about the Civil Rights Movement; the assassinations of President John Kennedy, his brother Robert, the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Medgar Evers; the clashes between peaceful marchers who would be attacked by police with water hoses and dogs; the torture of Emmett Till; the murders of Goodman, Cheney, and Schwerner.
How could there be “liberty and justice for all” in a country where these kinds of things were happening to Black people, or to white people who were trying to help Black people and other minorities?
“Liberty and justice for all” was a lie. But I was expected to lead others in saying it, and taking it to heart, when “all” seemed to apply more to the people who did these bad things than their victims.
The White Citizens Council supported Byron De La Beckwith Jr. after he shot 37-year-old Evers in 1963 in front of his home. It took 31 years before De La Beckwith was convicted; he died in 2001 at age 80. A warrant was issued in 1955 for Carolyn Bryant after her lies led to Till’s death, but it was never served. When it was discovered years later, the district attorney refused to honor it. Till died at 14; Carolyn Bryant Donham died in April at 88.
Also in April, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said he would consider pardoning a U.S. Army sergeant who shot a protester at a 2020 rally against police brutality. This despite the discovery of social media posts the former soldier had made promising violence against protesters.
Earlier this month a former U.S. Marine sergeant choked a homeless Black man to death on a New York subway train. The homeless man, a known Michael Jackson impersonator, yelled at subway riders, telling them he was hungry and “ready to die.” Daniel Penny put the man in a chokehold and held him until he lost consciousness and died. Days of protests occurred before Penny surrendered on charges of second-degree manslaughter.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis praised Penny’s actions, calling him a “Good Samaritan” and saying, according to the New York Post, “America’s got his back.” On a regular basis, America really does seem to “have the backs” of a certain class of people who look a certain way and do things some others wish they could do and get away with.
For some, the words “liberty and justice for all” have become part of a code where “justice” means escaping accountability for some and forcing injustice upon others in exchange.
Terry E. Manning is a Clemson graduate and worked for 20 years as a journalist. He can be reached at teemanning@gmail.com.
