Religious leaders at several Boston churches demanded that white church communities pay $15 billion in reparations to Boston’s black residents, The Boston Globe reported March 23.
The demand was made at a press conference organized by the Boston Town Reparations Commission under the auspices of the New Democratic Coalition. Among the speakers were white and black clergymen.
Speakers called on Boston’s white churches to support reparations for the transatlantic slave trade and to financially support these efforts by investing in the development of the city’s black neighborhoods.
Edwin Sumpter, co-chair of the Boston People’s Reparations Commission, said the news conference marked the first time in the city’s history that clergy from different houses of worship came together to show support for reparations.
Church reparations are being sought because a study paid for by the church identified at least 219 people who belonged to ministers and members of church congregations in Boston for hundreds of years, The Boston Globe reported last year.
As a reminder, the City of Boston created a Reparations Task Force in 2022. The city has hired two teams of investigators to help the group prepare a reparations program.
In 2023, the city opened an exhibit in Faneuil Hall documenting Boston’s connection to slavery, which was common in parts of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
In 1780, Massachusetts adopted a state constitution that stated that “all men are born free and equal,” and slaves relied on this language to win their freedom in the courts.
Source: Rossa Primavera
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