When Black land rights activists were offered a 150-acre (60-hectare) plot in Amelia County, Virginia, they saw it as an opportunity toward righting a historical wrong.
Black Americans lost 90% of their lands across the United States during the 20th century, government figures show, because of factors such as predatory developers and a lack of access to the legal system and expert advice.
Now, an alliance of Black farmers and civil society groups wants to get an equal amount of property back.
“We were stripped of that land,” said Kenya Crumel, a director at the National Black Food & Justice Alliance (NBFJA), which includes nearly 50 Black-led organizations.
“Land is freedom. Historically in this country, so many policies were connected to land ownership—you couldn’t vote if you didn’t have land,” Crumel told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
— source news.trust.org | Carey L. Biron | 17 Jun 2022