You Should Never Adjust To Oppression, Rev. Jesse Jackson Advocated In Milwaukee

Reverend Jesse Jackson called on people at Dontre Hamilton's rally for justice and not to adjust to the status quo of injustice.

By H. Nelson Goodson

January 2, 2014

Milwaukee, WI - On Friday, Reverend Jesse Jackson joined the Justice for Dontre Hamilton rally and march at the Federal Courthouse in Milwaukee and spoke how segregated the City of Milwaukee has become today. In a brief press conference outside the Federal Courthouse, he told the crowd that he is pushing for a federal investigation into the alleged discriminatory "practice and pattern" of injustice by the Milwaukee Police Department. He advised the diverse crowd, to never to adjust to the status quo institutionalized injustice system and to fight for equality and justice for those oppressed in Milwaukee. Jackson said, "One thing worse than oppression, is to adjust to it. You must never adjust. You must never explain to yourself, why it's alright, because it's all wrong."

Rev. Jackson had close-door meetings with Mayor Tom Barrett earlier to discuss poverty and unemployment in the Afro-American community. He alos talked to U.S. Attorney James Santelle in Milwaukee about an investigation into Dontre Hamilton's homicide by former Milwaukee Police Officer Christopher Manney. Jackson referred to Manney as mentally unstable. "If you assume the worst scenario, that he was challenged, the police, if you're trying to deter him from being challenged, you shoot him once, maybe twice. To shoot someone 14 times is illegal, immortal and mentally unstable," Jackson said, referring to Manney.

Rev. Jackson also spoke about the poverty stricken Afro-American community and the lack of Governor Scott Walker (R) and the Republican controlled legislature of not reinvesting millions of the excess pension fund back into the community. He criticized the City of Milwaukee of not reinvesting back into the Back community and allowing hundreds of vacant homes to proliferate in poverty stricken neighborhoods.

Jackson focused on Milwaukee's high incarceration rate of Afro-Americans compared to Whites. Milwaukee has the second highest Black poverty rate in the nation and the gap between White students who have scored higher than Blacks because of the lack of support for equal education and funding of schools compared to suburban school districts. 

Jackson before ending his address at the courthouse said, "They killed Emmett Till, but not his dreams. They killed Medgar Evers, but not his dreams. They killed Trayvon Martin, but he still lives. They killed Dontre, but Dontre still lives. There's power in the blood on innocents," Jackson told the diverse crowd that had gathered at the Federal Courthouse.

After Jackson spoke, he led a march back to Arrow Park through Wisconsin Ave. and N. Water St.

William Muhammad in a released statement from Minister Louis Farrakhan said during the Dontre Hamilton press conference at the Federal Courthouse, " The cry for justice is a natural cry from the human being when he or she feels they have been treated unfairly.  The cry for justice from a wife to a husband or the husband to the wife, children to their parents; it escalates where ever there is authority, where we exercise it unfairly or improperly then the cry will come up from those ill-affected for justice."
"The longer justice is denied the more intense will be the cry.  The cry of the pain of our people has not been heard by the institutions set up to adjudicate our grievances.  The amendments to the Constitution, the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments, give us certain guarantees and rights.  Yet, we cry for justice because no amendment in our favor has actually been enforced.

"So, the cry is not local with local demonstrations for justice.  The pain is national and global and the forces of evil are not willing to change while the ball is yet in their court to give justice, simple justice to those who cry out.
"The anger that is in the breast of the people will continue and as the pain continues to intensify, if our cry for justice is not heard soon, these demonstrations in over 190 cities across the country will produce a tsunami the results of which will bring about total chaos and destruction on all sides."