Page 8 The Skanner March 15, 2017
News
By Stacy M. Brown
(NNPA Newswire
Contributor)
P
ete Taney knew this
day would come.
“I’ve been looking
over my shoulders
all of my life, so this is
no surprise,” said Taney,
the lead vocalist, banjo,
fiddle and harmonica
player for the popular
Stroudsburg band, “The
Juggernaut String Band.”
Taney is talking about
a published report out of
the nation’s capital that
detailed recent meet-
ings between his family
members, descendants
of one-time slave own-
ers, and descendants of
Dred Scott, a slave who
in 1857 unsuccessfully
filed a suit arguing that
he and his family should
be given their freedom,
because they had lived in
Illinois and other places
where slavery was con-
sidered illegal.
Charlie Taney, Pete’s
brother, was outside the
Maryland State House
this week and read some
of the words that his
great-great-grand uncle,
Chief Justice Roger B.
Taney, wrote in the U.S.
Supreme Court’s Dred
DAVID SCHULTZ/MISSOURI HISTORICAL SOCIETY/WIKIPEDIA COMMONS
The Descendants of Dred Scott and Chief Justice Roger B. Taney Meet
Dred Scott, oil on canvas by Louis Schultze, 1888.
Scott decision 160 years
ago:
“Black people cannot
be U.S. citizens and have
no rights except the ones
that White people give
them. Whites are supe-
rior to Blacks. Slavery is
legal.”
Charlie Taney told the
reporters that, “You can’t
hide from the words that
[Roger B.] Taney wrote,”
as he stood a few feet
from a statue of his an-
cestor. Roger B. Taney
lived in Maryland and
was the chief justice
of the nation’s highest
court from 1836 until his
death in 1864. “You can’t
run, you can’t hide, you
can’t look away,” Charlie
Taney said. “You have to
face them.”
For Pete Taney, his
brother’s words resonat-
ed—and it brought back
so many memories.
“It wasn’t something
that we didn’t talk about,”
Pete Taney said on Tues-
day. “It was discussed at
family dinners all of the
time, our history. I’m just
so proud of my brother
and my niece to be able
to stand up [publicly] and
do this and take responsi-
bility. I completely agree
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with them.”
During the event in
Maryland earlier this
week, Charlie Taney
“
Pete Taney said.
Their appearance this
week in Annapolis was
part of an ongoing recon-
ciliation process, and a
push by the descendants
of both families to add a
statue of Scott near the
statue of the late Justice
Taney, which activists
have sought to remove
for years.
While Charlie Taney
said the meeting and the
statue presents oppor-
tunities to learn and a
chance to come together
and chance to heal a na-
tion—and not to bury the
past, Pete Taney said he
wholly supports a statue
of Scott.
“I believe adding a stat-
ue of Dred Scott would
create the kind of dia-
There is no similar bill
this year, and some of the
activists who in the past
have called for the stat-
ue’s removal now appear
to agree with the Taney
and Scott descendants
that placing the statue
in a more complete his-
torical context would be
preferable.
Charlie Taney, an ad-
vertising executive who
lives in Connecticut,
called his great-great-
grand-uncle a “compli-
cated man,” but also read-
ily acknowledged that he
was a “stone racist.”
It was Charles Taney’s
daughter, Kate Billings-
ley, who wrote “A Man of
His Time,” a one-act fic-
tional play about a Taney
descendant meeting a
Jackson accepted the apology from her family
and ‘all African-Americans who have the love
of God in their heart so that healing can begin’
turned to Lynne M.
Jackson, the great-great
granddaughter of Scott,
and apologized—on be-
half of his family, to the
Scott family and to all Af-
rican-Americans, for the
“terrible injustice of the
Dred Scott decision.”
Jackson accepted the
apology from her family
and “all African-Ameri-
cans who have the love of
God in their heart so that
healing can begin.”
Taney asked for a hug,
and the two embraced.
Pete Taney said he had
been there when the
groundwork was first set
for such a meeting.
There was a workshop
for a one-act play and
a taping for a National
Public Radio appearance.
“I got to meet Dred
Scott’s descendants and
it was very emotional,
but very wonderful,”
logue that needs to be
discussed openly in this
country,” Pete Taney
said. “Much of the stain
on my family’s history
needs to be discussed.”
Jackson, a former law
firm manager from Mis-
souri and the founder of
the Dred Scott Heritage
Foundation, told report-
ers at the gathering that
her family also believes
that having the statue
of the pro-slavery chief
justice, along with one
of Scott and historical
information about the
court decision, would be
a “learning experience
and an educational op-
portunity.”
“Add to it, don’t take
from it,” Jackson said.
Reportedly, a proposal
in the Maryland legisla-
ture to remove the Taney
statue died in commit-
tee last year, however.
Scott descendant. The
play, produced in New
York last year, brought
real descendants of each
family together for the
first time.
“A Taney bringing an
apology to a Scott is like
‘bringing a band aid to
an amputation,’” Charlie
Taney quoted his daugh-
ter as saying on Monday,
underscoring what the
family says is need for
additional dialogue and
continued healing.
“An apology is not
enough,” he said. “But it
is necessary.”
Pete Taney agreed.
“We’ve got to do out-
reach. This country and
its leaders are not doing
it but we can,” Pete Taney
said. “I’m so proud of my
brother and my niece.
Our family needs to keep
having these important
discussions.”
Oregon Mulls Joining National
Popular Vote Movement
National Popular Vote compact has gained
momentum since Trump’s Electoral College Victory
By KRISTENA HANSEN
Associated Press
SALEM, Ore. — Oregon legislators
are considering a proposal to elect the
president of the United States by popu-
lar vote for the fourth time in the last
eight years.
“
quire Electoral College delegates to
cast ballots for the national winner of
the popular vote. It’s triggered when
enacted by states with at least 270 com-
bined electoral votes, the magic num-
ber needed to clinch the presidency.
The compact is already 61 percent of
the way toward meeting its goal, with
When your vote counts for less than votes in
other states or when your state isn’t consid-
ered a swing state ... it’s hard to be motivated
Oregon is among several states in-
cluding Connecticut and Colorado cur-
rently attempting to join the so-called
National Popular Vote compact, which
has gained momentum after Donald
Trump’s Electoral College victory in
November.
The interstate agreement would re-
165 electoral votes from the 11 states
that have signed on so far.
Although Oregon has just seven elec-
tors, it’s one of a dozen states where the
compact has been approved by one of
their two statehouse chambers. Ore-
See VOTES on page 11
