![]() He's eclipsed by a large statue of slave-owner Thomas Jefferson, head high. In the grand gallery, there's only one image of a black man: a tiny bust of Martin Luther King looking downward. Everyone is white except three Native Americans fighting each other. Then he realizes that the impressive piece of government-funded art celebrating two centuries of American history has no black people on it. Robinson stands among tourists looking in awe at the gigantic U.S. The Debt opens in Washington D.C.'s famous Capitol building. Racist ideas sank deep into laws, attitudes, and assumptions. When slavery was finally outlawed, the discrimination continued. These stolen men and women received no rights and no money and they could not leave. He wants to make the American dream possible for everyone, not just those with a long-standing historical advantage.įor 264 years, American men of European ancestry traveled to Africa, stole Africans, and brought them back to America to work until they died. Randall Robinson's book of nonfiction, The Debt: What America Owes to Blacks (Dutton, 2000), is about remembering. ![]() ![]() ![]() Infoplease Staff Robinson's new book asks "What is Owed to Blacks?" by Jace Clayton ![]()
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