Justice

Next week Thursday at 3pm, and again at 10pm, State of Opportunity's Jennifer Guerra presents a special hour-long documentary on race, education, and opportunity in Michigan.

While some might say we're "burned out" with talk about race and racism, it remains a timely topic in so many ways. Before we bring it home with Jen's doc on race and Michigan kids, just a wide-ranging look at how race appears in the media last two weeks:

Yesterday the United States Supreme Court heard oral arguments on a case involving the Indian Child Welfare Act. The law is designed to make sure Native American children in the child welfare system stay connected with their tribes.  

Why?  Because for decades, American Indian families all over the country, including in Michigan, were wrenched apart by private and state child welfare workers.

Often with little reason, these workers removed Indian children from their families and tribes and tried to assimilate them into white and usually Christian culture. As barbaric as that might sound, it is not ancient history. 

Judge Alli Greenleaf Maldonado's mother was taken away from her family after her mother, Maldonado's grandmother, died.  She could have been placed with any number of relatives," Maldonado says. "But instead, she was sent to another state to be a domestic worker for a Mennonite minister and his wife."

Maldonado's mother was only four years old when she started working as a maid. Maldonado says it was common practice for young girls to be sent to be domestic workers,  while boys were sent to be farm hands in an attempt to give the children job skills. 

It feels like  juvenile justice is getting more attention as of late, with reform efforts picking up steam.

There's the first federal case to end a school to prison pipeline in Mississippi, and a new book on the brazen corruption of judges who locked kids up in exchange for kickbacks in Pennsylvania.

The concern around kids in the justice system might turn out to be a cultural blip, in danger of being crowded out by national interest in something like gun or immigration reform.

But maybe not. The State of Opportunity team has been sending this short animation back and forth for about a week. Something about it seems to signal society might be willing to change the way we look at juvenile offenders. 

Almost 14,000 kids in Michigan have been taken out of their own homes by the state because of an abuse or neglect allegation.

Those kids then rely upon the state's Department of Human Services (DHS) to keep them safe and put them in an environment where they have a chance to thrive. Most of those kids end up in foster care.

Six years ago the state was sued by the advocacy group Children's Rights over treatment of kids in its care.

The state was back in court today to see where things stand. Everyone agrees things have gotten better since the lawsuit started six years ago, but the court appointed monitor said too many kids are still unsafe.

Today, there are two speeches on everyone's minds: the speech that President Obama delivered on the steps of the Capitol, and the famous speech Martin Luther King Jr. gave on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in 1963. 

But there is another speech I have in mind on this MLK day, and it reminds us both of King's legacy and of the work that is left to do, for President Obama, for us and for our future.