This article is part of a partnership between The Jersey Bee andNext Cityexploring segregation in Essex County, New Jersey, and the solutions to building a more just and equitable county and state.
Shortly after the Ku Klux Klan marched through Newark, New Jersey, in the 1920s, large areas of the city and surrounding communities were redlined by the federal government as investment risks because Black people lived there. The discriminatory practice of redlining locked generations of Black families out of equitable access to jobs, housing, schools, and other wealth-building resources.
Redlining built on the legacy of slavery and has since evolved into modern-day segregation, where racially diverse and low-income communities continue to have limited access to economic and public health opportunities.
READ: In Essex County, New Jersey’s history of segregation persists
Nearly 60 years after the formal end of federal redlining and the passage of the Civil Rights Act, Black and Latinx households in Essex County are half as likely to own a home than white households and three times more likely to live in poverty than white residents.
After years of failed reparations bills, a self-organized group of advocates and experts is studying the harms of slavery and racial segregation in the former “slave state of the North.”
Convened by the New Jersey Institute for Social Justice (NJISJ), a nonprofit advocacy organization, the New Jersey Reparations Council came together on Juneteenth 2023 to launch its two-year study.
NJISJ has been a leading advocate for establishing a Reparations Task Force in the New Jersey legislature since 2019 and launched a public education campaign on reparations called “Say the Word” in 2021.
NJISJ’s 47-member Council includes nine committees focused on issues like the history of slavery, structural racism in the economy, and current-day segregation in New Jersey.
Key questions for the council include who would be eligible for reparations, how they would be funded, and how to translate the Council’s research into state law.
Jean-Pierre Brutus, senior counsel at NJISJ, said the group is exploring these questions with an “abundance mindset.”
“It’s not a question of limited resources. We need to be transformative in the way we approach this,” said Brutus. “We’re thinking about the harms of slavery, and not just harm [of] slavery, but its aftermath, which are ongoing and affect all Black people.”
The Council will release its final recommendation report on Juneteenth 2025. The Jersey Bee produced this article to help residents understand the history and questions shaping reparations in New Jersey.
A group of Klu Klux Klan members marched through Newark, N.J., in the mid-1920s. Archive photo courtesy of the Montclair History Center via the Newark Public Library. Original by Harry C. Dorer.
New Jersey’s history of reparations spans at least twenty years
The creation of the New Jersey Reparations Council comes after nearly two decades of failed reparations bills.
Most recently, New Jersey Black Caucus members tried to introduce a Reparations Task Force bill in 2019 and again in 2022, even securing resolution support from Essex County, Newark, Orange, and 15 other municipalities. Neither of these bills made it to the floor for a full vote.
Before the 2019 task force bill, former Essex County Assemblyman Craig Stanley tried to introduce a Reconciliation Commission act as far back as 2005. The bill would have established a commission to examine past and current conditions facing Black Americans and make recommendations to achieve reconciliation and justice. It also did not reach the full assembly for a vote.
Senator Britnee Timberlake, a co-sponsor of the Reparations Task Force bill, said it may be time to consider alternative means to study reparations. She said misconceptions about reparations and pushback on the term itself made it difficult for her and her colleagues to move the bill forward.
“There was a lot of inflammatory assumptions that occurred, which really slowed the progress down,” said Timberlake, who represents New Jersey’s 34th District in the State Senate.
She thinks that “outsourcing” the work of studying reparations to universities or community groups would help remove some political bureaucracy, adding it would free up time for lawmakers to focus on building important allies within the legislature.
“Let’s use our energy capital for actual reparations,” said Timberlake.
Early findings from the New Jersey Reparations Council
On Juneteenth 2024, one year after the Council’s launch, members from the New Jersey Reparations Council shared their initial findings in Newark about the impact of slavery.
Leslie Alexander, a history professor at Rutgers University and member of the historical committee, said that her committee’s first task was helping people understand that slavery existed in the state. New Jersey was the last Northern state to abolish slavery in 1866, months after the United States abolished slavery in 1865.
“The very founding of the colony was predicated on the enslavement of African people,” said Alexander. She added that understanding the “marriage of white supremacy and capitalism” is key to understanding slavery’s legacy and segregation today.
“The reality is that wealth in this country is based on the enslavement of African people. That’s the bottom line,” said Alexander.
Dr. Denise V. Rodgers, Vice Chancellor at Rutgers Biomedical & Health Sciences and member of the health equity committee, highlighted the state’s high Black infant mortality rate. In New Jersey, Black babies are 3.5x more likely to die than white babies.
While the state has made progress on Black health disparities, Rodgers says, it was only in recent years that advocates have drawn a clear throughline between a person’s health and racism.
“It is very clear that the more resources you have the longer you live and the better, the higher quality of your life,” she said.
Alexis Karteron, professor at NYU School of Law and member of the public safety and justice committee, said that she has been looking at how slavery has shaped today’s criminal justice system, including carceral practices beyond incarceration.
“We also need to talk more about other forms of carceral control, things like probation and parole that continue to have a stranglehold on people’s lives long after they are released from jail and prison,” said Karteron.
Other members shared updates from their committees, including research on the role of institutional religion in slavery and the limitations of the Mount Laurel doctrine on addressing racial segregation.
The Council is organized into nine committees focused on different topics: history of slavery, public narrative and memory, economic justice, segregation, democracy, public safety and justice, health equity, environmental justice, and faith and Black resistance.
What’s next
Over the next few months, the New Jersey Reparations Council will host a series of public comment sessions where the public can share live comments during the virtual meetings.
- Democracy – September 9, 2024 at 6:30 p.m.
- Environmental Justice – October 7, 2024 at 6:30 p.m.
- Public Education and Narrative – November 6, 2024 at 6:30 p.m.
- Economic Justice – December 12, 2024 at 6:30 p.m.
VISIT: Follow the Council’s website for updates on the events and ways to participate
The Council says the public sessions will help inform the recommendations they release in 2025, including reparations eligibility and what reparations could look like. Here are some of the questions being considered.
Who would be eligible for reparations?
The Council takes a position that all Black people in New Jersey should be eligible for reparations, Brutus said. This would include descendants of enslaved people along with Black immigrants who are subjected to ongoing structural racism and segregation.
“Regardless of where you come from as a Black person, if you are living in New Jersey as a Black person, you’re subjected to those harms.”
This approach hasn’t come without criticism. During the Council’s prior public sessions, several attendees raised concerns that any reparations for Black people must be lineage-based, meaning only descendants of enslaved people should be eligible.
Brutus noted the challenges of limiting reparations to descendants of enslaved people, such as the difficulties of tracing ancestry, and called on the community to help the Council think of reparations expansively.
What could reparations include?
“Any kind of reparations program or proposal or policy recommendation that we’re coming up with is going to be commensurate proportional to the harms,” said Brutus.
Brutus shared that reparations could include financial compensation for Black residents in New Jersey along with other forms of reparation, such as reparative policies and programs.
Sharif Braxton, community officer of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation which funds the Council’s efforts, agrees. He said while cash reimbursem*nts are one way people can receive reparations for economic exclusion, people harmed by systems are excluded from society in other ways, like access to housing, safe and affordable food, and quality education.
Senator Timberlake said this could look like reparations programs, such as down payment assistance to purchase homes or small business grants. “There’s a lot of different ways that reparations could be rolled out,” she said.
How will the Council translate its recommendations into state law?
Since the Council was formed without any formal legislation, there is no legal mandate for New Jersey to consider the Council’s recommendation.
Braxton of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation said that legislative commitment and buy-in will be key to implementing reparations in the future.
“[There] needs to be some commitment in doing some form of repair,” said Braxton.
While Brutus said finding legislative partners is on the Council’s radar, he doesn’t want people to think the Council isn’t already doing this. He said the Council has been working wih Assemblywoman Shavonda Sumter, who represents New Jersey’s 35th District in the State Assembly and co-sponsor of the Reparations Task Force bill.
“The work of the council doesn’t end with the report, right?” said Brutus.
Lessons from other states
New Jersey is not the first state to attempt to offer reparations, something Brutus hopes will work to the Council’s benefit.
“We’re always trying to learn best practices from other places and states,” said Brutus.
In July 2024, California allocated $12 million out of its $297.8 billion state budget to roll out a reparations program. It doesn’t include funds for direct cash payments but instead focuses on building the infrastructure to administer reparations.
Evanston, Illinois became the first city to offer Black Americans for past housing discrimination in 2021, but it hasn’t come without legal challenges. In May 2024, a conservative nonprofit Judicial Watch filed a civil lawsuit against the city, claiming the program is unconstitutional. Prism reported that supporters of the program say the lawsuit is an attempt to undermine the purpose of reparations: addressing past harms against Black people.
New York and Chicago also launched city- or state-backed reparations task forces in 2024.
Brutus says the Council is also exploring other models to sustain the work after the final report in 2025. Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, a prominent public health funder based in New Jersey, has supported the Council’s efforts to explore reparations in the state and has spent millions to redefine reparations across the country in the last few years.
He encouraged the public to think of reparations as an ongoing practice.
“[Reparations] is a process, a process to get to the end goal of racial justice, of freedom for Black people, and thus freedom for all people.”
Learn more
If you’d like to submit public comments for a specific public session, you must register at least 24 hours before the meeting. Learn more about how to make a public comment and the Council’s upcoming programs on their website.
You can also view the full recording of the Council’s Year One Update on Juneteenth 2024 on NJ Spotlight News.
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