As a little girl from East Oakland who had never met a lawyer, I had the audacity to become one. I knew the law could be a tool for advancing justice—but now I sit reflecting on how the law has been twisted to promote injustice instead. 

While not shocked, I’m still reeling from the recent 11th Circuit Court of Appeals decision holding that the Fearless Fund Strivers Grant Contest for Black women is discriminatory. Once again, Black women are bearing the brunt of injustice through unjust application of the law.

The 11th Circuit covers Florida, Georgia, and Alabama—states with some of the largest Black populations in our country. In order to arrive at this ruling, the Court determined that the grant program violated the Civil Rights Act of 1866 (Section 1981), a Civil War-era law written to ensure that formerly enslaved Black people had the right to secure economic freedom through the ability to enter contracts. The drafters of this Act understood precisely that ending slavery alone did not guarantee any other rights or freedoms for Black people. Thus, the Civil Rights Act was one of many laws enacted during the period of Reconstruction to prevent discrimination and additional types of bondage for Black people. With this decision, the 11th Circuit is content to mock our legal system—changing the rules and shifting the goalpost to maintain the fiction of reverse discrimination. What’s more, the Court has converted a law focused on contracts into one that would now sweepingly apply to grants—prohibiting who private businesses can give funding to.

The decision to block Fearless Fund is part of a much larger, calculated effort to block considerations of race in a country that has long made and implemented race-based decisions. These decisions have permeated every level of government, and have been bolstered by private action and political resistance—often from white people who have acted against integration in a myriad of ways. Examples range from white flight into the suburbs and closing of public pools to avoid integration, to resisting efforts to make public school gifted and talented programs more equitable, to fighting affirmative action, discriminatory home appraisals, restrictive and discriminatory homeowners associations.

So many of these examples are taking place at the local or state level, and as a result are not always making national headlines, are shared as a siloed one-off, or otherwise are not connected to the vast power grabs unfolding at the same time. This means there’s a risk of missing the bigger picture of the legal and political rollback of rights and economic and other freedoms. While many—Black people in particular, who have always had to fight for their rights—recognize the precarious nature of freedom in America, what’s most alarming is that rather than ascending on a long moral arc bending toward justice, we instead are on a trajectory to descend into a black hole of legally baked-in inequality. The danger is clear: the legal and political designs of today will not only set our course for tomorrow, but for decades to come. Below are some examples that help paint the picture of how vast the actual and attempted rollback of rights has become: 

Courtroom and Legislative Weaponization

• Hello Alice, which also provided grants to Black entrepreneurs, was subject to a failed lawsuit. 
• As of May, one conservative group has filed more than 10 lawsuits targeting various organizations seeking to support racial minorities
• GOP controlled State Attorney’s General sent letters to top CEOs across the country, threatening legal action for failure to remove DEI programs, indeed having a chilling effect. 
• Through state legislative action, Florida, Alabama, and other states, have eliminated funding for DEI programs and as a result, DEI professionals have been terminated in major institutions. 
• The Georgia state legislature passed a bill significantly limiting charitable cash bail funds, meaning those who can afford to commit crimes can walk free, while the poor are incarcerated.
• In refusing to hear a first amendment right to protest case, the Supreme Court allows a 5th Circuit case (AR, LA, TX) to stand, enabling lawsuits and personal liability against protest organizers for the conduct of others otherwise unaffiliated with the organizer.

Attacks on Education and Culture

• HBCUs—which were created to provide opportunities to Black students not permitted to attend other institutions—have been targeted through the complete removal of an HBCU board in TN, to a failed state bill that would have shuttered the only public HBCUs in MS. 
• Backlash to Black bodies seated in positions of power in higher education—from Claudine Gay at Harvard to Kathleen McElroy in Texas—with allegations of “plagiarism” being the new way of targeting Black people. 
• Attacks on Nikole Hannah Jones’ 1619 Project, book bans that seek to stamp out the stories of Black, other people of color, and LGBTQ+ communities.
• The assaults on Critical Race Theory and on AP African American History, and Louisiana’s requirement that all public K-12 classrooms display the 10 Commandments, in addition to 131 scholarships being put on hold or banned in Texas. 
• Florida Governor Ron DeSantis completely zeroing out $32 million dollars for arts and culture that were approved  in the state budget, impacting cultural institutions such as museums and many others. 

Dismantling Reparations and Economic Justice

• In Tennessee, lawmakers proposed a failed bill that would prohibit elected officials from talking about reparations at all. 
• North Carolina’s anti-DEI bill is so broad that it could effectively limit attempts to discuss reparations. 
• In Illinois, a reparations program in Evanston, the first city in the country to deploy reparations to Black residents, is being sued for being “unconstitutional” and discriminating against white residents.
• In the fight for reparations by Black farmers for racial discrimination under the USDA, a judge blocked consideration of race to determine who has been discriminated against—even though there is a long history of racial discrimination by the USDA. 
• Most recently, sandwiched between the anniversary of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre and Juneteenth, the Oklahoma Supreme Court dismissed a lawsuit of the last two survivors of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre, seeking reparations. 
• Idaho, Iowa, Arkansas, and South Dakota have passed laws prohibiting guaranteed income or universal basic income programs, with Mississippi, Arizona, and West Virginia attempting to do the same. The Texas Attorney General has sued a county for such a pilot program. 

Voting Rights and Political Power

• Since the Supreme Court’s 2013 gutting of the Voting Rights Act, in Shelby County v. Holder, voting rights remain weakened. 
• In its 2023-2024 term, the Supreme Court permitted racial gerrymandering in South Carolina, accepting the argument that redistricting wasn’t based on race, but on partisanship—even though the two are often intertwined.
• In Arkansas, when a group of Black voters sued to contest a redistricting plan that diluted the power of Black voters, the 8th Circuit affirmed a lower court decision holding that private citizens don’t have a right to enforce Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, despite decades of precedent permitting precisely that. 
• The Kansas Supreme Court ruled that voting is not a fundamental right. 
• Unwarranted removals from positions, such as Governor Ron DeSantis’ removal of elected prosecutor Andrew Warren, the case to remove Fani Willis as a prosecutor on the case regarding alleged attempts to overturn the 2020 election, and use of unwarranted  “investigations” and sanctions,  including the threat against Justice Anita Earls, the only Black judge on the North Carolina Supreme Court, for commenting on the lack of diversity in the court. It was not the first time she had been threatened with an investigation. 
• Voters in almost half the country will face new voting restrictions in the upcoming general election. 

Land and Resource Access

• The Louisiana supreme court has allowed the creation of St. George, a new, white, wealthy city to form—separate from Baton Rouge—even though the lower court found that the new city would not be able to provide public services in a reasonable amount of time, while continuing to rely on the resources of the parish from which it sought secession. 
• In 2021 Los Angeles County returned land fraudulently taken from the Bruce family in 1924 to their heirs, but only 2 years later the family sold it back to LA County for nearly $20 million dollars, because the current zoning regulations would prevent them from developing it in an economically beneficial manner. 
• Home appraisers undervaluing the worth of homes owned by Black people—for no reason other than those owners being Black.

Attacks on Reproduction, Gender, Sexuality, and Family

• Since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, states have enacted laws that penalize women and doctors for abortion—with bans or severe restrictions in 21 states. In addition, services and procedures for In Vitro Fertilization have been opposed and under threat in Alabama, and through organizations of influence such as the Southern Baptist Convention.
• Louisiana has criminalized possession of abortion medication. 
• State and local governments have banned protections and care for LGBTQ+ communities, and in 2024, the ACLU has been tracking 522 anti-LGBTQ+ bills targeting health care and expression, for example.

Taken together, it is clear to see how legal, political, and social tools—at federal, state, local, and individual levels—are being used to usurp and maintain power to construct a society that would keep us in an enduring racial and economic apartheid. From economics, to our physical bodies and families, to our political spheres, the clear goal is to return to the de jure caste systems we thought we had overcome, continuing with a de facto stamp of approval. This reality is daunting and overwhelming. Yet, I know that the law, coupled with other tools, can still be used to advance justice, and that the law is for remedies.

Fighting Back with the Law

• Fearless Fund is calling for an Executive Order and Congressional action to protect the right to fund marginalized groups if and when racial disparities exist.
• ACLU, Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, NAACP LDF are at the forefront of efforts in the courts, from providing defensive legal support as well as continuing offensive legal strategies to challenge racial and other disparities.
• California, New York, New Jersey, and Chicago have seen serious calls for economic repair and remedy through reparations task forces convened to study and make recommendations, despite backlash. These task forces reflect the work of citizens and state and local governments. 
• Through state ballot measures, many voters have opted to affirmatively recognize and protect reproductive rights in state constitutions, with Ohio being the most recent.

Education, Narrative, and Storytelling

• Organizations like Working Families Party, Highlander Research and Education Center are using education, organizing, and electoral politics to change who is in the room when policy decisions are made.
• Equal Justice Initiative is telling the truth and holding up a mirror to who we are and what we have been, while others such as Demos, PolicyLink, Partnership for Southern Equity, Liberation in a Generation, BLIS, and Nonprofit Quarterly are designing and naming what we can be, using narrative to drive our lexicon and national conscious. 
• Journalists and other writers are continuing to name and uplift what is happening, as Nikole Hannah-Jones has done with her New York Times The 1619 Project and The Color-Blindness Trap, while others are providing historical and other context, as Jelani Cobb and others have done with The Riot Report. 

Philanthropic Support

• Philanthropic institutions such as The JPB Foundation, the Kataly Foundation, and others are reaffirming their commitments and resources to support the work that fosters a multi-racial democracy and economic equity. 
• Other philanthropic figures are calling philanthropy in to be responsive with funding, use power and influence in this moment.

Individual Action

• Individuals with lived experience are continuing to design models that can deliver the society we need, as we’ve been lucky to witness in Common Future’s Accelerator. 
• LaTosha Brown and Cliff Albright founded Black Voters Matter to support voter registration and other matters that bolster voting rights and civic participation
• Resha Thomas and the Texas Black Action Fund are engaging Black people around organizing and civic engagement.
• Imara Jones is telling trans stories and using journalism to bring visibility to trans communities and combat hostilities faced.
• Ashlei Spivey founded I Be Black Girl, an Omaha-based reproductive justice organization centering Black women.

Hope is the foundation upon which we use these and other tools and tap into our collective imagination and will about what can be. It is also how we hold onto the yet to be realized ideals of a multi-racial democracy, an equitable economy, and recognition of our individual and collective human dignity, even when the law and other tools, at their worst, are used to design the contours of injustice. 

In two years, when we reach the 250th anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence, it is my hope that with our collective tools, we will have moved closer to, rather than further from, securing the freedom we have been promised, that we are owed, that we deserve, and that we can have.