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First US Truth Commission

Ron Chepesiuk
ON November 3. 1979, in ■Greensboro. North Carolina, members of the Ku Klux Klan and the American Nazi Party attacked a protest march led by communist labour activists who were trying to unionize black workers. In just 88 seconds, five of the workers were gunned down, and ten others wounded. The dead included three white men, one African-American woman, and a young man who had fled Cuba when hewasachild.
More than 25 years later, an independent commission called the Greensboro Truth and Reconciliation Commission (GTRC) has been organized to determine the truth, causes and consequences of what has been dubbed the "Greensboro Massacre." The GTRC is believed to be the first truth commission in the US and the first of its kind worldwide.
"What'shappeninginGreensboro is an innovative approach to setting up a truth commission," said Lisa Magarell, a senior associate with die international Center for TYansna-tional Jurisprudence (ITCJ) in New York City. “Unlike the truth commissions in Bosnia, Peru, and South Africa and other countries, the GTRC is focused on just one event It's also a grassroots effort, meaning that the GTRC hasn't been created by a government." Established in 2001, the ICl'J has assisted in setting up truth commissions in I2countries and helped the GTRC develop its actionplan.
The GTRC's seven members were chosen through a public selection process, and they were sworn inat a formal ceremony held at the refurbished Southern Railway
Depot In downtown Greensboro on June 12, 2004. The commissioners then spent the next six months hiring staff, finding workspace, and lookingforfinancialsupport.
The commission hired an executive director, research director, and communications director, and has the help of an intern and volunteers. By December 200-1, they had raised more than $230,000 from private foundations and residents of Greensboro and surrounding communities.
"We've really just begun the process," said Cynthia Brown, the
GTRC's co-chair. "We have been developing die infrastructure for a project that will be both complex and challenging to complete. We have until March 2006 to complete our work." Brown is a grassroots organizer and leader, former Durham, North Carolina city councilwoman and a 2002 candidate for the US Senate.
The genesis for the truth commission came from a meeting held in 1999 to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Greensboro Massacre. "Attendees were very conscious of the fact that the event had remained unresolved and that a lot of pain and hurt still existed," Wesley recalled. "The South African TYuth Commission was in die news, and they were conscious of how
hard South Africa was working to unchain itself from its past and move forward in the spirit of opennessand forgiveness."
Representatives from more than a dozen community groups, including the local Democratic and Republican parties, helped impanel the commission. In the view of some Greensboro community leaders, however, the project is unnecessary, and they fear that it will bring negative publicity to a community that's working hard to promote itself as a progressive southern city. The Business Journal.
V
which is distributed in the Greensboro area, noted that the local business community was Invited to participate in the process of nominating commission members, but chose to stay away. David Jameson, president of the Greensboro Chamber of Commerce, told the Business Journal: "It just didn't seem like (the G TRC) had a business perspective, and we just need to stay focused on what we're doing."
GTRC officials believe that the Greensboro business community is missing a golden opportunity to heal the divisive wounds of its past and to show that the city is as progressive as it claims to be. "They (the business community) are really missing a chance to build healthier
relations within its community and with the outside world," said Joya Wesley, the GTRC's communications director.
"Helping to build a community that's at peace with itself is the best way to attract business."
But the GTRC knows that its biggest challenge in malting its mission a success is to convince all groups that its process will be fair and impartial. So to guide its operations it has developed a set of protocols that they hope will reassure the public as well as potential participants that the
commission's work is independent and transparent.
One of the commission's guiding principles states: "We commit ourselves to the restorative justice, freed from the need to exact revenge or to make recriminations. The work that we do, and the report we will conditionally issue will be inspired by the belief that divisions can be bridged, trust restored and hope rekindled."
Achieving that will be a challenge, given the bitter legacy of the Greensboro Massacre. As Wesley noted, "No one has ever been convicted of the killings, even though there were plenty of eyewitnesses." Several newspaper reporters were on the scene, and cameramen from four local
television stations filmed the event.
TWice, all white jurors acquitted the suspects in federal and state criminal trials. Eventually, five of the attackers and two police officers were found liable in a civil case, and the Greensboro city government paid the victims and family members5350,000.
"The way the Greensboro incident was handled judicially created a lot of distrust of the system." Magarell said. "After all. the (American) system is suppose to protect everyone's rights, even communists."
In the project's preliminary stage, the commission learned some important lessons that it believes will help it fulfill its mandate. "There are many perspectives within the Greensboro community, and differing perspectives even exist within the Greensboro community on what really happened on November 3, 1979," Brown explained. "Manymythsnowcloud the incident, and they continue to affect the quality of life in Greensboro. We will have to take note of those perspectives and myths as we move ahead with our investigation."
In its research, the commission is gathering and analyzing a variety of documentation, including court records, newspaper articles, and police reports. Last January, it began
taking testimonial statements from individuals directly or indirectly involved with the Greensboro Massacre. ,
By March 2006, the commission expects to release a report Identifying steps that the local community can take to help heal the wounds caused by tile Greensboro Massacre. "The (Greensboro) community is ultimately responsible for bringing about reconciliation, and. hopefully, we will make recommendations that can bring that about,* Brown said. "By keeping the process as open and transparent as possible, we hope to talk to family members 'and their families and to communists, too." .
Activists in a number of other cities are following the Greensboro experiment closely. For instance, members of some Philadelphia. Pennsylvania, area religious communities told the Philadelphia Inquirer newspaper In June 200-1 that a similar commission could perhaps help the city of Brotherly Love come to terms with the 1986 bombing of MOVE headquarters by the city authorities. MOVE was a group of African-American radicals who believed uncompromisinglyIn black self-determination and self-defense and had a long-running dispute with the Philadelphia establishment. The attack sparked a raging fire, killed 11 ' people (five of them children), and destroyed60houses. 1
"I think there is much to be healed here in Philadelphia," Jdhn Meyer, a Quaker and Pliiladelphla religious leader, told the I>hiJadcl- . phia Inquirer. "We will be watching with interest and concern." 1
Ron Choposiuk. a South Carolina baled journalist, is Visiting Professor of Journalism at Chittagong University and Rosoareh Associate with the National Defense Cotlegofn Dhako.