Two minority groups treated unfairly by the federal government finally will receive their due. Legislation approved this week provides $4.6 billion to settle claims by American Indian landowners and black farmers that they were harmed financially or lost their land as a result of long-term racial bias and mismanagement by government agencies.
Some might consider the price too high, but the settlement is just. It rights historic wrongs and it reaffirms the principle that justice prevails in the United States – even if its takes decades.
The House approved the measure to pay the landowners and farmers on Tuesday. The Senate did so earlier. The bill now goes to President Barack Obama. He should sign it promptly. It the right thing to do – and it would fulfill his campaign pledge to resolve cases involving past government discrimination against minority groups.
The issues in this instance were clear-cut. American Indians claimed that the Interior Department cheated them of royalties on oil, gas, timber and other resources for years. Black farmers said that institutional discrimination in the Agriculture Department made it impossible for them to get loans and subsidies available to other applicants. No official opposition to the claims was mounted. Given the nation’s historic mistreatment of minority groups, any argument that bias was not a common government practice would be difficult to sustain.
Indeed, there was general bipartisan support for the payments. Opposition came from some Republicans who argued that while the claims had merit, they should be offset by spending cuts elsewhere. Eventually, a compromise was reached and the cost of the payments to the landowners and farmers will be offset by diverting surplus funds from some programs, by extending some fees and by savings measures in some programs.
President Obama’s expected signature on the bill will resolve only two specific issues. Similar ones are likely to crop up. Women and Latino farmers, for example, have filed similar claims. Those, too, should be settled quickly.
Time is important. Some of the American Indian and black plaintiffs are now too hold to benefit from the payments. Others have died. The settlements, however, set an important precedent.
They are an admission that the federal government did engage in patently discriminatory practices and that those acts created significant hardship for many Americans. Approval of the payments acknowledges those errors and compensates those harmed by them.
That, by any measure, is justice.