Message from President Barbara R. Snyder and Provost Ben Vinson III
To Our Faculty, Staff and Students:
Six years later, the words are the same.
I can鈥檛 breathe.
After all of the mourning and protests, the lawsuits and training, the promises made and lessons learned, nothing, it seems, has changed.
Lying on a Staten Island sidewalk in the summer of 2014, Eric Garner said 鈥淚 can鈥檛 breathe鈥 nearly a dozen times as a police officer鈥檚 arm stayed tight around his throat.
Last Monday in Minneapolis, George Floyd repeated the same phrase鈥攊n his case, with an officer鈥檚 knee pressing into his neck.
The local protests that followed have spread across the country, reaching Cleveland on Saturday. Ours opened peacefully, but devolved soon after marchers reached the Justice Center a few blocks away. Protesters pitched water bottles and spray-painted walls, officers released tear gas canisters, and before long, police cars were engulfed in flames.
Today protests continued in communities nationwide鈥攁nd even extended to London and Berlin. In Cleveland, meanwhile, officials announced a noon curfew for downtown to allow time for clean-up of streets and stores.
But what about the systemic racism cited so often in recent days? How can a city, a country, 鈥渃lean up鈥 that?
We cannot鈥攕hould not鈥攅ver try to wipe away the past.
We need to know it. Own it. And commit to forging a better future.
Four months after Eric Garner died in 2014, Tamir Rice was shot and killed by police while playing with a toy gun outside a Cleveland recreation center.
He was 12 years old.
The following year, the city accepted a 110-page with the U.S. Department of Justice. The document required sweeping reforms to address the department鈥檚 record of excessive force and urgent need to restore community trust.
The monitoring team鈥檚 , issued in September, found force incidents fell by nearly a third compared to 2017.
That team, including deputy monitor Ayesha Bell Hardaway of our law school, still found shortcomings, in particular in terms of resources for training and data systems. Nevertheless, the group concluded the department had made 鈥渟ubstantial progress.鈥
While the medical examiner ruled Garner鈥檚 death a homicide, the officer who choked him never faced charges. Nor did the one who killed Tamir. On Friday, Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was arrested and charged with third-degree murder. He appears in court tomorrow.
Small steps, true. But in a moment of so much anger鈥 and pain鈥 and sorrow, they matter.
In the often-quoted words of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. 鈥溾he arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.鈥
As an institution of higher learning, we have a profound responsibility to the future. When it comes to this moment, how can we best begin to fulfill it?
This week, we will provide opportunities to engage, and share resources for those who would like support. Tonight, though, we want to remind you of a part of our legacy: The first Commencement address Frederick Douglass ever gave came at Western Reserve College in 1854.
鈥淭he relation subsisting between the white and black people of this country is the vital question of the age,鈥 he told some 3,000 in attendance. 鈥淚n the solution of this question, the scholars of America will have to take an important鈥 part.鈥
Barbara R. Snyder
President
Ben Vinson III
Provost and Executive Vice President