Description
Convinced that what is needed in America is a serious, open, civil dialogue on racial, ethnic, and religious prejudice, William S. Cohen and Janet Langhart Cohen brought together an august and varied group of individuals in July 2008. Meeting in Washington, D.C., the participants, including Douglas Blackmon, Deepak Chopra, Sam Donaldson, Louis Gossett, Jr., and the Honorable John Lewis, came together to further a national conversation about the need for truth, tolerance, and reconciliation and what we can do to help all of our citizens to achieve their dreams in this land of great promise.
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Race and racism have played a divisive and defining role throughout much of America's history. Slavery, Jim Crow laws, segregation, and Ku Klux Klan terrorism have inflicted deep psychic wounds, social disparities, and economic disadvantages that have diminished the promise of equal rights and opportunities for all. While much progress in race relations has been made in recent years_including the election of Barack Obama as President of the United State_it's clear that our journey to a post-racial era is far from complete. In virtually every measurable category, whether income levels, job opportunities, access to health care, life expectancy, high school diplomas, incarceration rates, do not fare well compared to their white counterparts. The dialogue entitled Race and Reconciliation in America was convened to provide a forum for a long overdue, open, honest, and constructive discussion among people of good will about the need for the American people to truly grasp the depth of past misdeeds, why the legacies of past oppression persist, and how we can achieve a more fair and just society embodied in the American Dream.
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