DOJ Announces Tulsa Race Massacre Review

Welp, it only took 103 years and roughly four months, but the Department of Justice announced Tuesday that it will launch a federal review of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre.

According to ABC News, the federal Civil Rights Division’s Cold Case Unit is conducting a full review of the massacre, in which a white mob attacked, lynched and destroyed an entire affluent Black town in Oklahoma — leveling more than 1,000 homes and businesses and killing hundreds of Black residents — all because a single Black man was accused of raping a single white woman.

Kristen Clarke, the assistant attorney general for civil rights who announced the review in a statement Monday, referred to the massacre as “one of the deadliest episodes of mass racial violence in this nation’s history.”

So — not to be a Debbie Downer here — but one can’t help but wonder what’s even the point of all this. After all, the announcement of the review comes months after the Oklahoma Supreme Court told the last survivors of the massacre — Lessie Benningfield Randle, 109, and Viola Ford Fletcher, 110 — and their families in June and July that they are not owed reparations for the massacre that they experienced firsthand. Considering this, and the fact that there are no living perpetrators of the atrocity to hold accountable, it’s arguable that this review is kind of performative. 

In fact, the review is being conducted under the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act, which brings to mind the fact that recent investigations into the brutal, evil and egregiously racist torture and killing of Emmett Till have also been conducted by law enforcement officials in Mississippi, and those investigations resulted in absolutely zero being done to hold anyone accountable.

Still, Damario Solomon-Simmons, the lead attorney representing the survivors of the massacre, celebrated the decision in a press conference Monday.

“I’m so excited to announce that this morning, Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights, Kristen Clarke announced that the United States Federal Government Department of Justice will open a review and evaluation of the 1921 Tulsa race massacre,” Solomon-Simmons said. “It is about time! It only took 103 years.”

Solomon-Simmons did address the issue of reparations, saying, “This community would never stop fighting for reparations. This community would never forget what happened to our people, just for being Black, just for being successful.”

“So we are excited today. This has been a difficult journey, a lot of obstacles, a lot of odds, a lot of opposition, but today we have a victory,” he continued.

Tiffany Crutcher, a descendant of a survivor of the massacre who founded the Terence Crutcher Foundation and serves as the foundation’s executive director, also expressed gratitude for the review, acknowledging that what happened in Tulsa more than a century ago has been “ignored for far too long.”

“Today, my family and community are deeply grateful that the U.S. Department of Justice is finally preparing to review the 1921 Tulsa race massacre,” she said. “I leave you with this quote from my mentor, our mentor, Bryan Stevenson, this community will continue to stand on hope, and hope is what will get you to stand up when people tell you to sit down, and today, we continue to stand.”

To be sure, it is about time. It’s just unfortunate that it’s only happening after everything is long said and done, and no one involved in the massacre can be held to account or provided restitution. It will, however, be interesting to see what this review turns up, what new information we will learn, if any, and, most importantly, how it will impact the way we as a nation grapple with racial violence and injustice in the future.