Throughout Black History Month, we recall the achievements of Black Americans. These include the champions of the Civil Rights Movement—monumental leaders like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Malcolm X, Medgar Evers, Fannie Lou Hamer, and Ella Baker. The first Black Supreme Court Justice, Thurgood Marshall, also looms large; Marshall fought for civil rights long before assuming his rightful position in the highest court in the land. Marshall led the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and was known for fighting segregation in schools, a fight which culminated in the landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision.
That type of legacy is deserving of the utmost regard and respect during Black History Month and every other day—and it stands in stark contrast to his successor on the court, Justice Clarence Thomas.
Thomas was nominated by Republican President George H. W. Bush and has served on the high court since 1991. But he is no Thurgood Marshall. Where Marshall fought tooth and nail to upend threats to equity, civil rights, and justice, Thomas fights to take America back. He fights against the working class and minorities, finding unique ways to fight against the Black community he hails from in the process. It's why Black Americans shouldn't celebrate Justice Thomas during Black History Month. He simply doesn't deserve it.
His betrayals began before he was on the Supreme Court. Before becoming a justice, Thomas worked on the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) during the Reagan administration. While there, he fought the use of class-action lawsuits to enforce workplace-discrimination laws.
Thomas also had a tumultuous confirmation hearing amid allegations from Anita Hill that he'd sexually harassed her. Hill's testimony should have ended his career then and there, but a Black woman with credible claims of abuse in 1991 wasn't believed anymore than the majority of Black women who were systemically erased from the #MeToo movement today are believed.
Thomas escaped accountability. The gift he gave Black America in return was aiding and abetting white supremacy while cloaked in a judicial robe. The positions Thomas has taken paint a clear picture that he is averse to considerations of race in any and all programs, despite the persistent and evidenced inequality present in housing, education, healthcare, and employment.
Take the fight to access the ballot, one Blacks have fought for for generations. From not having the right to vote at all to poll taxes, literacy tests, gerrymandering, redistricting, and voter intimidation, you name it, Black voters faced it.
But those facts don't stop Justice Thomas for fighting to keep people who look like him from the polls. In 2013, Thomas voted with the majority in Shelby County v Holder to gut the Voting Rights Act, arguing racism in voting no longer existed and that enough progress had been made that the pre-clearance standard was no longer needed. This action and misguided ruling allowed Southern states in particular to advance rapid fire voter ID laws and voter suppression tactics designed to limit Black access to the ballot.
But Thomas' most egregious judicial take runs in stark contrast to his predecessor Thurgood Marshall's legacy. Where Marshall fought for equity in education and broke a system of education segregation, Thomas seeks to reinstate it by opposing affirmative action. Thomas argued that affirmative action creates "a narcotic of dependency" where there should be "an ethic of responsibility and independence," bemoaning the "ideology of victimhood" that allows the marginalized to "make demands on society for reparations and recompense."
Thomas has remained staunchly against affirmative action for decades, despite once claiming that without it, "God only knows where I'd be today."
Last summer, affirmative action in higher education admissions was eliminated by the conservative majority on the Supreme Court, and with that, Thomas' mission to upend the dreams of Black students across the country became a reality. In state after state, anti-DEI laws have since emerged and Republican states attorneys general banded together to push the private sector to abandon workplace diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts.
The Black community doesn't celebrate Thomas because Thomas does everything in his power to make life worse for us.
Black History Month isn't a time to glorify a threat to Black progress. Clarence Thomas has proven himself time and time again to be an enemy to Black people. Who needs white supremacists when a Black man who benefited from civil rights wins is leading the charge to destroy the very policies that made his career possible?
Ameshia Cross is a democratic strategist for national, state and local campaigns, a regular political commentator and contributor on MSN, NBC, BBC, SiriusXM, iHeart Radio and more. She is also a former campaign and communications advisor for President Obama.
The views expressed in this article are the writer's own.
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