Can’t solve case – fed key AND follow-on is a lie. Only our card assumes uniformity

But for some Black history scholars, calling such efforts reparations is a “detour” from true compensation to Black Americans.

“Local reparations are an impossibility, a virtual oxymoron,” write Duke University professor William A. Darity Jr. and arts consultant A. Kirsten Mullen in their new book The Black Reparations Project: A Handbook for Racial Justice.

Reparations have gradually been building steam in , — in most cases, voluntarily rather than prompted by a lawsuit. In their book, , Darity and Mullen argue that the goal of any US reparations program should be to eliminate the racial wealth gap — something they say only the federal government can afford to do.

“Reparations undertaken by state or local governments or by individuals or other private organizations simply cannot meet the goal,” they write in one chapter of the book, a series of essays from Black historians and sociologists edited by Darity and Mullen. “Neither state and local governments, nor other organizations, individually or collectively, have the financial wherewithal to eradicate the difference in Black and white net worth.”

Darity and Mullen argue that energy spent on local reparations schemes might actually be working against achieving a robust, national reparations program that would be more commensurate with what they say African Americans are truly owed.

“To the extent that these initiatives crop up everywhere, were a direct claim to ever be set before Congress for a national reparations program, opponents could conveniently argue that it had already happened since so many cities and states have adopted ‘reparations,’” they write.