Last week, I awoke to a news alert on my phone, stating that two sheriffs’ deputies in Florida had been murdered at a restaurant.  At a news conference, the Sheriff attempted to tie their deaths to an “anti-cop” sentiment caused by those protesting police brutality, asking reporters, “what do you expect happens when you demonize law enforcement to the extent that it’s been demonized?” This news brought forth two emotions- sadness and fear.  Sadness at the thought that these officers were probably good people, that they may have been targeted in revenge for the actions of bad officers, fear that more officers would yet be harmed, fear that more black men and boys would be targeted by officers who will see this shooting as a confirmation of their fears of black males (whether or not the shooter is black, as most cop killers are not, and whether or not the murders were in retaliation for police violence, as does not currently seem to be the case), and sadness at the thought that some people feel that violent acts such as these are their only recourse in the face of injustice.

One emotion that did not cross my mind that morning was surprise. After all, we live in a country where over the last few years, farmers and anti-government militants met federal agents with assault rifles in hand, in defense of the right of cows to graze on federal land, and won. We live in a country where, as the decisions not to prosecute the officers responsible for the deaths of Michael Brown, Eric Garner and others evince, forgiveness is almost demanded of marginalized communities when they are brutalized, in exchange for a hollow promise by their government to do better next time. We live in a country where our government jails peaceful protestors fighting for their lives, exonerates neo-nazis who engage in armed standoffs with police, and allows state actors to routinely kill unarmed citizens without consequence. In other words, we live in a country and a world where violence, or the threat of violence, seems to give people a better chance at obtaining their objectives than peaceful protest. In these circumstances, last week’s shooting, whether or not it is related to recent police murders, is a tragic but inevitable consequence. When those responsible for the establishment of justice- governments, police officers, attorneys, and judges- continue to treat people unequally under the law because of race, class, gender, or other arbitrary criteria, then violence, while not always justified, is always inevitable.

I was born in 1986. I watched the L.A. riots on television as a young child- the aftermath of a the acquittal of police officers who savagely and publicly beat an unarmed Rodney King. In middle school, I read about the forced sodomization of an unarmed (and detained) Abner Louima and the 41 shots fired into an unarmed Amadou Diallou, both at the hands of the police. In college, I read about the police killing of an unarmed Sean Bell the night before his wedding. I also watched  local news reports about Deonte Rawlings, an unarmed 14 year old killed at the hands of policemen who claimed the child had fired a gun at them. No gun was found by investigators, yet those officers, like most before them, faced no punishment, and no consequence. (One of the Louima’s rapists was sentenced to 30 years in a minimum security prison, aka “Martha Stewart jail”). I also got a chance to see officers’ disdain for citizens’ civil rights first hand when, outside of a house party that had been broken up by the police, I watched as a fellow student, a 4’10” cheerleader, was picked up by a police officer and slammed against a patrol car with such force that her body broke the side mirror. When I asked the officer why he would do that, he turned toward me, unholstered his gun and said, “because I can. Wanna see what else I can do?”

Having seen, heard about, and read these stories of gross injustice, I was fairly terrified when, one night in Northern Maryland, I was pulled over on a deserted stretch of highway for speeding on the way home to Buffalo from Washington D.C., where I attended college.  I thought that the trooper, white with a slight southern accent and shaved head, might be the last person I ever saw. I knew that, should he choose, he could murder me and get away with it. Instead, after asking me where I was going and where I was coming from, he smiled, said “I want you to get home safe to your parents, take it easy,” and let me off without a ticket. I was so grateful, not because I didn’t have to explain a ticket to my mother, but because I’d lived. That officer, who was just doing his job the way it should be done, had as profound an impact on me, in the opposite sense, as any of the officers I had seen or read about who treated citizens with unjustified violence.  Until that night, I viewed most police with loathing, and only complied with their requests out of intense fear.  That trooper was the first law enforcement official for whom I had respect.  After that night, I was pulled over a few more times (I inherited my lead foot honestly, as my first job as a passenger was to watch for police while my parents sped along the highway to take me to school on their way to work).  But, each time I was genuinely respectful, and most times, that respect was returned. 

When I started my first year of law school, my constitutional law professor began by asking the class what the law was about.  Eager and idealistic, one of my classmates responded, “justice!”  The professor (an honorable and wise man who worked for the ACLU for many years), wrote the word on the board, and then promptly erased it.  His point was that lawyers who argue for justice, fairness, or equity in court are those most likely to lose.  I realize that some of my colleagues may disagree with that position, but I know that far more of us recognize it as true- it’s why so few of us want to be public defenders, or to prosecute discrimination cases. And it’s why most of us would much rather be Chad Kelly’s lawyer (nephew of white football god Jim Kelly, who, despite actually assaulting the police rather than helplessly screaming “I can’t breathe,” is alive and free) than Eric Garner’s.

One of the most famous victims of senseless violence said that “those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.”  All of us who work within the justice system- police, judges, and attorneys, have a responsibility to those children who are now growing up watching the Stephon Clarks, Philando Castiles, Michael Browns, Eric Garners, Aiyana Stanley Joneses, Oscar Grants and Tamir Rices of the world die without consequence and without justice.  We have a duty to put “justice” back on the board, to truly recognize equity and fairness in our courts, and to treat citizens as citizens instead of enemy combatants.

If we fulfill our duty, we have a chance to create a peaceful revolution, to replace cynicism with engagement, to replace fear and loathing with mutual respect, and to replace the status quo of “black lives don’t matter” with a status quo of “equal justice under the law.”   But if we shirk our duty now, then those children will be left with no other conclusion than this- that all the actors of the so-called “justice system,” -from all the judges who preside over courts, to every electoral system and government official who appoints them, to every attorney, and all police- are as arbitrary, capricious, and evil as those officers whom they routinely fail to prosecute for brutal violations of the basic rights of those they are sworn to protect.  This too may cause a revolution, but not a noble one.  It will be ugly, violent, brutal, and indiscriminate. And while many of us may raise an aloof eyebrow and scoff at such a notion, being secure in the idea that our race, our class, our education or our professions will protect us, it will eventually touch all of us, as sure as it did those police murdered in Florida last week.   Americans have never responded peacefully to injustice in perpetuity, and we are all heirs to those who raised arms against taxmen and slavers in defense of justice.  Those of us who work with the law have a sacred duty to make sure that its foundation, the revolution of 1776, secures the blessings of liberty for all its heirs, so that it does not fall to the tyranny of a rightly angry mob.

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