Repair: Redeeming the Promise of Abolition

(Hardback)

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Katherine Franke makes a powerful case for reparations for Black Americans by amplifying the stories of formerlyenslaved peopleand calling for repair ofthe damage caused bythe legacy ofAmerican slavery.Repairinvites readers to explore the historical context for reparations, offering a detailed account of the circumstances that surrounded the emancipation of enslavedBlack peoplein two unique contexts, the Sea Islands of South Carolina and Davis Bend,Mississippi,Jefferson Daviss former plantation. Through these two critical historical examples, Franke unpacksintergenerational, systemic racism and white privilege at the heart of American society and argues that reparations for slavery arenecessary, overdueand possible.

Katherine Frankeis one of the nations leading scholars writing on law, racial justice,andAfrican American history. Her first book wasWedlocked: The Perils of Marriage Equality. She is the Sulzbacher Professor of Law, Gender and Sexuality Studies at Columbia University andchair of the board of Trusteesof the Center for Constitutional Rights.

Reviews

"For more than one hundred and fifty years African Americans have made demands that the federal government redress and repair the catastrophic social, emotional, political and economic consequences of slavery in this nation. In this new essential book,Repair: Redeeming the Promise of Abolition, legal scholar Katherine Franke engages the original debates concerning the conditions upon which newly freed Black people would rebuild their lives after slavery. Franke powerfully illustrates the repercussions of the unfilled promise of land redistribution and other broken promises that consigned African Americans to another one hundred years of second-class citizenship. Franke passionately argues that the continuation of those vast disparities between Black and white people in U.S. societya product of slavery itselfmeans that the struggle for reparations remains a relevant demand in the current movements for racial justice."

Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor,From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation

"Repairrevisits the revolutionary era of Reconstruction, that brief moment in the sun in the words of W.E. B. Du Bois, when the redistribution of land and wealth as recompense for unrequited toil could have secured genuine freedom for Black people rather than a future of racial inequality, exploitation, marginalization, and precarity. To being the road to repair,Katherine Franke makes a persuasive case for reparations as at least a first step toward creating the conditions for genuine freedom and justice, not only for African Americans but for all of us."

Robin D. G. Kelley, Freedom Dreams: The Black Radical Imagination

"Katherine Franke argues for a type of Black freedom that ismaterial and feltfreedom that is more than a poetic nod toclaims of American moral comeuppance.Repair: RedeemingThe Promise of Abolitionis a critical text for our times thatdemands an honest reckoning with the consequences, andafterlife, of the sin that was chattel enslavement. It is bold callfor reparations and costly atonement. Darnell L. Moore,NoAshes in the Fire: Coming of Age Black & Free in America "Katherine Franke is consistently one of the sharpest, mostconscientious thinkers in progressive politics. In a time definedby crisis and conflict, Katherine is among that small number ofthinkers whom I find indispensable. Jelani Cobb,New Yorkercolumnist and author,The Substance of Hope

Author Bio

Katherine Franke is one of the nations leading scholars writing on law, racial justice,andAfrican American history. Her first book was Wedlocked: The Perils of Marriage Equality. She is the Sulzbacher Professor of Law, Gender and Sexuality Studies at Columbia University andchair of the board of Trusteesof the Center for Constitutional Rights.