As he signed a proclamation, the president stated, “Only with truth comes healing, justice, repair, and another step forward.“
President Joe Biden signed a proclamation this week that turned key sites honoring Emmett Till into a national monument. The monument will maintain the locations near the Tallahatchie River, the Tallahatchie courthouse, and the Roberts Temple Church of God in Christ in Chicago, where his funeral was held. Now that these locations are federal property, defacing them is considered a federal crime.
Emmett Till, aged 14, was killed by two men in 1955 after a 21-year-old Caucasian woman falsely accused him of whistling at her. Till’s surviving family members joined President Biden as he signed the proclamation, including Till’s now 84-year-old cousin who was with him the night he was abducted.
“We can’t just choose to learn what we want to know. We have to learn what we should know. We should know about our country. We should know everything: the good, the bad, the truth of who we are as a nation,” the president said before signing the proclamation. “For only with truth comes healing, justice, repair, and another step forward toward forming a more perfect union.”
As the Lord Leads, Pray with Us…
- For the president and his advisors as they consider and establish national monuments.
- With thanksgiving to the Lord for the civil rights progress that has been made in U.S. society in the ensuing 68 years.
Sources: Reuters, The White House
