Since I first published this article the killing of unarmed black men have continued unabated and in 2019 and during the first eight months of 2020 there have been an increase in the number of black men, boys and black women killed by the police that included the killing of George Floyd on May 25, 2019 and the police shooting of Jacob Blake on August 23, 2020, to name only these two among the many who have been murdered by the police.
Police and policing include gun-carrying and some sort of badge-wearing, authorized to carry guns, people like George Zimmerman who killed black 17-year old Trayvon Martin in 2012 who was never convicted. Also included are vigilantes like Mark and Patricia McCloskey who in 2020 pointed guns at peaceful racial justice protesters threatened to shoot them if they set feet on their property. The Southern Poverty Law Center informs us that race-hating vigilante groups are on the increase. Someday, it may be sooner than we can realize, retribution will become reality, as the Bible declares.
Blacks cannot afford any longer to expect or wait for Governments, federal and/or state to protect them. It is now time for Blacks to take measures to protect themselves. And that means to deliver in kind "tour de force" to those who murder unarmed black men.
I shutter in my boots, so to speak, when I think about how Blacks served in wars, fighting people in foreign lands, to protect freedom for white Americans that they could not enjoy when they returned from battlefields to America. Included in this group of soldiers were my three blood brothers and myself who served in three wars. My brother Henry served during World War II, I heard him say, "When General Douglas MacArthur said, "We shall return" that he was among soldiers left on the front lines in the Philippines." He added "MacArthur, as promised, did return with more soldiers." My brothers David served in the Korean War, Jonathan served in the Vietnam War, and I, Uriah, served in the Army two years before the Korean War and two year during the Korean War. President Harry S. Truman extended my three-year volunteer tour of duty by one year when the Korean War was declared.
When i returned after serving in the military to my native and segregated state of Alabama (and I was in a segregated Army for two years) it was difficult for me to register to vote, but with persistence and courage I manage to vote a decade before enactment of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. With Martin Luther King, Jr., and other leaders. I helped to lead the Montgomery Bus Boy9cott that was launched following the arrest of Rosa Parks who refused to give her bus seat to a white person.
White Americans enslaved Black Americans for 246 years.They enacted Jim crow laws that denied Blacks citizenship rights. After leaving the Fields School that my Grandfather Benjamin F. Fields who was born in slavery with his sons established, the school I attended the first eight years of my schooling, I walked six miles one way to school when I was not able or fortunate enough to thumb-a-ride and be picked-up by a driver of a log truck, when one mile from my home a school bus picked-up white children.
Today the legacy of slavery, lynching, injustice and inequity is evident. Systemic racism is the color of America and that accounts for the police killing of unarmed Black men.
White policemen often approach black men with the image that is reflective of systemic racism which they embrace as being normal and moral, even though it is racist and immoral.
Moreover, such behavior is enforced and approved by a large number, if not the majority of white Americans in many communities and States, especially States where white people see it as right and honorable to pledge allegiance to the Confederacy statues.
Enough is enough! Obviously, nonviolence on the part of Blacks who are violently killed by white policemen is not the answer. That fact is well established. I disagreed with Martin Luther King, Jr. about nonviolence, even during some our Montgomery Improvement Association Executive Board meetings, and I did not agree with Malcolm X about violence, by any means necessarily, which, of course, he never actually committed. My approach or philosophy is not nonviolence or violence but responsibility which means taking responsible and appropriate action in the situation specific This is the approach needed to deal with police killings of unarmed black men. This also means recognizing that self-preservation is the first law of nature. And to save lives of others in harm's way is equally as important.
Now is the time for Blacks and non-Blacks who desire justice for all to employ and deliver in kind "tour de force" to match the force Blacks encounter as a lifestyle which often becomes their death-style. On June 28, 2020 Mark and Patricia McCloskey, mentioned earlier, brandishing guns, both lawyers, both pointed guns at racial justice protesters who were protesting near their home. They said they were protecting their property. During slavery Blacks were considered legally to be slave owners' property. Mark and Patricia were featured speakers during the 2020 Republican National Convention. Of course, human beings are more valuable than property, but not for many Americans.This more than suggest that everyone eighteen and older should have or be permitted to have a gun to protect, if not their property, their own lives. It further suggest that the Government should provide poor people with guns so they can have a fighting chance of standing their ground, hence survive.
The Black Lives Movement is a part of this forward and toward equity plan. I salute those, young and older, who are participating in this movement. It is good to see young people involved. Think about it, young people fight wars at the age of eighteen. the age I was when I enlisted in the Army. There were young people, included older people who were leaders of the Montgomery Bus Boycott, including Martin Luther King, Jr., 26 years of age, Ralph D. Abernathy 28 years of age and I, Uriah J. Fields, 25 years of age when we launched the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Young people, you have the energy and obligation to deal with the older status quo people who want things to remain as they are. This is your time. Never be convinced that people of the past had more wisdom and moral judgment than you. They did not. For moral character, I'll take you over them any day. The best days are ahead, providing you make it so. It's in your hand.

Below is the article being republished, "What will It Take to End Police Killing of Unarmed Black Men," that I first published four years ago. It remains relevant today.
Before addressing the matter of Police shooting of Black men and gun violence in America, I want to present a timeline list of some, most of them unarmed, Black men killed by the police in 2015 and 2016. They are:
March 6, 2015: Tony Rushinson, 19, (Madison, Wisconsin)
March 31, 2015: Phillip White, 32, (Vineland, New Jersey)
August 2, 2015: Eric Harris, 44, (Tulsa, Oklahoma)
April 43, 2015: Walter Scott, 50, (North Charleston, South Carolina)
April 19, 2015: Freedie Gray, 25, (Baltimore, Maryland)
July 5, 2016: Alton Sterling, 37, (Baton Rouge, Louisiana)
July 6, 2016: Philando Castile, 32, (Falcon Heights, Minnesota)
Unarmed Black men were killed at 4 times the rate of unarmed White men in 2015. Nearly 1 in 3 black people killed in 215 were unarmed. Unfortunately there is a lack of national data on the number of police shootings because they are not tracked, but citizen groups have tracked the number of black people killed by police, 102 in 2015 and 136, with the shooting of Philando Castile, so far in 2016.
Gun deaths by police and citizens combined in the United States in 2015 were 33,636. There were 372 mass shootings in the United States in 2015 that killed 475 people and wounded 1,870, according to Mass Shooting Tracker. The homicide rate per 100,000 people (data for 2012): United States 60%, Canada 31% and Australia 18.2%. The United States has nearly 30 times the number of gun shootings deaths as that in the United Kingdom.
Some people, especially those who have lost relatives and loved ones as a result of police shootings, ask, "What will it take to significantly decrease the number of deaths resulting from police shootings and citizens shooting citizens?" I have considered this matter from many angles, including prayerfully. Given the current "gun-ho obsession" of many Americans, including some who are gullible, the power of the National Rifle Association (NRA) and its financial ability to lobby members of Congress and convince many of them that they will not be reelected if they refuse to support the NRA's position of not having any gun laws and the amount of money gun manufacturers contribute to members of Congress, I have reluctantly but being true to what history and present evidence reveal, come to the conclusion that no meaningful gun control laws will or can be enacted by the Congress until murderers increase their killing exponentially to include the deaths of relatives and people in the families of gun makers, lobbies for the NRA and their family members and the business associates of gun manufacturers and family members of those who approved of people being armed in public places, including schools and churches. To this later group I have this message: any three people, or fewer, who do not have guns can, at some time, attack a person with a gun and take his gun away from him and kill him with his own gun. DON'T THINK FOR ONE MOMENT THAT THIS CANNOT HAPPEN! It has happened to well-trained policemen.
Only when the killing of people is increased exponentially as indicated above will Congress have the power to enact gun laws comparable to those in Japan, Australia and the United kingdom. It is this action, as deadly as it will be, NOT periods of silence and exhortation to pray, after mass shootings, expressions of condolences by politicians expressed to people who have lost loved ones murdered by gun killers and blazing advocators extolling the virtue of the Second Amendment to the United State Constitution in the face of the deaths of innocent citizens. Such rhetoric has been expressed for many years, even for generations, while deaths from gun shootings continue to increase. Don't let anyone tell you that gun deaths is decreasing in the United States...that it is only increasing in certain areas...areas where lives don't matter. If you accept that you also have to accept that genocide of people in those areas are acceptable, perhaps, a good thing for red-blooded Americans and some whose blood is not so red.
I regret that it will take more deaths of people which are increasing yearly, if not daily, but to reiterate, at this stage and state of affairs in America, there seems to be no other alternative to gun killing in America. And with the killings having expanded beyond inner cities but in every type of community, some of which are drug-infested, and strata of society the deaths will have the necessary impact and impetus for addressing positively gun control laws.
I hope that before this happens sanity and gun legislation can be enacted by the Congress and signed by the President, but I am not under any illusion that this is possible. So the slaughter of citizens by police and citizens by citizens and non-citizens living in America will continues at a greater manner than ever. There will be no need for foreign terrorists to supplement this carnage, although that too may happen. So get ready for the slaughter and carnage, although there is no way to get ready for it if you live in America. All you can do is be aware and hope that by chance it will not be you are someone you care about who are murdered. Yes, it could be you; it could be me. It could happen in any place, even in your home or in church. Living in a gated community, having the latest alarm and/or camera system, or security guards, offers no guarantee for survival. Of course, you are not going to spend all your time at home. Truly, there is no security. There is no route of escape.
How soon is too late? I'm afraid we have missed the opportunity to make a positive difference. Just maybe, its already too late.<><><>

I believe you will do Americans a favor, even more, by passing on (forwarding) this message to other people, especially young people, including the young-at-heart.
Thank you. -ujf

Copyright 2016 and 2020 by Uriah J. Fields.