A patriotic talk about structural racism? It happened here

I heard one of the most optimistic, patriotic, pro-American talks of my life on Tuesday night, and it was about structural racism.

Theodore Roosevelt Johnson — Raleigh native, retired Navy commander, and a scholar at the Brennan Center for Justice — visited Quail Ridge Books to deliver a rousing defense of the world’s first multiracial, egalitarian democracy.

“There’s been no nation in world history that has accomplished what we’re trying to accomplish,” Johnson said to a hometown audience of friends, family, and curious readers. “I can be fully Black and fully American in the same breath. That is the fullness of the American idea.”

You can also be a patriot and still embrace the fullness of American history. Johnson believes one of the keys to realizing our country’s founding vision — the radical idea that all men are created equal, and endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights — is understanding how our governing institutions have been warped by a long history of racial division.

His new book, When the Stars Fall: Overcoming Racism and Renewing the Promise of America, is a call for reforming those institutions, for tackling systemic racism as an urgent threat to the core promise of our country. If we recognize racial division as not just a matter of individual hearts and minds but something deeply rooted in policy, that actually makes the path forward easier. Fixing those policy failures is an act of devoted citizenship, a way of strengthening national solidarity by working toward a more perfect union.

“The incremental march to a better America, a more egalitarian America, that’s the journey,” Johnson said at Quail Ridge. “But you can’t talk about national progress if you can’t talk about the starting point.”

Johnson isn’t alone in linking love of country with the desire to know its full history. Testifying last week before the House Armed Services Committee, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, was asked to denounce the teaching of critical race theory. The commander of the United States Armed Forces doesn’t often get the chance to weigh in on curriculum controversies, but I’m glad Milley did. “I do think it’s important, actually, for those of us in uniform to be open-minded and be widely read,” said the four-star Army general. “The United States Military Academy is a university. And it is important that we train and we understand.”

Johnson, who served as a speechwriter to two former Chairmen of the Joint Chiefs, cited Milley’s comments during his book talk Tuesday night. “He has a curious mind,” Johnson said. “As Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, you want to understand the people you’re commanding and the country you’re defending.”

In my time as a student, a writer, and a university bureaucrat, I have met a great many teachers and professors who uncover the challenging parts of American history. Like Johnson, they are some of the proudest and most idealistic citizens I know. They recognize that our history is neither an unbroken march of progress nor a doom loop of despair. It’s a complicated mess, just like the present. And having a sense of curiosity about where we came from is an act of civic pride.

It will take many more curious minds to form what Johnson calls “bonds of solidarity” with our fellow Americans. Too often, he writes, we are simply “democratic strangers,” occupying the same country without taking the time to really know one another. The work of reform and renewal should be an opportunity to meet. “We don’t have to burn the institutions of society to the ground,” Johnson said. “But if you don’t talk to the people you’re angry with, the rage just deepens.”

Rage can be seductive. It feels righteous, clarifying, simple. But it is also at odds with our national character. “It’s inherently American to be optimistic, to believe that tomorrow will be better than today,” Johnson said. “It’s not inevitable. But we can have the country we want.”