OPINION:
Ferguson is still a tinderbox, but there’s hope and change this time. U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch has distanced herself from her predecessor, Eric Holder. She praises cops for taking responsibility as peacemakers, and she isn’t looking for opportunities to incite turmoil. She might start a process of healing the rift between minority communities and the men and women in blue who protect them.
Ms. Lynch addressed a national gathering of the Fraternal Order of Police in Pittsburgh on Monday, observing that when disorder and violence break out the police officers run to the sound of the guns when everyone else is running the other way. “You serve as defenders of our most cherished values,” she told them, “as guardians of men, women and children who need protection — sentinels holding the line against those who would do them harm.”
Ms. Lynch might have been describing events in Ferguson, Mo., the previous night as crowds turned out to mark the first anniversary of the shooting death of Michael Brown. A new tragedy hung for a time in the balance when shots were fired at cops trying to contain hundreds of protesters flooding the streets. Officers chased and wounded a young black man, a friend of Michael Brown, who is believed to have pulled a trigger first. Tyrone Harris Jr., 18, is luckier than his late pal: He survived, and faces 10 felony charges. Since then, protests have continued, but despite chants of the crowd that “we’re ready for war,” actual conflict has been confined mostly to civil disobedience. No blood has been spilled.
Eric Holder, as attorney general and America’s top cop, went to Ferguson after the shooting last summer to open a federal investigation. In tone and manner, he rubbed salt into an open wound, encouraging the birth of the “hands up, don’t shoot” and “black lives matter” movements. He contributed to the widespread belief that Mr. Holder doesn’t like white folks very much. He filed conclusions that harshly criticized cops as racists, touching off a new round of violence, in which two officers were shot and wounded in Ferguson.
Words can soothe anger and words can provoke anger. Public officials must be careful lest they incite a riot. Mr. Holder made a point of shoving a shiv into the national conscience at every opportunity during his tenure at the Justice Department, once calling America “a nation of cowards,” afraid to talk about race. His approach brought race front and center, but provoked a convulsion of violence within minority communities that led to record numbers of murders in Baltimore, St. Louis and Milwaukee. It’s called “the Ferguson effect,” but it could rightly be called “the Holder effect.”
In contrast, Ms. Lynch has stressed the need for reconciliation in her public comments since she succeeded Mr. Holder in April. “When officers and residents share a foundation of mutual trust and a reservoir of goodwill,” she told her audience in Pittsburgh, “residents are more likely to help with investigations; victims and witnesses of crime are more likely to speak up, and all of us in law enforcement are better able to assist community members when they face difficult circumstances.”
Ms. Lynch appears eager to put cops and minority communities back on a footing of mutual respect. It could be the start of the more productive “Lynch effect.”
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