The Dam of Injustice Can Only Hold Back the Waters of Righteousness for So Long

By Dan Rather, Dan Rather's Facebook Page

19 November 17

"...about the wickedness of people shielding wrongdoers & passing them off (or at least allowing them to pass themselves off) as honest men....If the broad light of day could be let in upon men’s actions, it would purify them as the sun disinfects."

- Justice Louis Brandeis

e are in a moment of reckoning. And I have seen similar moments before. They bend history in a new direction. The imperfect path of our republic has long stumbled and meandered towards a destination of justice. The lofty ideals of our founding about all men being created equal and the inalienable rights of "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" have been imperfectly and unequally bestowed on our citizenry.

But the dam of injustice can only hold back the waters of righteousness for so long. On race, sexual orientation, and gender we have made great strides towards equality in my lifetime, but a great journey still remains.

Now we see, with the flood of stories of sexual harassment and abuse, how much inequity and misuse of power has been hidden in our midst. But has it really been hidden, or is more that it has been excused? Have the norms of accepted behavior and the privilege of power allowed the moral compasses of our innate senses of decency and fairness to spin away from a bearing of truth?

We can do better. We must do better. And I believe in the mantra that one hears often in newsrooms, that sunlight - openness and transparency - is the best disinfectant for the sins of society.

It bears mention that we cannot allow the these tidal waves of testimony to swamp our moorings as a society rooted in the rule of law. Each of the accused deserves his or her day in court. But our ideals of justice also suggest that all people are equal before the law, the powerful and the powerless. And finally there seems to be the stirrings of a national awakening and a shift in the dynamics of justice.