This page includes a list of resources and references for those who want to better understand why we exist and what we will accomplish, with notes from our founder, Hal Huggins:

The Case for Reparations, by Ta-Nehisi Coates
This is the article that moved me to create Ride 4 Reparations. It is included as a chapter in Ta-Nehisi Coates’ book, We Were Eight Years in Power, but it was originally written for The Atlantic magazine. The same is true for all the chapters in the book. 

What Holocaust Restitution Taught Me About Slavery Reparations, by Stuart E. Eizenstat
This Politico Magazine article conveys the ethos of Ride4Reparations. It acknowledges the wrongful exploitation of enslaved people, and the continued and current suffering from that long-ago wrong. The author advocates actions similar to those advocated and enacted by Ride 4 Reparations, including education about the role of slavery in making America rich and powerful and the fact that many current inequities can be tied back to slavery. Eizenstat promotes programs to reduce and/or eliminate those inequities, and he argues against paying reparations to individuals. We agree with him, and we consider voluntary donations to our Recipient Partners to be a type of reparation.

Slavery reparations seem impossible. In many places, they’re already happening, by Thai Jones
This Washington Post article describes two groups that are paying reparations to those who were abused or their descendants.

H.R. 40
H.R. 40 is the proposal to study reparations that has been brought up in congress every year since 1989 but has never been debated.

The Mapping Prejudice Project, at the University of Minnesota
This is fantastic research showing us “how digital tools can illuminate structural racism and transform our understanding of the past.” Mapping Prejudice reveals how racial covenants have shaped the Twin Cities in ways many of its residents are unaware. Segregated Seattle and Mapping Inequality have done similar work in other parts of the country.

Jim Crow of the North
This is a powerful documentary created by TPT’s Minnesota Experience team and the Mapping Prejudice team. In the words of Kirsten Delegard from Mapping Prejudice project, “We are making a case for reparations. That’s the point of all of this. I hope that people leave an encounter with our map with the feeling that we MUST do something.”

Minnesota churches launch 10-year plan for racial healing, reparations, by Jean Hopfensperger 
This article in the StarTribune on November 28, 2020 describes an effort with goals very similar to ours. They refer to “Truth and Reparation.”