America has, once again, made it clear that it has no interest in doing even the bare minimum to make amends for the historic atrocities committed against Black people—even the Black people who experienced those atrocities firsthand.

According to CNN, the Oklahoma Supreme Court dismissed a lawsuit filed by the remaining survivors of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre Wednesday, siding with a lower court’s ruling that the plaintiffs, who are both more than 100 years old now, shouldn’t get damages because “simply being connected to a historical event does not provide a person with unlimited rights to seek compensation.”

Imagine looking the only survivors of one of the worst and most notorious race massacres in America’s history right in the eye and telling them they aren’t owed anything for what they suffered. Imagine saying that to Black people who are seeking reparations, not as the descendants of the people who suffered, but as the sufferers themselves. The state Supreme Court even acknowledged that the “grievance with the social and economic inequities created by the Tulsa Race Massacre is legitimate and worthy of merit.” Did the justices even wince a little when they admitted this to 109-year-olds Viola Ford Fletcher and Lessie Benningfield Randle knowing they were about to add a huge “but” to the statement?

“However, the law does not permit us to extend the scope of our public nuisance doctrine beyond what the Legislature has authorized to afford Plaintiffs the justice they are seeking,” the court wrote in its decision. In other words: The lower court wouldn’t give them justice, and the Supreme Court “justices” won’t either.

Source: SMH: Reparations Lawsuit Filed By Tulsa Race Massacre Survivors Dismissed By Oklahoma Supreme Court