St. Paul, Minn. — The Mississippi River begins its swift descent to the bayous of Louisiana not far from here, flowing more than 1,100 miles before it passes Baton Rouge.
Two Capitol cities linked by a mighty river; one North, one South. And since last week, two regions convulsed by shootings that have forced each to face painful realities about racial divisions.
St. Paul and its twin city, Minneapolis, are major urban centers, with affluent, well-educated and overwhelmingly white populations planted among the fields of Minnesota. Baton Rouge, Louisiana’s capitol city, is much poorer, more than half African-American and rose from the river’s southernmost bluffs.
For all that separates them, the fate of these communities was the same last week: In both places, black men were shot and killed by police. The aftermath of Philando Castile’s shooting during a traffic stop in the St. Paul suburb of Falcon Heights was broadcast live Wednesday on Facebook. Baton Rouge activists uploaded video of Alton Sterling’s Tuesday killing at a convenience store where he was selling CDs.
The deaths sparked nationwide protest that was mostly peaceful until a sniper in Dallas late Thursday killed five officers and wounded seven. The deaths of Lorne Ahrens, 48; Michael Krol, 40; Michael Smith, 55; Brent Thompson, 43; and Patrick Zamarripa, 32 made for the deadliest day for law enforcement officers since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
Since Castile's shooting, thousands of protesters have converged on the home of Minn. Gov. Mark Dayton, who greeted them and publicly wondered if Castile would have been shot if he had been white.
Twelve-hundred miles away in Baton Rouge, riot police confronted late-night demonstrators in tense standoffs that have set the city on edge. Police arrested 30 demonstrators in the early morning hours Saturday, and one officer was photographed drawing his gun during the demonstration of unarmed protesters.
In both communities, activists say, the shootings have forced to the surface longstanding tensions between the police and non-white residents.
“One thread that ties these shootings together is that they are symbolic of the unreconciled racial history in America,” said Nekima Levy-Pounds, president of the Minneapolis NAACP chapter, as she walked to a protest outside the governor’s mansion in St. Paul. “When a history of white supremacy is coupled with an irrational fear of black men, then this is outcome.”
A veneer of nice in Minn.
School cafeteria manager Philando Castile, 32, was shot through the window of his car across the street from the Minnesota state fairgrounds, home of the annual festival that bills itself as the Great Minnesota Get Together. The notion that Minnesotans are nice may be a stereotype, but it’s one that the state is happy to promote.
National quality of life rankings help bolster this image, with Minneapolis-St. Paul metro area posting high scores for incomes, education and safety. And true to form, protesters have chosen verbal confrontations over violence. On Friday, Gov. Dayton, who is white, waded into the crowd of protesters that had gathered before the governor's mansion and spoke with them.
But at the makeshift memorial that rose where Castile was fatally shot by St. Anthony police officer Jeronimo Yanez, non-white residents described racially motivated police harassment resembling that exposed after the death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo.
Emfel Maycol, who is Hispanic, said his non-white friends are wary of visiting his home one block from the scene of the shooting because police stop their cars.
“I’ve lived in Lincoln, Neb., and never had this problem. I’ve lived in Washington, D.C., and never had this problem. It’s the police,” said Maycol, 55.
The Twin Cities are as racist as any place in the Deep South, although the hostility is not as open, said Nancy Robinson, 60, who arrived in tears at the site of Castile’s death. A lifelong resident of the area, Robinson, who is black, said while she never met Castile, his killing had shaken her as badly as a death in the family would. Her granddaughter knew him from when she attended the school where he worked, and Robinson attended the high school where he graduated.
“It’s all the same all over,” said Robinson of racism in the metro area. “But here, they smile in your face as you’re stabbed in the back.”
Just eight months ago, Jamar Clark, 24, died at the hands of police in Minneapolis's North Side, where much of the African-American population lives. Prosecutors announced they would not press charges March 30, setting the stage for much of the outrage that erupted over Castile's shooting.
Economic disparities have have also fueled some of the frustration. After a 14 percent drop in black household income between 2013 and 2014, the median black household in the state dropped below Mississippi, according to a September analysis of U.S. Census data by the (Minneapolis) Star-Tribune.
This decline took place as income and poverty for other racial groups in the state remained stable.
“I call it the Jim Crow North,” said the NAACP’s Levy-Pounds. “People are able to mask their racism with a smile.”
Mica Grimm, 26, a founder of Black Lives Matter Minneapolis, said this niceness has its advantages. Those pushing for police reform have been able to use the region’s liberal politics to pressure leaders such as Dayton to speak about racial inequality.
“People here want to prove that they’re not racist,” Grimm said.
Open hostility in La.
On the southern lip of the Mississippi, racial tensions over the death of Sterling, 37, erupted into open hostility early Saturday. Police in riot gear faced off with protesters — most in their teens and 20s — who taunted them, and at one point one officer drew his weapon as he tried to break up a human chain that had formed on Airline Highway.
Eventually, officers retreated to police headquarters, watching in silence as the protesters celebrated.
Race relations in Louisiana are a far cry from Minnesota nice. According to a 2015 poll by The (Baton Rouge) Advocate and WWL-TV, Louisiana residents overwhelmingly supported keeping confederate symbols; not even a majority of African-Americans favored removal. Baton Rouge lacks the well-organized Black Lives Matter movement that exists in Minneapolis and St. Paul.
And unlike Minnesota’s Gov. Dayton, East Baton Rouge Parish Mayor-President Kip Holden, who is black, spent most of Thursday in Washington, D.C., according to The Advocate.
What Baton Rouge does share with the Twin Cities is racial disparity. At 14.1 percent, the unemployment rates for blacks is nearly three times higher than that of whites, according to 2014 U.S. Census data. And while African-Americans make up the majority of Baton Rouge’s population, they compose roughly 30 percent of the city’s police force.
Even those who disapproved of the unrest said Sterling’s death may have been a tipping point in the city’s race relations.
At the Triple S convenience store, the site of the shooting, a sense of community prevailed Friday evening. Restaurants delivered pizza and sandwiches for free. Hundreds of residents milled about, angry but restrained. Police were nowhere to be found — and were not needed, at least on this night. There was no violence, nor any threats of unrest.
Tammara Crawford, an administrator at a local Bible college, said she felt compelled to come after her 10-year-old daughter asked whether Sterling would still be alive were he white.
This generation of activists doesn’t want to wait for change, she said.
“They’re restless. They’re angry. They’re irritated,” said Crawford, 33. “They’ve had enough. We all have.”
Resident Tremayne King said resentments that have simmered under the surface for generations could soon boil over.
“The people mean what they say,” he said. “They (Baton Rouge police) weren’t expecting this to happen. This time we’re serious.”
Shared grief for those killed
As protests continue, families are left to mourn two victims whose anonymous lives contrasted deeply with their public deaths. Sterling was close with his son, Cameron, said Quinyetta McMillon, mother of their 15-year-old son. They were supposed to spend Tuesday together.
“They liked to hang out and eat. (Sterling) loved dry Frosted Flakes cereal. I’m serious,” she said. “Just a big old kid.”
Like Castile, who worked with children for a living, Sterling wasn’t one for hostility.
“Alton always had a smile on his face. He didn’t let anything bother him,” McMillon said.
The world is shocked by the violence, said Castile’s girlfriend Diamond “Lavish” Reynolds as she talked to press from a hotel parking lot in St. Paul. Flanked by her lawyer and the Rev. Jesse Jackson, Reynolds was as composed as she was on live video Wednesday evening as Castile slumped against her in their car, bleeding to death.
“It’s been horrifying,” Reynolds said. “It’s been horrifying for not [just] for me here in St. Paul but everyone across the world.”
“My deepest condolences to every family — those in Baton Rouge, those in Texas. I would never wish harm upon anyone.”
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