JENA, La.
North Carolina Central University law student Quinn Byars had heard all the talk about being part of history for making the trek to Jena, La., with thousands of other protestors Thursday. But college students like Byars believe they’ve made a much bigger statement to the world.
“For our generation it’s so important because we don’t really get the opportunity to come together like this,” says Byars during Thursday’s rally in Jena. “It gives us an opportunity to come together to make noise and come together on an issue.”
To take a stand against injustice, specifically the excessive charges leveled against the six young Black male high school students in the small Louisiana town for injuries suffered by a White male student in a school fight, is what brought thousands to town to demand justice for the group dubbed the “Jena 6.”
Jena is a rural, central Louisiana town of nearly 3,000 residents (85 percent White) surrounded by acres of cotton fields and small two-lane highways. It’s also a town that historically has had tense race relations, where Whites live on their side of town and Blacks on theirs. Rarely do the two meet.
“Yeah, it’s kinda divided,” says Roy Beard, a Black, 42-year-old native of Jena. “That’s the way it’s always been. We’ve gone to school together, but after that, we go our separate ways. But the younger generation, there is a big change in them for the bad. If it wasn’t bad, why would you hang nooses from the tree?”
The tree is what became the center of controversy at Jena High. Last year a Black freshman asked the school’s principal if he could sit under a tree on campus where historically only Whites congregated. Black students generally hung out in some bleachers at the school. Days after the principal said the Black student could sit anywhere he wanted, three nooses were hung from the tree.
