We Demand The Full Disclosure And Digitization Of All Slavery Era Records!

On October 2, 2002, the City Council of Chicago passed the Slavery Era Records Disclosure Ordinance by a vote of 44-0. It was sponsored by Alderwoman Dorothy Tillman, Mayor Richard J. Daley and Alderman Ed Burke. Similar Ordinances were passed in Philadelphia, Detroit and Wayne County, Milwaukee, Berkeley, Los Angeles, Oakland, San Francisco and Richmond (California).

In January 2004, Bob Brown filed his first lawsuit in the Northern District of Illinois alleging that 28 Defendants committed millions of dollars in fraud on their contracts with the City of Chicago, and their Slavery Era Records Disclosure Affidavits. He withdrew it.

On May 12, 2006, Brown filed a second slavery era records disclosure and whistle blower lawsuit in the Circuit Court of Cook County. This lawsuit included the Cities of Chicago and Berkeley, and other jurisdictions, as co-Plaintiffs. It also included 102 Defendants who committed 549 violations on their Affidavits, and $2.9 billion in fraud between 2003 and 2006.

On April 6, 2009, Brown filed a third lawsuit against the Chicago 2016 Olympic Committee to expose their COINTELPRO operations that violated his human rights. He withdrew it. He lobbied at the United Nations in Geneva, the Houses of Parliament in London, the Congressional Black Caucus in DC, UNESCO in Paris, the Olympic Committee in Copenhagen, and worldwide.

Brown’s second lawsuit was dismissed on September 25, 2009. The Judge ruled that the Slavery Era Records Disclosure Ordinance could not be enforced by private citizens, that the lawsuit was “based on publicly disclosed information,” and that he was not a whistle blower, not “an original source of the information.” The Judge also ruled that he “put the pieces together,” and that he is “a historian and researcher who compiled publicly disclosed information to offer an important social expose on the City’s business partners.”

Bob Brown has finally published his two-volume book titled We Demand The Full Disclosure And Digitization Of All Slavery Era Records. It documents his lawsuits and two decades of work and calls for the empowerment of a new generation of digital researchers, scholars, activists and organizers, worldwide.