Column: Commitment to justice compels law officers to listen, then move to fix systemic problems

I express my sincerest condolences to the family members of George Floyd. As an African American man, it is disheartening to watch the death of yet another one of our own at the hands of a law enforcement officer. The circumstances of Mr. Floyd’s last moments on Earth evoke images of the violence, inhumanity, and countless degradations inflicted upon those in our beloved country whose skin tone relegated them — in the eyes of some — to second-class citizens, or worse, less than human, irrespective of “the content of their character.”

I do not know whether race played a role in (now former) Officer Derek Chauvin’s decision to drive his knee into Mr. Floyd’s neck for over eight minutes that fateful day. Both the state of Minnesota and the Department of Justice have launched separate investigations to uncover all the facts.

But as a federal law enforcement official and a black man, I believe that we all must have an open and honest dialogue with an eye towards answering some very tough questions, such as: Why, time and time again, do men and women like George Floyd die at the hands of the very same officers who swear an oath to protect them?

To be clear, I am a proud member of the law enforcement community. Each day, my office works with law enforcement officers who make tremendous sacrifices to protect the public. I know that they are among the finest citizens in our communities, and the over- whelming majority of them perform their work with honor and professionalism. But while it is our duty as a law enforcement community to protect the public, perhaps more importantly, our character and commitment to justice compel us to listen to and empathize with those who suffer the most when we fall short. At this time in the nation’s history, our ability to build the public trust will depend on our ability to listen and then take meaningful action to fix what are, in the eyes of so many, systemic problems.

John Locke, an oft-cited political philosopher, espoused the concept of the social contract. Under this contract, the governed accept the authority of the government in exchange for protection provided by the government. To many in our communities, George Floyd’s death — and the death of many other African Americans at the hands of law enforcement — is yet another example of a long- standing breach of the social contract formed by those who, over 240 years ago, promised us life, liberty, and equality under the law.

What we do as a nation and a law enforcement community in the years that lie ahead will determine whether, using the powerful language of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., black men like George Floyd and many others will be able to cash the check issued by our Founding Fathers, and find that our nation’s bank of love, respect, and commitment to equality has sufficient funds.

For my part, and my brothers and sisters in law enforcement, the journey begins by carrying out the Justice Department’s commitment to work with community leaders to find constructive solutions to the problems exposed by Mr. Floyd’s death. This will, as the attorney general put it, help us ensure that Mr. Floyd did not die in vain.

Kenji Price is the U.S. attorney in Hawaii.