Mississippi is the last state in the nation to fail to recognize the Armenian Genocide. As an American of Armenian descent, this issue hits particularly close to home. For many, the historic event remains relatively obscure, buts its impact has dramatic political ramifications over one hundred years later, which continues to raise the importance of active recognition. It is time for Mississippi to join the ranks of every other state in the nation, and officially recognize the Armenian Genocide.
As World War I raged, the Ottoman Empire quietly coordinated and carried out a brutal and efficient slaughter of the Armenian people. Those who survived were driven into the desert or tortured. As the eyes of the world centered on Western Europe, Turkish leaders committed the first mass genocide and human rights catastrophe of the 20th Century. Ultimately, more than 1.5 million Armenian people died. They were targeted for no more than their race and their Christian faith. Today, Turkey continues to deny its involvement in these events, further necessitating the importance of active recognition by official organizations, states, and actors from around the globe.
It was not until the middle of World War II when the term “genocide” was first introduced by Raphael Lemkin, a Polish-born lawyer who had fled persecution and escaped to the United States in 1941. Lemkin had lost multiple family members in the Holocaust and knew that the world was struggling with a dearth of both law and language to address the atrocities appropriately. In that same year, he was moved by a radio address from Churchill who described the horrific mass executions being conducted by the Germans as the “crime without a name.”
Lemkin was deeply inspired by the Armenian genocide and the vehement need to place such a catastrophic and systematic destruction of a people into a specific term, so that the world could both better understand such events, prevent such destruction of life, and hold perpetrators accountable. He first used the term “genocide” in a book describing the evils of life under the Axis powers, and the word was elevated through its use by the newly formed United Nations in 1948.
Following Alabama Governor Kay Ivey’s proclamation last April, every state in the nation besides Mississippi has now recognized the Armenian Genocide. Other states have officially certified recognition through a variety of means including gubernatorial proclamation, legislative recognition, or in many cases, both gubernatorial and legislative action.
Some Mississippi leaders have attempted to achieve official recognition of the Genocide through the legislative process. In 2015, then Representative, and now Hattiesburg Mayor, Toby Barker sponsored a piece of legislation that would have actively recognized the Armenian genocide. The resolution acknowledged the call for recognition which came earlier from student leaders at the University of Southern Mississippi. Unfortunately, the resolution died on the legislative calendar.
At the national level, a bill was introduced in 2019 which would have officially recognized the Genocide on the federal level for the first time. It proved to be one of the most bipartisan pieces of legislation of the year, as it passed both the Democratic-controlled House and the Republican-controlled Senate by historic margins. Unfortunately, the bill was not signed by President Trump. However, with massive bipartisan support, and the large presence of Americans of Armenian descent spread out across the country, legislation is very likely to reemerge on the calendar this year. Mississippi has the chance to participate in this process by joining every other state in the nation, recognizing the Genocide, and thus encouraging federal leaders to act on recognition efforts again.
Today, the persecution of Christian in the Middle East continues. The New York Times has noted that Christian populations in the Middle East have fallen from 14% to less than 4% and have been all but eliminated in certain states, including Turkey and Iran. Official recognition of historic events such as the Armenian Genocide calls us to be better, and in so doing hopefully prevent future massacres of people based on no more than their race or religious creed.
Ultimately, official genocide recognition is about the truth. As some attempt to use the long march of history as a chance to obscure, fog, and rewrite events, it becomes all the more important that we stand courageously for the truth. Only by clearly studying and recognizing history can we learn from the lessons of the path, and attempt in some way to construct a better society moving forward. Mississippi leaders have the chance to play an important role in the furthering of truth by recognizing the slaughter of Armenian Christians as what it truly was: a terrible genocide.
Hunter Estes is the Development Director for the Mississippi Center for Public Policy, the state’s non-partisan, free market think tank.
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