Perspective: First Lady’s Spain Trip Stirs Up Reflections of America’s Past: It seemed surprising that two days before first lady Michelle Obama’s recent visit to Spain, the U.S. State Department removed a warning on its website that stated, “We have received isolated reports that racial prejudice may have contributed to the arrest or detention of some African-Americans traveling in Spain.”Someone must have grasped the incongruity of the State Department having such a statement on its website when the African-American wife of the first African-American president of the United States was about to arrive in Spain.
The presence of such language on the State Department website should not surprise any minority in this country or any person of a darker hue who has traveled here. Perhaps, a historical perspective about the United States and its treatment of African-Americans and darker-skinned foreigners, especially by the State Department, would be helpful.
