Justice Denied, Sharpton Delayed

Al Sharpton, making up for lost time. (By Linda Davidson -- The Washington Post)

Twenty-two members of the House Judiciary Committee took their seats for yesterday's hearing into the Jena, La., racial conflagration. Cameras and a standing-room-only crowd jammed the hearing room. But where was the star witness?

"Let me apologize," the Rev. Al Sharpton told the committee after strolling in an unfashionable one hour and 42 minutes late. "I have been on the tarmac in New York for the last two hours, so it was the airlines, not me, that is responsible."

Not exactly, Reverend. True, Sharpton's 8:30 Delta Shuttle flight was canceled, but even if it had been on time, it would have put Sharpton on Capitol Hill well after the hearing's start time. The real reason: Sharpton had to be on the set of NBC's "Today" show in New York yesterday morning.

As it happens, Sharpton may have done the lawmakers a favor. Before his arrival, Democrats, Republicans and the other witnesses managed to have a relatively low-key discussion about the case.

Richard Cohen, president of the Southern Poverty Law Center, argued that the white students who hung a noose at their high school shouldn't be prosecuted for hate crimes just because black students had been unfairly punished by a nefarious district attorney for beating a white schoolmate. Likewise, Harvard law professor Charles Ogletree urged the committee to focus on failing schools and ways to improve race relations in Jena.

But overshadowing this dialogue was the empty chair at the witness table. "If I were compiling a group of witnesses to encourage the diminishing of racial disharmony, I don't know that Mr. Sharpton would have made my cut," Rep. Howard Coble (R-N.C.) advised Chairman John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.).

As if on cue, Sharpton, in a three-piece suit, walked in a few minutes later and, to the tune of hundreds of camera-shutter clicks, took his seat. Conyers asked if he wished to make a belated opening statement, and Sharpton certainly did.

"It is almost like the national government is not in the country while we're watching nooses on the news every night," he said so loudly that microphones were superfluous. "The Justice Department," he continued, poking his fingers in the air, "needs to step into Jena and the Jenas of this country and establish that . . . the states did not win the Civil War."

Conyers, with civil rights credentials of his own, reminded Sharpton that he was "in the federal government right now before the Judiciary Committee, who I think has responded in quite a timely manner." The chairman further advised Sharpton: "I'm not sure if you had the benefit of what I thought was some excellent discussion."

But it was no use. It may have been Sharpton's words, his presence, or merely a coincidence, but after his arrival, the session quickly turned into an attack on the Bush administration and its representative at the hearing, U.S. Attorney Donald Washington of Louisiana, an African American himself.

Cohen, the civil rights lawyer, appealed for "cooler heads" and cautioned that "the wheels of justice grind slowly." But Sharpton demanded immediate action. "I know that the wheels of justice may turn slow, but it seems that it's at a standstill."

Soon after that, Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee (D-Tex.) exploded with rage at the U.S. attorney. "Tell me why you did not intervene," she shouted at the witness, who clenched his jaw and fiddled with his pen. "These broken lives could have been prevented if you had taken the symbolic responsibility that you have, being the first African American appointed to the Western District," she said, her voice breaking into a shriek at times as the audience cheered. "I am outraged."