California’s Governor Newsom Signs Reparation Law

Governor Gavin Newsom has signed a first-in-the-nation law requiring companies with over $100 million in worldwide gross income per year to search records and disclose slavery-related transactions. The records will show if the company, or predecessors of the company, profited from chattel slavery.

No doubt with $68.7 billion in industry underwriting income and over $111 billion in investment income in 2025, several insurers will fit the new law’s category. Many insurance companies opposed the bill as it progressed through the Legislature. They said this duplicates a law passed in 2000 and insurers have already submitted records on their involvement, or non-involvement, with slavery.

The California Legislature’s Black Caucus made the bill a top-priority in the just concluded session. It was written by Assemblymember Isaac Bryan. The law will apply to all companies that existed, or whose predecessor firm existed on, or before, December of 1964.

All records will be sent to California’s Civil Rights Department and will be made public. Companies could be indicted for perjury if they tamper with the records, or report them incorrectly.

Companies will have time to do the research since the first filings are due on January 15, 2029.

Proponents claim the database to be compiled from the filings will be a useful tool for researchers, journalists and academics to find connects between current company wealth and the company’s participation in a slave economy.

One example given by the California Reparations Task Force involved JP Morgan Chase. Two banks the company owns took the ownership of 13,000 slaves as collateral for a loan. When the company defaulted, the banks ended up owning 1,200 of those slaves.

By the way, JP Morgan Chase issued a formal apology for the incident last year.

“I’m thinking agriculture. I’m thinking banking, insurance. I’m thinking anything in the financial sector,” Bryan said. “Once the public has this disclosure and we have a full accounting of the impact, then it’s up to us to decide what that means and what we’re going to do about it.”

Source link: CalMatters — https://bit.ly/4j94549