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From The Chicago Tribune

By Ronald Hampton, Executive Director, National Black Police Association

A police department’s officers are trained to enable Constitutional due process safeguards. Armies are not designed with this purpose – armies are trained to kill. The suggestion of the National Guard to be deployed in black and Mexican neighborhoods in Chicago is an outgrowth of the scary trend toward militaristic policing by many police agencies in the U.S. (Chicago in particular). The problem is compounded by many men with militaristic aspirations, but lacking courage for military service; rather using police work and low-income residential communities as way to achieve military aspirations.

The National Black Police Association is an organization of black police officers. If anyone has the credibility to speak on a nonsensical suggestion that a military entity be deployed in Chicago, it is us. Most of our members have policed the country’s biggest cities and most dangerous neighborhoods. The NBPA and its members know through personal experience that the National Guard does not belong on Chicago streets. No surprise to us that most of the people supporting the deployment of the Guard in Chicago have never been police officers. Add to that, that most of these misguided people have never served our country in the U.S. Military. Many NBPA have served in the U.S. Military (e.g., the writer, a United States Marine); therefore, our members know that there is stark difference between military duties and police duties.

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