by Malik Miah

About the author: Malik Miah is an advisory editor for Against the Current, a magazine published by the Socialist organization Solidarity.

It's happened to most Blacks at least once in our lifetime. Driving towards home or heading from work on the freeway a cop decides to pull you over for no reason. You wait in your car (you never get out first), hoping it's nothing. As you wait, the tension increases throughout your body. You keep your hands visible and crack no smile. Is it just a ticket? Or worse? (You wonder why African- Americans have high blood pressure.)

It's happened to me. In Detroit—my hometown—in 1970, for example, I was coming home in the late evening after attending Wayne State University.

Iturned down my street on the...