Mr. President, you are right

“The President … should be supported or opposed exactly to the degree which is warranted by his good conduct or bad conduct, his efficiency or inefficiency in rendering loyal, able, and disinterested service to the Nation as a whole. Therefore it is absolutely necessary that there should be full liberty to tell the truth about his acts, and this means that it is exactly necessary to blame him when he does wrong as to praise him when he does right.” —President Theodore Roosevelt

There are times when it seems as though disagreeing with President Obama has become something of a cottage industry. Indeed, I will fully admit to having voiced reservations about his policy proposals and political stances in many venues, including in this forum last week. Yesterday, as I was reading for work, I came across a story titled “Obama says mistrust of police corroding America,” about a speech that the president delivered to the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation on Saturday. This led me, in turn, to find the transcript of the speech — and there is much of value in that speech.

President Obama told the audience, which included the family of Michael Brown, the Ferguson, Mo., teen whose death has sparked more than a month of protest, that “the anger and the emotion that followed his [Brown’s] death awakened our nation once again to the reality that people in this room have long understood, which is, in too many communities around the country, a gulf of mistrust exists between local residents and law enforcement.” Moreover, citing statistics from a recent public opinion poll, Obama noted that “the majority of Americans think the criminal justice system doesn’t treat people of all races equally. Think about that. That’s not just blacks, not just Latinos or Asians or Native Americans saying things may not be unfair. That’s most Americans. And that has a corrosive effect — not just on the black community; it has a corrosive effect on America.”

{mosads}Mr. President, you are right. The distrust of the police, in my estimation, is a homeland security issue. When a large portion of the American populace is not merely disconnected from the police, but perceives itself as a target — whether this perception is real or imaged — then there is a major issue facing the domestic security of this nation.

This divide is not healthy for the community that the police serve, nor is it safe for police officers themselves. It is important to remember the unsafe work environment facing police officers in all the critical discussions about Ferguson, militarized police and profiling by police. It is also necessary that Americans and their elected officials continue discussions seeking to bridge divides between communities and police departments. President Obama recognized this truth on Saturday, saying in part that “we need to help communities and law enforcement build trust, build understanding, so that our neighborhoods stay safe and our young people stay on track.”

Let all of us, no matter our ethnicity, religion, education level, gender or hometown work together to solve this issue. It matters not whether we join hands because of moral imperative, religious faith, love of humankind or for patriotism. It matters only that we act together, in concert, to establish trust between officer and citizen.

Gibson is an associate professor of political science at Westminster College in Missouri.