Stephen Henderson

Detroit Free Press Editorial Page Editor

On the ground, draped with New York police officers who wanted to teach him a lesson about mouthing off, Eric Garner reminded us of the layered problems that frame the racial tensions between police and black America.

It's not just about the literal chokehold that squeezed the life out of Garner as he protested, 11 times, that he couldn't breathe. This is also about the stifling authority being unleashed against black males in wild disproportion to their behavior, and the quickness with which even a minor transgression can be met with lethal force, then rationalized by a criminal justice system gone maddeningly astray.

This is what has black parents fretting. Frankly, it's also what has black people like me, those of us for whom civil rights progress has meant relative comfort among America's middle or upper classes, wondering whether it's time to be in the streets to protect our children, our families, our neighbors.

And this is where the focus must be for solutions: on shattering dangerous, fantasy-driven notions about the necessity of violent police-citizen interactions, especially in black communities.

Time and again, we hear from police officers that deadly force was warranted, that petty crimes justify confrontations that lead to the end of someone's life. It's 21 times more likely to happen to black men than to others, according to the non-profit investigative news service ProPublica.

We need to concentrate on reinstalling basic covenants that value life over property or attitude or even respect. And we need to remind ourselves that when police decide that their job is to compel submission rather than enforce the law, the slide to the role of executioner has too few speed bumps.

Garner's case is instructive because of the video (taken by a citizen who got indicted for his work, unlike the cops who killed) that distinctly illustrates myriad troubling dynamics.

In its essence, it shows us that Eric Garner's life meant less than officers' pride or unmerited need to assert their authority.

Garner is agitated in the beginning seconds of the video. clearly perturbed by the mere fact that police are detaining him and, as he says, "always" messing with him.

It's not the way anyone tells their son or daughter to respond to police interaction. And for decades, black people have had "the talk" with their kids about not challenging police authority for fear of often deadly over-reaction.

But notice that Garner's behavior is neither harmful nor even threatening. He's being disrespectful, not violent. Cops are supposed to recognize the difference.

The officers' response was aggressive. Garner was allegedly selling unlicensed cigarettes — a non-violent crime that typically results in a fine, maybe a little jail time if it's a serial offense.

Still, several cops converge on Garner for an arrest, and when he resists, they take him down, one officer employing a chokehold.

It's the dictionary definition of out-sized response. It's also shrouded in racial overtones that should disturb.

Garner was a "big black man," six-foot-three and 350 pounds. His size, aggravated by his demeanor and almost certainly his skin color, surely played a role in the number of officers who responded. But what was the exigency in Garner's case? His mouth? We have police to protect citizenry and property. Neither was at stake in Garner's case, so where's the justification for lethal force?

Think of how similar the circumstances are to Ferguson, Mo., where an officer repeatedly talked about fear stemming from Michael Brown's size, telling an improbable and bizarre story about Brown running through bullets to warrant so many shots being fired.

The assumption of inherent threat from large black men should be mitigated by a police officer's training and moral character. It's obvious we're not close to that in far too many jurisdictions.

Garner's case also indicts the criminal justice system's handling of these kinds of incidents. There should likely be a requirement that outside prosecutors deal with controversial officer conduct, to remove even the appearance of blue-line excuse making. And the standard for justified police use of force must be remeasured to take into account the nature of alleged crimes. The law should not see selling illegal cigarettes as sufficient to warrant violent confrontation between several officers and a citizen. And even if that citizen resists, lethal force is wildly disproportionate. That could be an area for justice department interest.

The Garner video calls us to re-examine, very seriously, the balance between law and order and civil liberties — especially where black citizens are concerned.

We are the ones who live in the most violent communities, and need the police the most. But the prevalence of crime in black communities is not an invitation to authoritarianism, or the assumption that life and liberty have value that diminishes as skin color gets darker.

Police should serve and protect. For black America, that axiom is moving further from, not closer to, the truth.