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Reconstruction in America

Mass lynchings of Black people following the Civil War.

By Bullet or Ballot: One of the Only Successful Coups in American History

David Zucchino on the white supremacist plot to take over Wilmington, North Carolina.
Newspaper cartoon of Ku Klux Klan

The Deadliest Massacre in Reconstruction-Era Louisiana Happened 150 Years Ago

In September 1868, Southern white Democrats hunted down around 200 African-Americans in an effort to suppress voter turnout.

White Supremacists and the Rhetoric of "Tyranny"

White supremacists have long used fear of losing essential rights in their arguments.

Reasserting White Supremacy

South Carolina’s Ben Tillman and the 2016 presidential election.
Black family outside their homestead, Nicodemus, Graham County, Kansas.

Exodusters

Migration further west began almost immediately after Reconstruction ended, as Black Americans initiated the "Great Exodus" outside the South toward Kansas.
The Northampton Election, December 6, 1830, by J.M.W. Turner, c. 1830. A British election taking place in a town square with people waving banners and standing around.

The Tyranny of the Ballot

A man who wants everyone to know his views explains why he’s against voting in secret.
FBI agents and local police examine a bombed out pickup truck in Natchez, Mississippi.

The History of Violent Opposition to Black Political Participation

Leaders in the 20th-century South faced violence and death for promoting voting rights; systemic failure enabled their killers to go unpunished.
Abraham Lincoln campaigning with the Wide Awakes.

The Club of Cape-Wearing Activists Who Helped Elect Lincoln—and Spark the Civil War

The untold story of the Wide Awakes, the young Americans who took up the torch for their antislavery cause and stirred the nation.
Harry Truman speaking at the 1948 Democratic National Convention.

The 1948 Democratic National Convention Is the Missing Link in Civil Rights History

Civil rights activists failed to expel an all-white, segregationist delegation. But their efforts foreshadowed later milestones in the fight for equality

General George H. Thomas' Journey From Enslaver to Union Officer to Civil Rights Defender

One of the thousands of white Southerners who supported the Union during the Civil War and a rare example of a slave owner who changed his views on race.
Portraits of white men.

How 155 Angry White Men Chained Alabama to Its Confederate Past

Their plan required not only a social and legal division along racial lines but a political one, too — a separation that persists today.
Three Mississippi women, denied the right to go onto the House floor at the opening of the new Congress, stand Jan. 4, 1965, outside the Capitol. From left: Annie Devine, Fannie Lou Hamer and Victoria Gray.
partner

Remembering Past Harms is a Key First Step for Achieving Social Justice

Mississippi makes a move to confront a shameful episode from the past.
Portrait of Medgar Evers.

The Day The Civil-Rights Movement Changed

What my father saw in Mississippi.
African American man casting a ballot following the Fifteenth Amendment.

Echoes of 1891 in 2022

Using the congressional filibuster to prevent voting rights legislation isn't new. It has roots in the 19th century.
Texas Governor Greg Abbott signs state legislation on voting rights.

The Strange Career of Voting Rights in Texas

Republicans in Texas, and indeed around the country, remain hell-bent on going back to the future.
Man standing on top of a phone booth, surrounded by rioters outside of city hall.

The Forgotten City Hall Riot

In 1992, thousands of drunken cops raged against the mayor of New York — leaving an indelible mark on the city’s likely next mayor.
Civil Rights March on Washington, people holding signs calling for integration

How White Violence Turned a Peaceful Civil Rights Demonstration Into Mayhem

Winfred Rembert on protesting in the Jim Crow South and getting arrested.
Artistic rendering of a sheet of newspaper with people crossed out, flowing above people working menial jobs whose heads are also crossed out, working next to signs that read "Sorry."

On Atonement

News outlets have apologized for past racism. That should only be the start.
Wilmington coup marker

We’ve Had a White Supremacist Coup Before. History Buried It.

The 1898 Wilmington insurrection showed “how people could get murdered in the streets and no one held accountable for it.”
A composite photograph of South Carolina's majority-black legislature created and circulated by opponents of Reconstruction

The Austerity Politics of White Supremacy

Since the end of the Confederacy, the cult of the “taxpayer” has provided a socially acceptable veneer for racist attacks on democracy.
Rudy Giuliani and a graphic that says "multiple pathways to victory."

Disenfranchisement: An American Tradition

Invoking the specter of voter fraud to undermine democratic participation is a tactic as old as the United States itself.
Pro-Trump protester.
partner

The True Danger of Trump and His Media Allies Denying the Election Results

Misinformation and conspiracy theories can foment violence and thwart democracy.
Broadside showing the Louisiana Returning Board entitled "The Political Farce of 1876," published by Joseph A. Stoll, c. 1877.

Undecided Candidates

An excerpt from the diary of presidential hopeful at the outset of the contested election of 1876.

An American Pogrom

Uncovering the truth about the 1898 massacre of black voters in Wilmington, North Carolina.

White Supremacy Is the Achilles Heel of American Democracy

Even in a high-tech era, fears about minority political agency are the most reliable way to destabilize the U.S. political system.

What the Civil Rights Movement Has to Do With Denim

The history of blue jeans has been whitewashed.

No Twang of Conscience Whatever

Patsy Sims reflects on her interview with the man who was instrumental in the death of three black men in Mississippi.

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