“Redeeming” the South
At lunch break today I finished Redemption by Nicholas Lemann. I closed the book and sat in silence for a few minutes. Along with A Briefer History of Time, this narrative has been slowly changing the way I view my world, and the closing chapter was a stunner.
What I’d like to do in the next few posts is give an outline of the history Lemann tells, and sketch a few of the major figures. Then I’ll talk about what impacted me so much in the last chapter. My next bit of history to research is the growth of the two major political parties in the US. As you’ll see, for the Democrats to be the assumed party of African-Americans is a pretty major change from the way things were in the aftermath of the Civil War.
The Historical Context
Lemann starts the book in Colfax, Louisiana, in 1873. The Civil War is (ostensibly) over, General Grant is president for a second term, and Louisiana is in turmoil over its recent election. It was close, probably due to ballot fraud, and both Democrats and Republicans claim they won. Federal troops install Republicans, including a few black officeholders. A black deputy sheriff (Republican) named William Ward and a white deputy sheriff (Democrat) named Columbus Nash are then bickering over which of them should get control over the local police. Ultimately, the Republicans break into the courthouse in order to install Ward. Against this backdrop, Lemann tells the following story:
A party of white Democrats bearing weapons rode into town a week later, April 4,, fearing that the new sheriff, Ward, was training a black militia who would do unspeakable things to the white townspeople. There were skirmishes between the whites and the blacks, resulting primarily in the deaths of the blacks. Ward went for reinforcements on April 9th. Another week went by and, on Easter Sunday, several hundred white men went into Colfax, armed and ready to attack, complete with a cannon. The blacks holed up in the courthouse, which the whites then set fire to.
At this point, the blacks waved a white flag of surrender from inside, and the leader of the white militia went forward to receive the surrender. He was shot–but merely wounded. Black accounts claim it was an accident, brought on by the discharge of a white weapon. Whites claim he was murdered in cold blood.
Immediately, the white militia began killing the trapped blacks, carving up their bodies even after they were dead. Unfortunately, the story goes on. That evening, some of the same white men shot black prisoners they had taken throughout the day. Fearing for their lives, the families left behind don’t dare to collect the bodies, which are left in the streets. At the end of the matter, once the US Army arrived, three whites and between seventy-three and three hundred blacks were dead.
As recently as 1921, the "Colfax Riot", as it was termed by the whites, was celebrated with a monument in the town cemetery. No one was punished for the murders, despite an attempt at a trial by a federal court. In fact, because the government had even attempted a trial, Southern resentment in newspapers grew:
We, having grown weary of tame submission to this most desolating war of the negro upon us, propose to take a bold stand to assert the dignity of our manhood, to say in tones of thunder and with the voice of angry elements STOP! THUS FAR SHALT THOU GO AND NO FURTHER! the Caucasian, 1874.
It is in this violent, racially charged environment that Lemann’s story takes place. He tells of how Mississippi blacks, threatened and killed by white Democrats, were frightened into voting Democratic. He tells of the impotence of General Grant and his unwillingness to send federal troops to enforce the newly passed 14th and 15th amendments. And he tells of how the saga of Reconstruction is framed in terms of Northern corruption, states rights and the Southern desire to gain financial strength and stability.
Next: The Major Players
Image from the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, originally published in Harper’s Weekly by Thomas Nash.