Racism post the Emancipation Proclamation

Echo - excellent opinion history essay published in the Abilene Reporter-News, in Texas:

"I never, in my life, felt more certain that I was doing right, than I do in signing this paper. If my name ever goes into history it will be for this act, and my whole soul is in it." President Abraham Lincoln said as he signed the Emancipation Proclamation January 1, 1863.

The Emancipation Proclamation is one of the top ten most important documents in the history of the United States.

Yes, the Republican Party used to be the Party of Lincoln and for that time, they were the party of anti-slavery.

But let’s be clear, the Democratic Party, the once conservative party, was staunchly pro-slavery, saying “Slavery was intended as a special blessing to the people of the United States.”

So what happened to the Republican Party?

As Blacks were being lynched, denied their civil rights, denied the right to vote and hounded by the Ku-Klux-Klan, the Republican President Eisenhower sent troops to the South to protect minorities. 

Then, everything changed in 1964 and 1965, when the Civil Rights Act (CRA) and Voting Rights Act (VRA) were signed by President Lyndon Johnson.

The GOP’s 1964,nominee for president, Barry Goldwater, voted against the CRA. Goldwater won only his state of Arizona and five states in the Deep South. Ayes in support for both the CRA and VRA, came from both Republicans and Democrats.

Among the Republicans who voted nay were conservatives. All the Democrats who voted nay were the segregationists Dixiecrats. They would all switch to the Republican Party, including racists Strom Thurmond and Jesse Helms. White resentment sent millions of Dixiecrats to the Republican Party.

Throughout the '60s, John Lewis battled bigotry and hatred, almost succumbing to his injuries by a hateful mob. He would be instrumental in the march at Selma, eventually become the Democratic Congressman from Georgia and be famous for getting into “good trouble."

Where were the conservatives during the civil rights era? Silent, mostly. Some, including the Ku-Klux-Klan, called Lewis and Martin Luther King communists. "The Freedom Fighter," a KKK publication, attacked the “Black Warren Court, the NAACP as…being too dumb to learn, filthy, diseased, evil-minded Negro.”

I remember growing up in the '60s. I learned the terms red-lining, unfair housing, racism, bigotry and even saw evidence of all of this. I also grew up with classmates whose parents did this.

I also had friends or the parents wearing George Wallace hats. George Wallace was the racist governor of Alabama who declared “segregation today, tomorrow and forever!” The George Wallace folks just traded in their hats for today’s MAGA hats.

Of course, Trump and his dad engaged in red-lining.

So, over the years there has been a smattering of good news from the GOP regarding race, including G.W. Bush reauthorizing the Civil Rights Act. However, in 2013, the Supreme Court ruled the VRA preclearance could end. Within days, Republican governors enacted voter IDs, designed to make it harder to vote, especially among the poorest and the most disenfranchised people. Most adults alive in the '50s and '60s remember this all too well.

CRA signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson on July 2, 1964.

In recent elections. voters had a choice, such as those in Alabama. Democratic U.S. Sen. Doug Jones, the attorney for the families of four Black girls murdered in the Birmingham church bombing, was replaced by — a football coach.

So, are we further along with race relations than 60 years ago? Of course.

Has King’s dream become reality? Depends on who you talk to.

Blacks are followed to their own home by police and by white neighbors.

Recently, inaugural poet Amanda Gorman was followed home by a white security guard. Red-lining still happens. Banks still deny loans to Black families simply for being Black. Governors still deny new trials for Black prisoners though there is evidence to overturn their conviction.

Today, the Republican Party has no resemblance to the party of Ike. They have all voted against the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act and the For the People Act. The 45th president hardly could resist racist claims President Obama wasn’t born in this country.

He also claimed Neo-Nazis and white supremacists are “very fine people”. He can’t stop defending the confederate flag, a symbol of our racist past.

Then, there’s the made up problem of critical race theory, an academic term which will be discussed later. What are they afraid of? How does the GOP become more inclusive? Stop defending the Confederate flag. Stop making it harder to vote. Stop this extreme effort to whitewash history.

If we must never forget 9/11 (and we must never), then let’s not forget about 1921, in Tulsa. 

Never forget who was Emmitt Till, Medger Evers and Rosa Parks.

“They are, in effect, still trapped in a history which they do not understand; and until they understand it, they cannot be released from it.” — James Baldwin, American novelist, playwright, essayist, poet and activist.

Mark Grose lives in Abilene, Texas.