The Reconstruction era following the Civil War was a time during which efforts were made to right the past wrongs of slavery via policies designed to greater empower newly freed slaves with "the same civil rights as those of whites." In the aftermath of a bloody four year war, a noble if ambitious enterprise.
Though, as we know, those efforts were met with immediate resistance and opposition from the newly vanquished South, and from such entities as the Klan who intimidated, terrorized and murdered freed slaves and Republicans (who were then, the ideological opposite of what they represent today).
Reconstruction didn't last long, but still the period gave rise to at least some legislation that provided pathways toward "legal equality" for Black people. Or so the story goes.
However, the road to said "legal equality" has been fraught with many obstacles and setbacks for the next 140 years or so, and continues to be, because the struggle for civil rights, on many fronts, is far from over. In fact, it's only just begun.
Following Reconstruction came Jim Crow and segregation, the lynchings and race riots, and the murderous attacks upon the generational wealth of Black communities like Tulsa, Rosewood, Atlanta and others. But then came the Civil Rights movements of the 50's - 70's, Affirmative Action, and the landmark passing of the Civil Rights, Fair Housing, and Voting Rights Acts.
In all a tragically too long story of inequality and injustice, overcome, piece by piece, little by little, and by minute degrees over time, until it seemed, at least with the election of Barack Obama, that we were finally beginning to turn a corner on racism, hate, and bigotry in America. Disparities still, but perhaps beginning.
Little did we know eh?
Because though the election of America's first Black president was a joyous and historic occasion for many, it was also an event that seemed to stir and awaken the more malevolent minded within our society. An event that convinced those of such mentalities, that they were being "replaced," and that America needed to be "taken back" from whomever they imagined "had it."
And it was Donald Trump, their rabble rousing, hate preaching demagogue, who gave (and STILL gives) voice to their deepest fears and their most ignoble of sentiments.
So, to achieve those ends, to take US back, they fabricated a paranoid, alternate reality filled with lies, conspiracy theories, and outright demagoguery, to better enable what they'd set out to do.
They created the lie of massive voter fraud, to deprive Black people, the poor, and other minorities of their right to vote via gerrymandering, voter suppression laws, the closing and moving of polling places, and the enacting of laws enabling them to oust election officials and override election results,
and in so doing, conspired to undermine America's confidence in our elections.
To achieve their ends, conservative judiciaries and their Federalist Society manipulators and associates have worked to undermine and/or roll back landmark civil rights legislation having to do with voting rights, affirmative action, and the like.
To achieve those ends, they created the lie of CRT in elementary schools, to facilitate the removal of Black and minority history and to whitewash America's history of racism, in textbooks that now portray Rosa Parks, not as a notable figure in the Civil Rights Movement, but as some bus rider who was just having a bad day.
To achieve their ends, they attempt to terrorize, threaten, and intimidate - to silence and erase minorities, liberals, democratically elected officials, educators and school board members, members of the LGBTQ community...
and ANYONE else who does not see the world through their mean-spirited and cynically twisted vision, by labeling their opposition as "groomers and predators."
And having gotten away with all of the above and more, including endorsing hate speech, fascism and supremacy, openly inciting threats, insurrection and violence,
they have now become so emboldened as to brazenly enact legislation clearly designed to disempower and disenfranchise Black and minority elected leaders and voters in their own communities.
For example, in Mississippi, Republicans of late passed a bill to create a separate unelected court in a Black majority city, giving the citizens of that community no say.
In Georgia and other states, Republicans have removed Democrats of color from local boards, and in Louisiana, Republicans were involved in an effort to recall a mayor of a Black majority city, by discounting some 25,000 of the city's voters to lower the number of needed signatures.
While in Texas, GOP lawmakers are proposing laws to strip cities of self-governance, and to take over a majority Black school district in Houston.
And that's just the latest. Because the Republican effort to disenfranchise and disempower Black people and other minorities has been going on for at least a decade. "Taking America back" as they say... piece by piece.
An all out assault, an ongoing coup, the shackling of a people. Make no mistake about it, in Trump's MAGA America, Jim Crow is alive and living WELL.