Here's What's So Jarring About Hillary Clinton's Thoughts On Reconstruction

[Depaysement]

At the the Iowa Democratic forum on Monday night, Hillary Clinton took one of the easiest questions lobbed her way -- Who is your favorite president? -- and blasted it right into the back of her own goal.

She did fine with the first part, naming Abraham Lincoln, but then dipped into the history of Reconstruction, bemoaning the vengeful way in which the North targeted the South after Lincoln's assassination.

"You know, he was willing to reconcile and forgive. And I don't know what our country might have been like had he not been murdered, but I bet that it might have been a little less rancorous, a little more forgiving and tolerant, that might possibly have brought people back together more quickly. But instead, you know, we had Reconstruction, we had the re-instigation of segregation and Jim Crow. We had people in the South feeling totally discouraged and defiant. So, I really do believe he could have very well put us on a different path."

. . .

After the Civil War, freed slaves were given the right to vote, and people who participated in the rebellion were temporarily barred from the ballot. The Union army was used to assure that the elections would be honored. Imagine if a big chunk of today's Republican Party was blocked from voting, and you can get a sense of the political leaning of the Congress, legislatures and governors in power immediately after the war. Congress passed a Civil Rights Act and a series of sweeping and, for the time, radical Constitutional amendments. For the first time, legislatures in the South created public schools and put an effort into public health. The Democratic Party of the time settled on a path of obstruction, determined to undermine the Reconstruction legislatures. The white supremacists chose that path not because Reconstruction was failing, but because they were afraid it would work.

. . .

In real life, freed slaves were not passive victims of Klan violence, but fought back in ways both organized and spontaneous -- a resistance that never died, even in the darkest days of Jim Crow.
One of the historians we spoke to for the podcast, Douglas Egerton, put it this way: "Reconstruction didn't fail in the South. It was killed. It was murdered."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/hillary-clinton-reconstruction_us_56a7f9c3e4b04936c0e8a6c9

[DonCoquixote]

1. and here is the problem with many

both Hillary, and yes, to a large extent Saunders.

This is NOT a matter of trying to win people's hearts, or their minds. If there was logic, then people would wonder how come the Rich Good ol boys were always the ones making the money. It it was a matter of the heart, then racism would have died long ago. The only thing that stops racism is a combination of truth and shame, NEITHER of which is a simple matter of money. Oh yes, Money is a major part of it, and it will take the sort of coin that neither the Cruzes nor Hillarys of the world are willing to spend. However, there is an aspect of racism that is just plain old, suicidal malice, an outright addiction, no less than nicotine or cocaine, and addictions only die when someone hits bottom, something that has not happened to the bigots, because the politicians know there is money and power to be made by becoming a co-dependent.

[Vattel]

3. Interesting post. Thanks.

[daybranch]

4. Good post but suggest

we all read W.E.B. DuBois's book "Black Reconstruction" for detailed understanding of the violence inflicted on the former slaves including his statement that after the civil war both Whites and blacks became slaves (to the very Northern and Southern rich). Martin Zinn's compelling history book "The People's History of the United States" discusses the conditions by which both Native Americans, poor whites, and poor blacks have been manipulated and mistreated by the top 2 percent since the time of Columbus.

[DonCoquixote]

5. good suggestion, however

I remember hi ow a lot of people would quote Joe Bageant, author of books like "deer hunting with Jesus." His theme was the poor whites, which he called the "scots-irish" were an oppressed, exploited people, and that the nation had been so busy labeling them rednecks that they had failed to help them. Yes, there was truth in that, but the one thing Joe never hit on is that, unlike all other races, the poor whites were always willing to give sympathy and allegiance to the rich whites, because they never want to think that they are just one group among many. They wanted to feel they were the chosen people. The Calvinist churches (baptist, etc) that are a major part of Southern Culture also do a lot to keep the poorer whites from actually get angry enough to rise up. It is why Unions are weakest in the South, despite labor conditions that cry out for Labor unions. It is why so many Southern Churches are outright citadels for the GOP, preaching politics from the pulpit and raising funds to win elections. While I can sympathize with the genuine plight of many poor whites, there is alwasy the fear of what has happened many times; that all a preacher or politico has to do uis strum the right heartstrings and my comrade will suddenly turn on me, and join the rest of the GOP kicking my face in.

And yes, this is why I never forgive either Clinton for all the damn racist dog whistles they blew in 2008. If that worked and put Hillary into the white house that year, that would have said "we would rather have the membership of the bigot than the minority." I know I may have to choke down Hillary, and the thought of it, howevfer necessary it may be, makes me sick, because I know if she could turn us in for the support of half the old "dixiecrat" types, she would.

[Art_from_Ark]

2. I actually agree with Hillary on this

Reconstruction might have started out as something positive, but in a lot of cases it degenerated into little more than Northerners taking advantage of a bad situation. The bulk of Reconstruction was handled under the Grant administration, which was the most corrupt administration that had existed up to that time, and there were cases where the "Union army (that) was (supposedly) used to assure that the elections would be honored" actually made sure that Republicans would be elected. Look at the 1874 "Brooks-Baxter War" in Arkansas as an example of a corrupt electoral process that was set up to ensure that the Republican won the race.

Republicans weren't satisfied with stealing local elections, though. In 1876, they went for the biggest prize of all-- the Presidency. The theft of that election, in which another former Union general, Rutherford Hayes, was installed as President, was so glaringly obvious that the Washington Post took to referring to Hayes as "His Fraudulency". But the South accepted the theft on the condition that Reconstruction end and Union troops withdraw. And when the Union troops pulled out after more than a decade of "reconstruction", what kind of economy did the South have?