After the Civil War, Lincoln’s successor, Andrew Johnson, pardoned all former Confederate leaders and resisted Congressional efforts at Reconstruction, the intended remaking of the former Confederacy into a free labor society. This meant laborers would be free to work for the highest bidder, (though, of course, no labor unions — Socialism!). Not that the highest bidders’ bids were high, but the conditions and pay, and the promise of owning land, were infinitely better than slavery, particularly the especially vicious American variant.
Reconstruction lasted throughout the two terms of Ulysses S. Grant’s presidency and real change was briefly accomplished. Three Constitutional amendments and several powerful laws, with federal enforcement, brought about a short period of freedom for Black Americans, who held majorities in more than one Southern state, voted in large numbers and elected Blacks to represent them inCongress.
Southern whites naturally decried the federal intervention to enforce the freedom amendments, including voting rights, asBayonetRule and continued to be outraged by the federal clamp downon the Ku Klux Klan, whichhad impeded southern style law enforcement for righteously terrifiedwhites.
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As you might suspect, Reconstruction ended abruptly, and White Supremacy was restored, pursuant to a famous compromiseto settle thecontestedelection of 1876. Here’s Andrea Bernstein on the Hayes-Tilden Compromise:
The great-granddaughter of a Black congressman from South Carolina, voted out as soon as South Carolina whites regained control and Black voting disappeared for a century,continues, eloquently and poignantly.History can break your fucking heart.
I have been saying (and writing) that 110,000,000 eligible US voters sat out the 2020 presidential election. I was repeating unverified information from a trusted source (Mary Trump, I think). I prefer multiple sources to confirm facts.
The other day I did the math. Adding Trump’s 74,000,000, Biden’s 81,000,000 and110,000,000 gives us 265,000,000, an unlikely number of 18 years plus in a nation of 334,776,423, (as of Trump’s 76th birthdaylast week.)
National Public Radio reported it was a mere 80,000,000 who took no side in Biden v Trump. I stand possibly corrected. Here’s their story, with the various rationales for abstaining from our democratic duty to hold our nose and vote every few years:
My math, using the 110,000,000 number, gave me about 20% of the U.S. population under 18, which seemed very low.
Quick check with the US Census, and, yep, just over 20% under 18.
By comparison, the younger population under age 18 numbered 73.1 million, or 22.1% of the U.S. population in 2020, a 1.4% decrease from 74.2 million in 2010
So the number of eligible voters who sat out Trump v. Biden was likely around 100,000,000 friends of democracy.God damn.
On the other hand 26,664,746 more votes were cast in 2020 (67% of eligible voters) than in 2016 (55%) meaning possibly 130,000,000 Americans sat out 2016. The 2020 increase broke 11.2 million more for Trumpie and 15.4 million more for his Democratic opponent. Hence the drive in every Republican state to nullify the votes of non-Republicans in the name of Election Integrity (and the hothouse grown Independent State Legislature Doctrine.)
Chris Hayes with an excellent essay on the power of live, sworn testimony to topple corrupt, powerful bullies. A witness from the Army spoke the words above to lying, bullyingdemogogueJoe McCarthyonJune 9, 1954, back in more innocent days when lies debunked were accepted as lies, and lying was still considered bad, wrongand disqualifyingfor an office of public trust.
Joseph Welch’swordsto destructiveSenator Joe McCarthy ended McCarthy’s reign, McCarthy was censured and finished drinking himself to death threeyears later. McCarthy’s unscrupulous, evil gunsel Roy Cohn begat ratfucker Roger Stone, forming a straight line fromNixon to Trump. I find the history fascinating.
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