Adam Serwer

Now, theoretically, you know, the end of quote unquote Negro domination should have led to some sort of peace.

But in fact, what happens is now that these communities are more vulnerable, now that black people are more vulnerable, now that there is no democratic accountability to black people,

the racism actually gets worse.

Ida B. Wells writes about this.

Frederick Douglass talks about this, which is like, if politicians do not fear losing your vote,

You know, they will overlook all kinds of things.

And what happens is particularly local authorities in the South, they simply just stop enforcing the law to protect black people in general.

And I do fear that what you're seeing with stuff like this in Tennessee is not simply a question of partisanship.

And to see it that way is actually like...

tremendously naive.

What you're doing is you are severing an entire community from democratic accountability, and that is going to leave them vulnerable to economic dispossession, to violence, to discrimination.

And I worry that that is precisely the point.

I mean, if you look at the way that the Republican Party changes after Reconstruction,

There's a North Carolina senator who was elected on a fusionist ticket.

I'm blanking on his name at the moment, but he is a tremendous champion of black rights.

There's this incredible scene in the Senate where he is mocking Benjamin Tillman, who probably holds the record for the use of the M word in the Senate.

And he's just making fun of him and talking about what a dummy and a loser he is.

And then, you know, North Carolina disenfranchisement happens.

And this his name is Senator Pritchett.

And after disenfranchisement happens, this guy becomes a huge advocate of the, quote unquote, lily white Republican Party of like just completely, you know, abandoning the whole black rights thing.