A Historical Look At Policing and Violent White Mobs

Speaker 1: 00:00 Last week's riot at the capital raised many questions about how law enforcement responded compared to their response and preparation over the summer during protests for criminal justice reform. In fact, their lack of preparedness was outrageous and even painful to see for many who have witnessed police use of force for seeking equality and justice throughout history. Joining me to discuss the historical perspective of this is David Miller, a lecture of history at USD, where he teaches race and ethnicity and the civil war professor Miller. Welcome. Speaker 2: 00:33 Well, thank you for having me, Speaker 1: 00:35 You know, first let's talk about the historical reality of black people being brutalized by law enforcement while asking for equality and justice while angry white moms are in many ways welcomed by law enforcement and rarely face accountability for their terror and atrocities. Speaker 2: 00:51 Yeah, I think this is absolutely the appropriate place to start because obviously we're now still sorting through the facts and figuring out what exactly happened. And a lot of people there's a lot of perceptions and feelings that this was a very different response than what we've seen over the summer or what might've happened. Had these been black lives matter protesters. And what's interesting is we now have data. In fact, I was just seeing there's a, a, uh, the website five 38 is reporting a recent academic study that showed during the summer. In fact, since may authorities were twice as likely to break up and disperse left-wing protest and right wings. And there were 34%, uh, likely to use force against right-wing protest when we 51% against the left. So clearly we now have data that shows that people's feelings and perceptions are actually accurate. So I think the question then is what's the historical context that what's what, what's the larger picture of us history that allows us to, to engage in this question. Hmm. Speaker 1: 01:49 You know, and there were Confederate flags, nooses, and chance to hang vice president Mike Pence, for example. So many of them Americans didn't just see writers, they saw a painful reminder of an angry Lynch mob. Can you talk about that? Speaker 2: 02:02 Yeah. This is one of the things that, you know, Americans are aware of. We know that there was a civil war, there was a Confederacy, there was lynching, but we tend to treat parts of American history as isolated or unique enough events. And historians know that, of course, all of these things are interconnected and there's a much larger story. And so to see a Confederate flag or the idea of, uh, uh, of lynching it and in a political act has very clear, painful connections, uh, to the historical reality of that, that throughout the history of the United States, white mobs, both inside and outside the law have used terror and force and, and, and, and violence to, to suppress black freedom efforts to, to suppress efforts by minorities, by immigrants, by women, um, to advocate or exercise constitutional rights. Uh, and the connection I think to the civil war is particularly important because a lot of people are talking this as if there's sort of a division like the civil war. And in fact, I think thinking about the repercussions of the civil war in the outcome of the civil war, the consequences, uh, in terms of race can help us understand what's happening and what we saw. Speaker 1: 03:14 So then what motivates, uh, angry white mobs, are there similarities specifically between the angry white, white mobs after the civil war during reconstruction, for example, and then last week's predominantly white mob in terms of their motivations. Speaker 2: 03:30 Yeah. You know, it's hard to draw exact parallels, but what we know is that the roughly 400 year history of the United States is one based on not just white supremacy, but white normalcy. Um, going back to slaves arriving in 16, 19, the naturalization act of 1790, that declared whites, uh, whiteness as requirement for citizenship, white has been the standard and as such white rage or right. White protest is oftentimes viewed as being legitimate and fundamentally patriotic, whereas black or Brown is not. And that's oftentimes because they're protesting from outside the system, a system that didn't include them. And an example of this is during, um, right after the civil war during reconstruction in 1866, uh, while reconstructing the state of Louisiana black veterans of the, of the union army in the civil war, uh, went on a, uh, a freedom March, uh, to, uh, advocate for their right to vote and a white mob of deputized sheriffs and former Confederates attack them. And this riot left 50 people dead, 150 wounded. And, and, and that's just one example. We could go to Colfax in 1873 or Wilmington in 1898, where you have whites who have this, who use violence outside the law to preserve their white authority and their normalcy, because that's what allows them, especially at the voting booth to have power and to enact things like Jim Crow. Speaker 1: 04:59 So then do you think that those reasons are similar to the reasons we saw what happened last week at the Capitol? Speaker 2: 05:07 You know, that's hard to say, um, this is a large group of people with very motivations and, uh, varied, uh, reasons for being there. Those can even change in the moment. Um, but certainly it's clear when you see white supremacy, symbols, and Confederate flags, that there is clearly a white nationalist and white centered grievance, um, that that's undeniable. Um, but I do think that again, as we sought out those details and, and exact motivations, the bigger picture makes sense. Um, the bigger picture of history is that white people have had the, the right and are therefore perceived as being legitimate protestors, whereas black and Brown folks are not. Uh, and so that lens a, uh, maybe a, you know, a perception of being less hostile or less dangerous, whereas black protesters are historically viewed as being illegitimate and dangerous. So I think that the, the, the roots of this go back well beyond, uh, you know, even 2016, they go back deep into our history, back to the civil war, back to reconstruction, back to the founding of the country. And that's sometimes I think hard for, uh, for people to, to think about and come to terms with. Speaker 1: 06:27 Yeah. So I, you know, looking at history then, um, is that why, you know, you think maybe law enforcement used so much force with demonstrators this past summer calling crew who were calling for criminal justice reform versus almost no force, uh, for the writers at the camp. Speaker 2: 06:42 I mean, it's certainly possible. I think we know that it's, it's clear the statistics bear it out. So this just isn't, you know, people perceiving it, like I said, this report that shows that, uh, law enforcement used violence 51% of the time against left BLM protests when we 34% of the time against white. And I think that comes back to a historical reality that white people and their anger and their outrage is viewed collectively in our imagination, whether we want to believe it or not as being somehow legitimate and somehow patriotic, whereas black outrage and anger is viewed as dangerous. It's viewed as a threat and therefore, um, perhaps police are more likely or more willing, um, to, to use violence, uh, and to use more extreme, uh, countermeasures, uh, than they would against whites. Speaker 1: 07:34 Um, you know, after last week's riot, there are calls for peace and reconciliation before justice. Uh, when you look back at history, is that approach problematic? And if so, why? Speaker 2: 07:45 I would say that it is, you know, I'm not a politician, I'm not here to tell anybody all this what they should or shouldn't do. But historically I think one of the lessons of the civil war in particular civil war memory is that we see that after the war, there was a real discussion about what the war meant, what was its purpose. Um, some, both North and South wanted to reconcile. One had to have reunion others, especially former enslaved people, black veterans, their view of the civil war was that it was about emancipation, who was a moment of, of opportunity for racial justice. And what we know through our study of the memory of the civil war is that the reunion, the reconciliation, uh, message one out and, and what justifies that is what we might call the lost cause. Uh, and, and of course the result of that was another a hundred years of Jim Crow and racial segregation and white supremacy and violence. And so I think the lesson that, that the end of the civil war offers us is that when we're debating between peace and reconciliation and justice, um, that we have examples in our history where justice was left undone, as people rushed to simply reunite and sort of put, put the past behind them, Speaker 1: 08:59 Is that one of the reasons history seems to repeat itself. Speaker 2: 09:03 Yes. Um, you know, what, we're, what we're living with now comes from somewhere, uh, and it comes from a long history and a long past. And so, yeah, th these repetitions of history, aren't sort of just random, they are part of the decisions that people made in the past, um, that are now bearing out today. Um, so yes, yes. I would say absolutely. You know, it's not so much that history repeats itself, but it's that the historical consequences, uh, of the decisions made in the past are bearing fruit and they continue to, Speaker 1: 09:36 I've been speaking with David Miller, lecture of history at USD, professor Miller. Thank you so much for joining us. Speaker 2: 09:43 Thank you for having me.