What it celebrates, in part, is the official end of slavery in the United States, something signed into law by Abraham Lincoln through the Emancipation Proclamation. A republican president. And who were largely the Confederates?
Democrats in the deep south.
What the holiday also celebrates is the contribution that black Americans made on their own to fight for their freedom, donning Union uniforms and going into battle against the Confederates who sought to maintain slavery and secede from the United States.
I have never been bothered at all by the holiday, nor the celebration of a very defining moment in our history for black Americans. What does bother me is the lack of history provided to the American people when we talk about it.
Especially when you know the media, Joe Biden himself, and the democrat party will celebrate their making it a national holiday.
The thing is, while the Emancipation Proclamation freed the slaves, it did not immediately end racism. It did not change the views of the Confederates, and certainly it did not change the views of the democrat party, and I think making that narrative front and center is important when we talk about the holiday.
Because it is important. It is important to understand who it was who fanned the flames of racism throughout our history. It is important when the narrative that will be laid out is before the American people is that it was we the democrats who acknowledged the struggle of black Americans and made official the celebration of their freedom.
Sure. One can say, times have changed and ideas have shifted. For decades the democrats have tried to pain the republican party as a party of racists. It has never been true of course. But that's their story and they aren't going to edit that one.
What's worse is that the democrat party has been quite successful selling that narrative, most notably among the very people they, the democrats, largely contributed to the continuing degradation and separation of in America.
That's quite a feat if you think about it. And kudos to the democrats for having achieved it without many people blinking an eye.
Who fought against slavery and who continued to fight for the rights and freedoms of black Americans after slavery's end is an absolutely pertinent and vital part of the story.
You see, the thing is, the republican party itself was created as an anti-slavery party. Factions of the then Whig party adamantly opposed slavery and wanted it ended. Their sole purpose, after a meeting in Ripon, Wisconsin, was to oppose the expansion of slavery into the Western territories.
Abraham Lincoln joined the republican party and was the first president to serve as a republican. And of course, he ended slavery after the Civil War.
Thus, it was the republican party who freed the slaves.
At the time, the republicans called slavery a crisis. They opposed the tyrannical leadership of democrat president Andrew Jackson who did not see the urgency of ending it, and did nothing to oppose the push in the South to keep slavery, and expand it.
While the republicans won the fight, democrats continued to oppose the rights and freedoms of black Americans. This was particularly true in the South.
Southern democrats formed the Ku Klux Klan. Democrat legislators wrote and passed into law Jim Crowe laws, forcing blacks to the back of the bus and reserving designated areas where blacks could eat in restaurants, or barred blacks from eating there altogether. There were separate bathrooms and separate drinking fountains for blacks vs. whites. The democrats opposed equal voting rights for black people, fought against equal opportunity laws for black people and fought to maintain segregation of black and white students in schools.
No democrats voted for Civil Rights for black Americans. No democrats voted for desegregation either. When the laws were signed, the democrats made every attempt to refuse to uphold them.
I simply think that the whole story is important, and not enough people know it. I think it is an opportunity for black Americans to get the whole story and to understand it. I think it is important for black Americans to understand who was on their side and who was vehemently, and even violently opposed to them.
The horrible and haunting history of lynchings were not carried out by republicans. They were carried out by democrats in the South.
It is important to note that not only were democrats very open about their racism. They were proud of it. It was on full display, and they were not afraid to be called racists. The KKK did not operate in the shadows. They operated front and center, despite hiding their identities under white hoods. But everyone knew who they were.
The holiday is important to the American people. It is important to the history, even dark parts of it, of America. It is important to black America.
To not acknowledge, or try to erase from history the who, what, where and when is disingenuous. It rapes the achievement and tarnishes the cause. It makes a mockery of the battles and struggles of black Americans and the republican party who fought so hard for them to have freedoms and enjoy the same rights afforded to all Americans.
It is also unfair to the black people of this country to not have an opportunity to honestly evaluate how much they have achieved and who the people were who helped to make it possible. Because the history is as important as the day. And without the history, the day is meaningless. Especially when the ones telling the story now are the ones, who had they won the fight, would have had nothing to sign into law as a national holiday.
Like the way I write and the things I write about? You can follow me on Twitter at @jimbauer601 or follow me on my Facebook page.
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