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|5.18.06 @ 8:56AM|#
Both Damon Root and David Southern grossly oversimplify the record of the Progressive Era in race relations. It's true that there were many dark strains to "progressive" thinking. As Root and Southern both note, southern "progressives" like Woodrow Wilson were only interested in helping white people. Wilson segregated both the federal government and Washington, DC, and neither Warren Harding nor Franklin Roosevelt bothered to undo what Wilson had done. In the North, many "scientific" progressives, influenced by Darwinist ideas, started thinking about improving society through eugenics.
But both Root and Southern are guilty of serious over-reach. The movement to institutionalize segregation in the South was prompted by fears that Populist and Progressive ideas would lead a union of poor black and white voters against the landowners. (See "Alabama: History of a Deep South State," by Rogers, Ward, Atkins, and Flynt, for some good background.) And it's a bit of a stretch to blame Progressives for every racist book published from 1890 through 1925. If you want to blame them for the bad, why not credit them with WEB DuBois, who was active at the same time and who, I suspect, would have described himself as a "Progressive." Or Jane Addams, on the board of the NAACP?
Furthermore, Plessy vs. Ferguson was not decided by Progressive justices, as Root tries to imply, but by the "sound" men who protected private property from the Populists. As for the "orgy" of racist legislation that followed, most of the laws Root cites were passed 10 to 25 years after P v F. It's a bit of a slow-motion orgy you've got there, Dave.
As for Mr. Root's attempts to argue that Progressive devotion to government power was somehow connected with their racism, the simple fact is that it was the federal government that broke the back of racism in this country, and everyone knows it. Prior to World War II, the U.S. was a racist country, through and through. Racist attitudes permeated every part of our society, and every institution and movement reflected those attitudes. James Chace's Book "1912," gives a much more balanced picture of Progressive sympathies and equivocations over racial issues. Libertarians who want to believe that government always makes things worse make bad historians.
|5.18.06 @ 9:03AM|#
"the federal government that broke the back of racism in this country"
Funny, MLK never really mentioned them.
MP|5.18.06 @ 9:23AM|#
Alan,
Racist attitudes permeated every part of our society, and every institution and movement reflected those attitudes.
Quite true.
Libertarians who want to believe that government always makes things worse make bad historians.
I think you missed Damon's point. The true lesson to be learned by that era is that the Progressives, in entrusting the government with ever increasing levels of authority, further enabled the racist tendancies of the general population to be enshrined in law and enforced by the power of the state. I think it is ridiculous to equate progressivism with racism, but it is worth considering how much different the plight of blacks would have been without the ever increasing power of the state intruding in their lives.
|5.18.06 @ 9:34AM|#
The better we understand this history, the less likely we are to repeat it.
Bwhahaha! The mis-named "progressives" still love racism and the practice of racist government programs. Big time.
|5.18.06 @ 9:53AM|#
It might also be worth noting that the federal government's role in the civil rights struggles of the 20th century were successful only insofar as the nation was no increasningly longer as thoroughly racist as Mr. Vanneman, himself, over-reachingly contends.
I am also intrigued by his use of scare quotes regarding Wilson's status as a progressive. Is the implication here that Wilson doesn't count as a progressive?
Finally, I doubt many libertarians, as opposed to anarchocapitalists, believe government always makes things worse. (Usually, sure.) Moreover, while we're on the topic of overreaching conclusions, calling attention to yet another example of the unintended negative consequences of giving power to government even for a worthy purpose is hardly the same thing.
|5.18.06 @ 9:55AM|#
[sigh] "no increasningly longer" should be "increasingly no longer." Okay, time for more coffee.
|5.18.06 @ 10:44AM|#
Re "Ironchef," Martin Luther King agitated constantly for federal civil rights legislation. It wasn't MLK who desegregated the schools, gave blacks the right (and power) to vote, or forced private businesses to accept blacks as customers.
Re "MP," I didn't miss Damon's point, I rejected it. Most, though certainly not all, racist legislation was at the state level, which could only be overturned by the Supreme Court, or countered by federal law, which is exactly how institutional racism was destroyed, in the 50's and 60's. The idea that southern legislatures passed segregationist legislation on the basis of Progressive ideas is ridiculous. The U.S. had previously used both state and federal law to enslave blacks; using the law to discriminate against them was hardly an expansion of state power.
As for the sleepy Mr. Ridgely, I'm not sure if he's agreeing with me or contradicting me. Anyway, if I ever meet an anarchocapitalist, I'll be glad to buy him a cup of coffee.*
*But no free lunch! Bwhahaha!
|5.21.06 @ 12:19PM|#
Not that anyone will read this at this point, but this particular point isn't really a federal/state issue. The point is that the expansion of state power allowed the institutionalized racism of the Jim Crow era. Enslavement is a different issue as before emancipation, slaves were not considered to have human rights. Once african americans were universally recognized as people, it required progressive legal doublespeak in order to come up with a doctrine like "seperate but equal." It's always nice when oxymorons become laws.
The contention that "racist legislation ... at the state level, ... could only be overturned by the Supreme Court, or countered by federal law" is patently false. It is how it was overturned. Nothing prevented states from repealing those laws. To suggest that there was no other possible way for institutionalized racism to end is certainly overreaching.
If you're attempting to imply that anarcho-capitalists are generally unemployed, then I think you still have a lot to learn. One usually has to be very well educated to have even heard of anarcho-capitalism. Most likely anyone who knows what it means is perfectly capable of buying his own cup of coffee. :)