A bald fact: more than three thousand freedmen and their white Republican allies were murdered in the campaign of terrorist violence that overthrew the only representatively elected governments the Southern states would know for a hundred years to come. Among the dead were more than sixty state senators, judges, legislators, sheriffs, constables, mayors, county commissioners, and other officeholders whose only crime was to have been elected.
-- STEPHEN BUDIANSKY
I'm currently reading Tear Down That Myth, which debunks some of the myth making about Ronald Reagan, including discussing how in various respects he was more moderate (on taxes, negotiation with the Soviets, use of military force) than some on both sides might think. The image still holds, including someone (who lived through the times though as an adult and one closer to his politics) who recently told me that she thinks that most people liked Reagan, including many Democrats.
Myths, helped along by textbooks and so forth, have long dominated the Civil War, before/during/after. Some still don't want to believe it was fought over slavery or that U.S. Grant (some rather have Reagan on the $50) was overall a pretty good historical character. I have to admit that sometimes reading Civil War accounts, you can easily be routing for the South, an even battle of some sort necessary after all for good drama. There are loads of books about the Civil War, much fewer about its aftermath, even of the Reconstruction, a period over twice as long. The importance to law (including three amendments) and history plus all the drama involved, notwithstanding.
The upcoming gun case ultimately is directly connected to an election time battle, a type of Easter Sunday massacre, that is the subject of books itself. United States v. Cruikshank involved federal prosecutions of locals who killed blacks protecting a courthouse, the ruling underlining that the Bill of Rights (including the use of militia) applied only to the federal government. The ruling left open a thin lifeline, one no longer much sought out by the mid-1870s (at least for nearly a century), if the federal government could clearly show that the federal right to vote was being infringed on account of race. Reporting on the upcoming gun case should include this little remembered tragic moment of history.
After all, the result is shown to be fairly typical in the title book, a lot of effort by a few leaders (and many of the people themselves) to get some justice resulting in small gains, gains that were short lasting at that. The violence and fraud used, hesitantly admitted to when pressed but justified as necessary, is depressing (and repeated, in various forms, to this day ... Republicans now serving as the heavies, albeit thankfully the violence is mostly in rhetoric). The efforts to protect and enjoy basic rights also is inspiring, short lived much of it might have been. One blog review touches upon the charm of this book:
Right up front, I'll make something plain; Stephen Budiansky's book "The Bloody Shirt" does not attempt to break new ground about the Reconstruction era. Instead, this book is designed to revive and retell the stories of a few individuals to illustrate the experiences of many. To his credit, Budiansky does not claim to be writing an authoritative study of Reconstruction, his intention is to show the impact that terrorism had in a few places and on a few persons in the South after the war as part of a larger reflection of the post-Civil War South. ...
His narrative technique is sometimes a bit jumpy and fragmented, and the chronology gets muddled up, but this does not detract from the larger issues at hand. Budiansky's book is a reminder of the spasms that wracked the post-war South and the racism, violence, and depredations that plagued African-Americans and Republican whites.
The book in effect provides various excerpts of Reconstruction, somewhat disjointed at times, but often as exciting as a novel. The travels throughout the recently defeated South of a reporter of The Nation; a hopeful "carpetbagger" is burned by locals, marries a black teacher from the North, becomes a politician and sheriff and is run out of town by violence; General Longstreet knows when he is whipped, becomes a Republican and is beaten again by local whites this time; a former slave coach driver becomes a local magistrate but ultimately dies doing basically the same thing after whites (like one who later became an infamous race baiting senator) "redeem" his town, and so on. One or more stories that would make good fodder for fiction or film.
And, necessary for a true education of our history. I have read about the Reconstruction, including Eric Foner's well known book. But, exploits like these (with letters, newspaper clippings and the like) provide a vivid way to truly understand what was at stake and what occurred.