Black Voters, Democrats, Republicans, and History

Ku Klux Klan members and a burning cross, Denver, Colorado, 1921

I recently enjoyed a segment on the The World and Everything in It with Alonzo Rachel giving a brief overview of black American history vis a vis the Republican party. I’ll include a brief synopsis below.

The fact is that it was the Republican Party under the leadership of Abraham Lincoln that paved the way for black emancipation from slavery. The Republican Party was actually a fairly new party arising from the growing popularity of abolitionists. It was the Democrats that actually seceded from the country and formed the Confederate slave holding States. After losing the Civil War, it was the Democratic Party that formed the KKK in order to violently kill Republicans both white and black and convince them with basically terrorism to stop trying to have influence in the South.  Decades later the opportunity for the civil rights movement was helped by Republicans who drafted the 1960s civil rights legislation during a session of Congress before LBJ, a Democrat got behind it. That civil rights legislation actually passed with 100 percent of the Republican vote but only a portion of the Democrat vote.

I agree that we have forgotten so much history. I recently was talking to a new acquaintance on a plane ride home. He mentioned how the Republicans had a lot of work to do to overcome their sordid past. He mentioned the KKK as one example. People need to be told that all that was from the Democratic party. Myself, I don’t hold to party loyalty. I hold to principle loyalty. I consider myself a Christian first, a conservative next, and a Republican as long as their candidates stand for Christian principles. Historically the Republican party has tended to stand for what is right. Unfortunately, there has been a lot of misinformation in the last 150 years. And there has been resulting slippage and confusion of direction. There are some changes that need to be made in the Republican party, but not in the liberal direction.

Alonzo Rachel also made a spoof of the recent ad celebrating the 4oth anniversary of Roe v. Wade. He makes it clear how abortion is welcomed by many as a racist practice.