Harold, I certainly agree with you about the factional dynamics within the Republican Party in the early 1870s. I guess my point was that even with a somewhat stronger intent to enforce rights that, given the reality of the 19th century state, there was little means to do so. There was no concept of keeping a substantial standing army or possessing and maintaining a large bureaucracy to carry out Recounstruction.

I agree with you in part about the strategic nature of Republican support for the Readjusters. Scholars since the books of Hirshson and DeSantis have noted Republican opportunistic support of independent movements in southern states during the 1880s. But it's rarely wise, however, to draw too strict a line between practicality and principles in American political history. After all, the Republicans could still muster enough support for black political rights to almost pass the Lodge Bill in 1890. I do disagree with you about the possibilities of a sustained biracial coalition in the late 19th century, about what it could have changed. The governing class and the dominant economic interests certainly must have feared it--why else would they fight it so fiercely. I think its success could have prevented the consolidation of the caste system that took place in Virginia from 1890-1924.

Lastly, you're right about church-going black folks leading the fight for civil rights in the 1950s and '60s. But the relationship with federal enforcement was more complex that you indicate. At each step, whether from the Morgan decision to the Brown decision to the Montgomery Bus ruling, there was a reciprocal relationship between black protest and federal support. There had been black protest earlier--of street car segregation in Virginia cities in the early 20th century, for example--but without outside, specifically federal, support it did not succeed. That takes away nothing from the courage of the black people who challenged segregation. It indicates that a lot of components had to come together so that their courage could drive legal and social change. In the 20th century, as in the 1880s, biracial coalitions were needed if you aimed to change the whole society.

Jim Hershman

----- Original Message -----
From: Debra Jackson/Harold Forsythe <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Friday, November 17, 2006 5:11 pm
Subject: Re: Nicholas Lemann's "Redemption"

> It is very important to remember that the radical faction of the
> RepublicanParty was nearly gone by the death of Senator Charles
> Sumner in 1874.
> Absent the political will amongst the public and in the governing
> Party,tied to the Republican's loss of the House of
> Representatives in November,
> 1874;  it is not surprising that the bold plans of 1863-1866 were
> set aside.
> Moreover, the Republican Party was the party of industrialization and
> northern industrialists had a much greater interest in extensive
> cotton and
> tobacco production, both for home processing and consumption and
> for export,
> than in an expensive democratization of the South.
>
> Regarding Virginia, there was strong Republican and northern
> industrialsupport for Mahone's interracial coalition, particularly
> from the accession
> to the Presidency of Chester A. Arthur, but this was strategic not
> reformist.  Mahone went to the Senate in 1881 as an Independent
> and voted to
> organize the body for the Republicans.  Mahone and Riddleberger
> broke the
> "solid South" keeping the Republican Party in control of the
> Senate for much
> of the 1880s.
>
> Arthur was the leader of the stalwart faction within the
> Republican Party,
> interested in winning elections and little else.  Had the
> Readjuster-Republican coalition maintained its control of Virginia
> governance past 1883, considerable change may have been made in
> Virginia(perhaps no disfranchisement, stronger labor unions, etc.)
> but I doubt that
> this would have had much affect on the deep South.
>
> When liberation and justice came it came because ordinary church-
> going black
> folks put their lives on the line throughout the South.  For the
> most part
> the federal government followed, it did not lead.
>
> Harold S. Forsythe
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "James Hershman" <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Friday, November 17, 2006 1:02 PM
> Subject: Re: Nicholas Lemann's "Redemption"
>
>
> > The question of why the victors in the civil war were unable to
> > refashion Southern society, to ensure full freedom for the former
> > slaves, has been asked by historians in a serious way since the
> 1960s.> Most have concluded that the North lacked the commitment
> to overcome
> > white Southern resistance and/or tired of the struggle by the late
> > 1870s. A new book (2006) by Charles W. Calhoun, _Conceiving a New
> > Republic: The Republicans Party and the Southern Question, 1869-
> 1900_,> is the latest look at the matter. Calhoun stresses the
> obdurateness of
> > the white southern "redemption" in waring down the northern
> commitment> to equal rights. He has a good chapter on the 1890
> Lodge Elections Bill
> > (called the "Force" Bill by the southern Democrats), the one really
> > serious attempt from the mid-1870s until the Civil Rights
> Movement of
> > the 1960s to promote black voting rights. Part of the problem
> stems, I
> > think, from the 19th century concept of laissez faire as it
> applied to
> > government action. Along with federal protection of rights, a strong
> > Freedman's Bureau needed to operate for at least a generation after
> > emancipation to help provide the social, economic, and
> educational basis
> > to help to achieve full citizenship and overcome some of the
> impediments> of slavery.
> >
> > Jim Hershman
> >
> > [log in to unmask] wrote:
> >
> >>Whether by generally non-violent means in Virginia, or by far
> more blatant
> >>tactics in the Deep South, Reconstruction was undone, as
> described by
> >>Lemann's
> >>book, Ayers's review, and most of the posters on this topic,
> from various
> >>points of view.
> >>
> >>Why it was allowed to happen?  White Southerners had just gotten
> their>>clocks
> >>cleaned rather thoroughly, more so than any other Americans
> before or
> >>since.
> >>The North could have done anything it wished.  Were whites in
> the North,
> >>and
> >>their government, able to win the war, but not prepared to win
> the peace,
> >>or
> >>willing to spend and sacrifice what that victory would have
> taken?  From a
> >>certain perspective, it looks like they were unwilling to "stay the
> >>course," but
> >>chose to "cut and run."  Or pehaps, they just did not care very
> much about
> >>the
> >>freedmen.
> >>
> >>Or pehaps the situation in the South (like Iraq) was unwinnable.
> >>
> >>I'm reminded of another war we lost.  Sidney Lens dedicated The
> Forging of
> >>the American Empire (1971) "To the children of Vietnam, who are
> being>>murdered
> >>and maimed by my government--and yours."
> >>
> >>Michael B. Chesson
> >>U/Mass-Boston
> >>
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> >>
> >>
> >
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