Right-wing states attacking diversity erase, repeat our ugly history of discrimination | Opinion

One common argument against the teaching of history is that it is a waste of time. And, given that history is often taught as a rote recitation of events that will never return, this argument might have some merit.

But the fact that there will never again be a first or second world war doesn’t mean there won’t be a World War III. The fact that America once threw off the shackles of a crazed monarchy doesn’t mean it is exempt from embracing a new, equally crazed monarch in the future. And the fact that the inequalities and injustices sired by de jure Jim Crow segregation laws are relics of the past does not mean that similar inequalities and injustices sired by de facto segregation will not appear in the future.

History does repeat, and we are seeing evidence of this today. For example, after the Civil War, the Reconstruction era in the American South saw hopeful progress for formerly enslaved people, with several elected to both federal and state political offices. But it wasn’t long before this progress was viewed as a threat to white supremacy, which spawned a cycle of events that caused it to be largely undone.

A similar type of progress was also erased after the death of George Floyd. For an all too brief time, America experienced a “mini-Reconstruction” as businesses, entertainment, education and even politics began to resuscitate long overdue discussions about the lingering effects of institutional and systemic racism — only to have it met with attacks on the teaching of African American history, affirmative action and diversity, equity and inclusion or DEI initiatives.

These backlashes were not surprising, especially since, throughout American history, the civil rights, liberties and even the lives of African Americans have been treated as little more than poker chips to be self-servingly gambled by politicians seeking votes, financial gain and populist appeal, from President Andrew Johnson canceling Gen. William T. Sherman’s plan to provide land to newly freed slaves after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, to Rutherford B. Hayes ending Reconstruction completely in order to win a disputed presidential election, thereby ushering in decades of Jim Crow segregation laws and racially motivated violence that political cartoonist Thomas Nast once described as “worse than slavery.”

In addition, the federal courts that were ostensibly created to protect the rights of racial, political and religious minorities instead issued the Dred Scott decision that openly declared African Americans had “no rights which the white man was bound to respect.” They ignored, for decades, the 14th Amendment’s intent to apply the federal Bill of Rights to the states. And in the 1896 case of Plessy v. Ferguson, the courts endorsed the doctrine of “separate but equal,” which made this same amendment’s equal protection clause more illusory than real.

Now many right-wing politicians and judges are playing these poker chips again. The United States Supreme Court has significantly weakened the Voting Rights Act and all but eliminated affirmative action in higher education — a ruling that has, in turn, ignited a politically opportunistic backlash against DEI. And it should not be surprising that many of the states that have variously outlawed or weakened DEI were once slave-holding states and had post-Civil War Jim Crow laws.

Although these anti-DEI policies are disingenuously advertised as combating “reverse discrimination,” the truth is far more sinister: Federal politicians are, in reality, hoping to reduce the economic and political power of African Americans, while state politicians are hoping that these policies will drive current African American residents away, and dissuade others from moving to their states by making them inhospitable places to work and live.

It’s time to recognize that the quixotic propaganda that eliminating affirmative action and DEI initiatives will somehow bring about a society where people will be judged by their achievements instead of their race, gender, political connections, religion (or lack thereof), sexual orientation and gender identity is like believing that “separate but equal” was actually going to work out that way.

David R. Hoffman is a retired civil rights and constitutional law attorney. He lives in South Bend, Indiana.