ugnet_: Democrats & Africans in the U.S.

[RWalker949]

The confusion about the history of Africans in relations to the Democratic party is a serious problem; look at Sharpton's speech, the two elements that drew the most press attention were his comments on the blood Africans shed to get the right to vote and the reason why Africans are in the Democratic party, I quote form one paper:

"One of many standing ovations went on for a minute after he told delegates that after the nation failed to deliver on Civil War-era promises of "40 acres and mule" to freed slaves, "we didn't get the mule so we decided we'd ride this donkey as far as it would take us."..."Mr. President, the reason we are fighting so hard, the reason we took Florida so seriously, is our right to vote wasn't gained because of our age," Sharpton said. "Our vote was soaked in the blood of martyrs, soaked in the blood of good men, soaked in the blood of four little girls in Birmingham."

A knowledge of history substantiate one part of his position, the cost in blood for voting rights and other so-called civil rights, and if anything Sharpton did not really  describe the immense amount of blood lost in this struggle.The other part that drew so much press coverage, namely "we didn't get the mule so we decided we'd ride this donkey as far as it would take us," conveniently overlooks the fact that it was the Democratic party who lead the opposition to the 40 acres and a mule, and all of the so-called Radical Reconstruction agenda put forth by the Republican party.  In point of fact Africans in this country were voting Republican until the 20th century when there was some slippage in support of Wilson, who promised a fair deal for all, and then reneged, leading to the famous confrontation between Wilson and Monroe Trotter; indeed Africans did not really come out in favor of the Democrats until the great depression when FDR promised to relieve some of the extreme economic pain, in contrast to the laissez faire policies of the Rep. administration.

Just to get some background on the evolution of the Democratic Party and its relationship to the Africans in the US, I have inserted what PBS, a government funded corporation, says about the history.  Remember this is not a revolutionary or nationalist entity saying this but PBS:


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The Democratic Party was formed in 1792, when supporters of Thomas Jefferson began using the name Republicans, or Jeffersonian Republicans, to emphasize its anti-aristocratic policies. It adopted its present name during the Presidency of Andrew Jackson in the 1830s. In the 1840s and '50s, the party was in conflict over extending slavery to the Western territories. Southern Democrats insisted on protecting slavery in all the territories while many Northern Democrats resisted. The party split over the slavery issue in 1860 at its Presidential convention in Charleston, South Carolina. Northern Democrats nominated Stephen Douglas as their candidate, and Southern Democrats adopted a pro-slavery platform and nominated John C. Breckinridge in an election campaign that would be won by Abraham Lincoln and the newly formed Republican Party. After the Civil War, most white Southerners opposed Radical Reconstruction and the Republican Party's support of black civil and political rights.
The Democratic Party identified itself as the "white man's party" and demonized the Republican Party as being "Negro dominated," even though whites were in control. Determined to re-capture the South, Southern Democrats "redeemed" state after state -- sometimes peacefully, other times by fraud and violence. By 1877, when Reconstruction was officially over, the Democratic Party controlled every Southern state.

The South remained a one-party region until the Civil Rights movement began in the 1960s. Northern Democrats, most of whom had prejudicial attitudes towards blacks, offered no challenge to the discriminatory policies of the Southern Democrats.

One of the consequences of the Democratic victories in the South was that many Southern Congressmen and Senators were almost automatically re-elected every election. Due to the importance of seniority in the U.S. Congress, Southerners were able to control most of the committees in both houses of Congress and kill any civil rights legislation. Even though Franklin Delano Roosevelt was a Democrat, and a relatively liberal president during the 1930s and '40s, he rarely challenged the powerfully entrenched Southern bloc. When the House passed a federal anti-lynching bill several times in the 1930s, Southern senators filibustered it to death.

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/jimcrow/stories_org_democratic.html