Nicholas Lemann

This book shows how, in 1875, political power in Mississippi was wrested by violent means from the black-supported (and largely black-staffed) Republican government by what was essentially the pre-war white power structure. Many blacks were killed in the state in that year, and blacks were prevented from voting. Lemann's documentation of what happened, based on testimony in Congressional investigations and on other contemporary sources, is impeccable, and his conclusion is overwhelming. show more Local whites, with the covert and sometimes overt support of whites elsewhere in the South, carried out with extreme violence a successful rebellion against the authority of the U.S. central government. Its purpose -- and result -- was the disenfranchisement of the black population, which in turn led to black political powerlessness, black economic subordination, and Jim Crow. The process, or "Mississippi Plan" was adopted throughout the South in the wake of the Compromise of 1877, which gave the Republicans the Presidency and the Democrats a free hand in the south.

The book is fascinating in itself-- it shows more clearly than anything else I have read how we got from the Emancipation Proclamation to Jim Crow -- but it is also a compelling illustration of the power of political myth. In the latter part of his book, Lemann describes how the racist violence of 1875 was converted into the "Redemption" myth of a valiant Southern effort to oust corrupt carpet-baggers, and restore self-government in the south. This myth took hold not only of popular culture (viz "Birth of a Nation" and "Gone With the Wind") but of serious academic discussion, all the way into the second half of the 20th century. Myths like this can, and do, kill. show less

Little lives rock big boats in Lemann's twofold drama of Pres. Johnson's Great Society venture. Act 1 introduces us to black victims of white progress in the sharecropper South, as they cast their hopes & fates northward to "the promised land" of Chicago in the 1940's. Act 2 presents the political quandary of the Johnson and Nixon administrations in confronting the new eruption of poverty & black anger in urban America. Act 3 returns us to the streets of Chicago for the denoument of all that show more political palpitation in the all too rapid breakdown of the War On Poverty. Lemann makes more of people than of policy; if this is not the best history of the War as a government program, it is certainly the best account of its human creation, its human frustration, and its human compassion. show less

Another of the older titles that has been on my reading list too long. Some of this history is important to consider again, as the SATs were in theory going to be revamped again in 2019 before public backlash put the kibosh on the planned "adversity score" that test takers would also get. You can learn from this title that this feature was first devised in the middle 20th century! And some of what feels backwards about standardized testing as a student or a teacher did make more sense with show more detailed background about its inception. Still, it was a bit too fussy about including a play-by-play of the ETS Corporation when we didn't need that to get the overall point. show less

Nicholas Lemann, a veteran New Yorker correspondent, grew up in New Orleans, the son of German Jews in a world of gilded privilege. Yet in contrast to his parents’ generation, which always sought to downplay their religious background, Lemann was intrigued by his roots,