To prevent a coup – strengthen the military spine

Two weeks ago, I commented about Jefferson’s fear of a presidential coup. Last week I spoke about using nonviolent methods to prevent a takeover by the incumbent president, who told Chris Wallace on Fox that he might not leave the White House if he loses the coming election. Afterward, I expressed my concerns and showed a copy to Ian Shapiro, a friend and polymath who’s done brilliant work on both foreign and domestic policy. He sent me back a portion of his new book on economic insecurity, The Wolf at the Door: The Menace of Economic Insecurity and How to Fight It. I quickly realized we were approaching the same problem from different angles. Insecurity makes people want to believe that Trump is leading them to better days. And getting Ian’s message across will help protect us against a presidential takeover.

The Army is a crucial player in any takeover. American military tradition is stanchly against political activity and devoted to defending the Constitution. There would be great resistance at all levels to using the military politically, especially to end politics by takeover. And because the military contains a large cross-section of America, we all influence it. Military diversity makes it harder to unite on unauthorized, unpopular activities in conflict with American military tradition, especially if they depend on secret planning.

But presidential takeovers in other countries force us to the sobering realization that a perverted commander-in-chief can pervert the military, given enough time. That makes all the work we’re doing to prepare for this election crucial to prevent White House treason – even though he’s talked about it openly. Concerted opposition to Trump and to takeovers, expressed in a vigorous campaign, make it less likely that the military will participate in a coup.

But outside the military, Trump has been constructing other forces which respond to him – using or threatening to use the National Guard, border guards and other armed federal agents in Portland[1] and elsewhere to stir up trouble where peace had reigned. Even more serious are the private militias that conduct their own training with their own arsenals. The great bulk of domestic terrorism has come from those groups. Instead of fidelity to the Constitution, they aim at violently defeating American government in order to achieve undemocratic aims in conflict with the Constitution and the law. Some American elections have been overturned by force of arms.

Unreconstructed admirers of Civil War secessionists would gladly reverse the results of the Civil War. Guns and racism have become closely entwined. Gun shows and private militias confront us with a plethora of racist and conspiracy theories making the point.[2] Their treasonous impulses fuel my strongest objections to gun rights today – guns are not being used for self-defense but for calculated murder, intimidation and political takeover.[3]

Trump’s outrageous racism and complements to racist killers are obvious efforts to get those armed but irresponsible groups behind him, ready to function as a palace guard to keep him in office regardless of the election. Private militias, like gangs and criminal cartels are dangerous because they oppose democracy, are divorced from national values, and expect to gain from violence. Instead of respecting peaceful demonstrations, they’ve spawned provocateurs in places like Portland, to give Trump an excuse for shutting democracy down. They and their standard-bearer in the White House must be stopped. And we have to keep up the fight for government of, by, and for the people.

[1] Washington Post Blogs, A violent send-off on feds’ final night at Portland courthouse, July 31, 2020 Friday 12:07 AM EST

[2] John A. Wood, THE PANTHERS AND THE MILITIAS (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 2002); Kenneth S. Stern, A FORCE UPON THE PLAIN: THE AMERICAN MILITIA MOVEMENT AND THE POLITICS OF HATE (Norman: U. Okla. Press, 1997); Southern Poverty Law Center, “Terror From the Right: Plots, Conspiracies and Racist Rampages Since Oklahoma City,” http://www.splcenter.org/get-informed/publications/terror-from-the-right (visited Jan. 23, 2014).

[3] Stephen E. Gottlieb, Unfit for Democracy: The Roberts Court and the Breakdown of American Politics 173-77 (NYU Press, 2016).

The Federal Budget should protect Americans

Here’s what I just told Schumer and Pelosi:

First, no funding should be provided for federal troops against domestic protestors. Absolutely zero.
Second, no funding should be provided for any judicial nominees not yet approved. Stop Trump.
Third, the Heroes Act should be fully funded. People are about to go off the cliff without help and if we push them over the whole economy will crash for a decade.

Without those, don’t agree to any budget bill.

Feel free to copy; the more the better.

How Can Trump Be Stopped?

I wonder what Germans could have done to stop Hitler in 1932, before or after he had the keys to power.

One option was to fight back. Some believe we have to. Actually, some Germans fought back well before the takeover, but the German government was much harder on leftist fighters than on Hitler’s Brown Shirts. Leftist violence, justifications aside, became an authoritarian excuse, the way Trump wants to use any defense of democracy here.

The major alternative is the Mahatma Gandhi/Martin Luther King nonviolent response. Leaders of protests – against Trump, abuse of our Black and Brown fellow citizens, and against the violence, racism and murders by the Alt-screwy – overwhelming choose nonviolence.

That got India free of Britain but Muslim Pakistan left largely Hindu India anyway. Martin Luther King’s nonviolent approach ended formal legal segregation and won new Civil Rights Laws but left too many African-Americans out of the education, jobs, homes and opportunities they deserved, another partial victory. Maybe that’s all we get in life.

And we can vote. We must vote. Whatever we do on the streets will be backed or undercut by what we do at the polls. It may be an act of faith, but it will prove the most important prayer we’ll ever voice.

Why? I think violence is doomed and we must stay clear of it. Actually, King wasn’t nonviolent. That’s a hard truth, but King’s success depended on his own supporters getting their heads cracked in front of cameras for national television – not unlike what Trump’s troops are doing to people in Portland. There were many, Black and White, who, like John Lewis, had the courage to board busses for the Freedom Rides toward violent racists waiting with firebombs to force them out of the busses and with clubs to bludgeon and bloody them when they came out. I never had that courage, but have enormous respect for those who did. I played a bit part in the Civil Rights Movement, from the safety of legal offices and demonstrations where I didn’t expect trouble – I Marched on Washington to hear King describe his dream, and I joined demonstrations in places like New York City. The movement needed more bravery than I had.

Why? Because some people are moved by changes in national sentiment and by the bravery and decency they see on television news. Let’s be clear, we need institutions of power to back off, like Marco’s Army did in 1986, when confronted with “streets gradually teeming with people to quietly face off … armored tanks …[with] linked arms and prayers and flowers and songs.” But if it’s Duarte’s violence in today’s Philippines, Tiananmen Square in 1989 where peaceful pro-democracy protestors were crushed under relentless tanks, instead of Manila with flowers in 1986, if it’s either bloodthirsty repression or a sense of humanity that stops the armies short, it matters what the soldiers do and what the generals do. Trump is shaping a force under his command and preparing troops with practice maneuvers against demonstrators. Unfortunately, it’s not clear that the public will recognize nonviolence or who’s attacking whom when Trump creates violent incidents, or how the regular Army will respond.

If those in command of the guns, tanks and other weapons, say to each other this is not what we do in a democracy, then Trump better leave fast, maybe to visit his dear friend Vladimir Putin. But if they react that it’s a sadistic joy to mow the unarmed down, no arms could stop them.

There’s another issue. Recent events eroded respect for some police departments. But, depending how events go, there could be significant confrontations between the Alt-Screwy and pro-democracy protestors. In that case the police may be all we have. Yes there must be ways to reform the way they operate, but it’s not just that they have to learn community policing, it’s also us who have to invite the police in, break bread with them, so that we get to know each other. We do need them.

— This commentary was scheduled for broadcast  on WAMC Northeast Report, on July 28, 2020.

Authoritarian brutality here in America

This was sent to me by a friend of more than half a century. He accurately calls it a “must read,” and reports how truly upsetting it is. And I’d add how overwhelmingly important it is to stop the brute who claims residence in the White House. You can read the original post by Austin Sweet here but my friend Andy provides context in his introduction and I’ve copied it to make it easier to start reading:

Hi,

If you have been trying to decipher the story in Portland, this is a must-read. The account comes, as you will see, from a retired surgeon who lives in Vancouver, WA (just across the bridge from Portland) and just finished his term as chairman of the state agency that licenses and oversees all doctors in Washington. It is included in a post on Facebook by his son-in-law.

(An acquaintance of his runs the Nieman Fellows Journalism project and lives in Portland, and he wrote yesterday about journalists totally failing to tell Portland story from the ground.)

This story is exactly like the story I heard yesterday by NPR”s reporter in Portland.   Andy

“While I’ve been sort of following the ongoing events in Portland, I was floored by the information I recently received from my father-in-law, Alden Roberts. It is incredibly important that people know what is happening in Portland, because it is very scary and has very real implications for our entire country.

By way of context, Alden is a general surgeon, retired as the Chief Medical Officer of a hospital in Vancouver, Washington, and just finished his term as the Chairman of the Washington Medical Commission (the state agency that licenses and oversees all doctors in the state). I share this information to emphasize that he is a community leader, a very smart, educated, and informed person, and is not one to exaggerate or spread misinformation.

Here’s what he has observed in Portland over the past few days:

‘1. The protests are confined to a 2 block radius around the courthouse, and if you’re 4 blocks away, you can’t tell anything has been happening. There is nothing going on outside of that region, and Portland is functioning as normally as the Pandemic will allow. It is not burning, nor is it out of control.

2. The protesters are absolutely peaceful at the Protests that I have been part of, and with the exception of graffiti, are completely within their constitutional rights to protest. The protests involve singing, chanting, and have used “white walls” to block whites who are trying to disrupt or corrupt the protests. Yes, cursing is rather commonplace. More than ½ of the protesters are white. All are protesting for Black Lives Matter, although the entrance of the federal paramilitary force has brought out a lot of people, including myself, who are incensed at the use of unregulated federal force against law abiding citizen and against the will of the state and local governments.
3. ALL of the protesters are wearing masks to minimize transmission of CoV-2. However, as at times there are 1000 or more of us, it is hard (though not impossible) to maintain social distancing. When the federal paramilitary force is deployed, it becomes impossible.
4. The Police responded unprovoked and were brutal, but nothing like the paramilitary force. There is a court order that forbids the police to use teargas. I was not there when it was just the police.
5. At the protests I have attended, I did not witness any unlawfulness on the part of the protesters. Each time, the federal paramilitary personnel launched an apparently unprovoked attack. There have been no “riots.” The federal paramilitary force has had no training in crowd control, has no oversight, was not invited to Portland by local leadership, does not have any form of identification do not wear name badges, and wears military camo. They are heavily armed with flash-bang grenades, less-lethal bullets, pepper bullets, pepper spray and tear gas. They will pull goggles off of protesters and spray pepper spray into their eyes. They used a baton to beat a US Navy vet, broke his hand and sprayed pepper spray in his eyes because he asked why they weren’t honoring their vow to protect the constitution. During the assault, he stood still and did not resist until blinded by the pepper spray, he turned around and walked away. The “line of mothers” on Sunday was gassed and shot with less-lethal bullets for chanting Black Lives Matter. At least one was pregnant. A protester holding a sign up with both hands was shot in the head with a “non-lethal” bullet and will likely have permanent brain damage. While I have not personally seen this, there are videos of people being kidnapped into unmarked vans by the federal paramilitaries as they left the protests, held for a couple of days, interrogated, then released without charges or explanation. At this time, re-read my first two points. The protests are no threat to Portland and only encompass a 2 block area. They have been peaceful, with graffiti as the only illegal activity. They are well controlled and supported by a cross section of Portlanders. There is no reason for the federal government to be involved, and the excessive force being used appears to be nothing more than a political show of force against US Citizens by the Trump administration.
6. About 3000 protesters showed up last night (July 21); all with masks, very well behaved. Certainly no chaos, no violence on the part of the protesters. I left at 10:30, the paramilitary attacked at 12:30. I spent an hour talking to the medics. They say they are being targeted by the paramilitary personnel. They are often the first to be shot at and tear gassed. When they try to help an injured protester, the paramilitary personnel throw flash-bangs and tear gas at them (they carry gas masks). One of them was beaten, dragged away from the injured person they were treating and arrested. They are from OHSU as well as Portland Fire.
7. The Elk statue was taken down by the Police to “protect” it, but the Elk statue was a favorite of the protesters because it was uncontroversial; so they got a blow-up elk and put it where the real statue used to stand. It’s sort of a rallying point.’

This should concern, if not terrify, all of us. This is an unidentified and unaccountable federal police presence attacking American citizens who are not violating any federal laws. This is literally how the “secret police” in other authoritarian regimes began. The comparison to the early stages of Nazi Germany is NOT AN EXAGGERATION anymore.

Silence is complacency. Please share this post. Please spread this information. Please get involved. Do not allow or condone this conduct by our federal government. I don’t care which political party you support, this is an affront to the U.S. Constitution and the founding principals of our nation.”

Jefferson on Trump

I was weeding some of my papers last Saturday and found a copy of a letter sent by Thomas Jefferson from Paris, where he was representing this country, on December 20, 1787, to James Madison here in America. As a slave-holder, Jefferson committed grievous wrongs, but Thomas Jefferson wasn’t stupid and what he wrote struck me because he was precisely describing what we most fear today. Jefferson’s letter was about the Constitution. He played no part in writing it, stationed in Paris as he was. But having gotten a look, he wrote his friend about what he did and didn’t like.

He wrote Madison “I like much the general idea of framing a government which should go on of itself peaceably.” He also wrote:

The second feature I dislike, and greatly dislike, is the abandonment in every instance of the necessity of rotation in office, and most particularly in the case of the President.

That has now been limited to two terms by an amendment, but listen to Jefferson’s reasoning. The president [quote]:

becomes of so much consequence to certain nations to have a friend or a foe at the head of our affairs that they will interfere with money and with arms. A Galloman [Frenchman] or an Angloman [Englishman] will be supported by the nation he befriends. If once elected, and at a second or third election outvoted by one or two votes, he will pretend false votes, foul play, hold possession of the reins of government, be supported by the states voting for him, especially if they are the central ones lying in a compact body themselves and separating their opponents: and they will be aided by one nation of Europe, while the majority are aided by another. The election of  President of America some years hence will be much more interesting to certain nations of Europe, than ever the election of a King of Poland was. Reflect on all the instances in history, antient and modern, of elective monarchies, and say if they do not give foundation for my fears, the Roman emporers, the popes … [from their alliances], the German emporers til they became hereditary in practice, the Kings of Poland, the Deys of the Ottoman dependencies.

The timeliness of Jefferson’s fears stunned me.

Many Americans tend to be romantic about our presidents – if they like one thing about a president they think they’re all good. A star on a popular TV show must know how to govern America, protect it from disease, and foreign powers, and raise the people’s income and welfare by bellowing about whom they hate. Please forgive my sarcasm.

The same afternoon, my wife tuned into a town meeting run by the National Peace Corps Association, with the current head of the Peace Corps among the speakers. My mind drifted back. John F. Kennedy created the Peace Corps. Many people liked him because he was young, vigorous and handsome. But the gifts most valued by the people where we served were John F. Kennedy half dollars. They valued Kennedy because he showed respect for people all over the globe – not necessarily the leaders of their countries, but always the people. It was a nonpartisan tradition, followed by presidents of both parties ‘til it was up-ended by a man who thought all a president has to do is talk tough and tell people who’s fired.

But he has no right to fire voters. In the same letter, Jefferson remarked that it is crucial to protect

the fundamental principle that the people are not to be taxed [and I would add or otherwise governed] but by representatives chosen immediately by themselves.

— This commentary was scheduled for broadcast  on WAMC Northeast Report, on July 21, 2020.

Our Human Constitution

Recently I spoke with a class of high school girls. They asked me to talk about the Constitution and we agreed I’d talk about how we interpret it. I wasn’t advocating any particular method. In fact, I referred to the late Justice John Paul Stevens, adopting an observation by the then sitting president of the Israeli Supreme Court, that a judge does best who “’seek[s] guidance from every reliable source.’”[1]

While talking with the girls, I finally realized how to encapsulate what I wanted to say: The Constitution is a human document, written by human beings for use by human beings. It is not self-executing. There’s nothing automatic about checks and balances. They work when people believe in and use them. They don’t work when people in power care only about favoring themselves and their friends.

That’s not a flaw in the document. There are flaws in the document. It still bears the marks of slavery  ̶  numerous clauses were designed to protect slave-owners even though the word slave does not appear. And it was written by men for men in 1787. But the men who wrote the Constitution referred to its prohibitions as “parchment barriers.” Parchment was an older form of fine paper, often used for formal documents. The Founders clearly understood that the document they wrote and ratified would prove as good as the people running it.

I didn’t draw conclusions for the girls, but I want to spell out some implications for you:

• When the president thinks he is an elected king and should control all the levers of government without being questioned or restrained and when a majority of Senators believe they should protect him, they’re simply making the Constitution irrelevant. The Constitution doesn’t protect the president or the senators; they do it for themselves.
• When the president is more intent on encouraging us to fight among ourselves over the color of our states and our skins than to work together for the good of the country, the Constitution hasn’t failed us. We’ve failed it.
• When the president turns us from leader of the free world to its laughing stock, the Constitution hasn’t failed us. He has.
• When the president encourages the most selfish among us to sacrifice the air, land, water and climate that sustain us, the Constitution hasn’t failed us. He has.
• When the president dithers for months after being warned of a coming health catastrophe, the Constitution hasn’t failed us. He has.
• In the days before we had antibiotics and other drugs, quarantines were the principle way that our governments tried to protect us from infectious diseases. When people carry weapons into the state Capital and threaten state governors over quarantines,[2] the Constitution hasn’t failed us. They have.

The Constitution is a parchment barrier. We have to do more than protect the document. We have to use it wisely.

— This commentary was scheduled for broadcast on WAMC Northeast Report, on July 14, 2020.

[1] Judicial Discretion 62 (Y. Kaufmann transl. 1989).@ BedRoc Ltd., LLC v. United States, 541 U.S. 176, 192 (2004) (Stevens, J., dissenting).

[2] See https://www.businessinsider.com/michigan-open-carry-laws-legal-protesters-guns-at-state-capitol-2020-5 and https://www.newsweek.com/michigan-closes-down-capitol-face-death-threats-armed-protesters-against-gov-whitmer-1504241.

Trump expands China’s power – which country does he “work” for?

The damage Trump has been doing to the country he is supposed to be leading boggles the mind – Is this Treason? Here’s Iran expert Juan Cole’s excellent discussion of one piece of Trump’s disloyalty: How Trump lost Iran to China: 25-Year ‘Lion-Dragon Deal’ makes Iran part of One Belt, One Road

The Case for Black Reparations

Many years ago, one of my professors at law school, Boris Bittker, wrote a book called The Case for Black Reparations. Bittker was known mostly for his work on taxation, but he cared and wrote a great deal about race. One year at Reunions, he took my wife and me to see a pair of very interesting films about the confinement of Japanese-Americans on the West Coast in internment camps during World War II, and the experience of Japanese-Americans in Hawaii, many of whom served in the American military. Bittker’s book on black reparations went through the issues in a very lawyerly way as if he were arguing to a court. But let me describe it on a very human level.

First the white slavers stole the freedom of Africans. Then they stole many of their lives, and, of those who survived, they stole the fruits of Black labor. When finally, the slaves were legally freed, White Supremacists stole it all again: the lives of African-Americans by lynching, their labors by a century of intimidation that virtually re-enslaved them. And when finally they found places where they could prosper, White Supremacists, many in the white robes of Klansmen, burned those places to the ground – the Black Wall Street in Tulsa,  Rosewood in FL;  changed election results by murder in places like Colfax County, Louisiana,  and Wilmington, North Carolina; and went on murderous rampages in a number of northern cities.  When whites made programs that helped build white wealth – like Social Security and Unemployment Insurance – jobs held by Blacks were excluded by statute. When Blacks sought good jobs, discrimination shut them out. When segregation finally became illegal, African-Americans had to start again on the ground floor of white men’s businesses, where once again they were given little for their effort – how many times do Trump and his white supremacist supporters insist on making their own wealth by stealing the labors of African-Americans?

And when they engage in peaceful protest, they’re told it’s unseemly behavior. Heaven forbid a Black man take a knee, or complain that Black Lives Matter. We aren’t supposed to focus on righting the wrongs to our African-American friends, colleagues, clients, customers and citizens.

So yes, there’s a strong case for reparations. I understand we’re not equally responsible nor equally beneficiaries of the wrongs done. But we Americans quite ordinarily help each other when we can. And, anyway, that’s a problem for the tax code – if the rich make the poor pay for reparations, it will be just as unfair as everything else the rich make others pay for. It matters how it’s done.

I have, however, one reservation. The most important thing that we can do for our African-American brothers and sisters is to secure their safety. We’ve all been talking about that nonstop for quite a while as each new case surfaces of African-Americans viciously and needlessly killed.  I’ve been commenting about that for years and have worked to fight it in the courts. I’m not sure what road gets there first, so that my friends, colleagues and former clients can enjoy their lives, family, property and careers in safety. That will take more than money. It will take effort and commitment to turn so-called law enforcement around so that it enforces the law for the benefit of everyone, including people of color. Few things would give me greater joy or peace of mind than to be able to share this life in peace and justice with all of you.

— This commentary was scheduled for broadcast on WAMC Northeast Report, on July 7, 2020.

 

MASK MATH

Wearing a mask substantially reduces virus transmission. Without locking in a specific number, let me explain the power of mask math. A mask that reduces your risk 80% at any distance between you, means your risk is only 20% of what it would be in the same situation without the mask. If the other person is also wearing a mask, that also reduces the risk by the same 80% and also leaves only 20% of the risk you’d otherwise have. Here’s the big MASK MATH story – to find your risk, multiply the chance of being infected by each of the masks. That brings the risk down to 4% of what it would have been. That depends on how prevalent the virus is, how far apart you stay, and whether the others are also wearing masks. But my point is that cooperation pays enormous dividends. It’s why New York City was so successful in bringing down a major outbreak. It’s not just what we do for ourselves but the collective effect is VERY powerful. It’s also why the sooner we take protective action, the more effective those protections will be because they act like multipliers, not just additions but multipliers. And that’s why the scofflaws who claim it’s their freedom to refuse to wear masks deserve good spankings. It’s time they grow up.

Stay well, all of you.

Our Umpteenth Effort to End Racial Murder and Abuse

I wanted to deliver this last week but Trump’s use of the military against domestic protestors had me fear for the future of our republic and I put this off.

But I want to talk about these horrible scenes of murder of African-Americans by police. People killed who posed no threat, where the police had everything well under control, and it wasn’t even clear if the victim had done anything meriting police attention, let alone murder. Breonna Taylor, an EMT, was killed in her bed in Louisville.

This reminds me of the Civil Rights Movement I grew up with. People in prayer outside boards of election that wouldn’t let them register. 14-year- old Emmet Til killed on a visit to Mississippi relatives, accused of whistling at a white woman. Viola Liuzzo, a civil rights worker shot in her car. Michael Schwerner, James Chaney and Andrew Goodman, an integrated trio of civil rights workers, released by police in front of thugs who followed, murdered and buried them where they were not expected to be found.

The murders and lynchings stayed in front of our eyes until we hurt, just as we are hurting for George Floyd, choked to death in Minneapolis; Walter Scott, over a brake light in Charleston, SC; Ahmaud Aubrey, killed for jogging while Black in Georgia; Tamir Rice, a twelve-year old, in Cleveland; Stephon Clark, killed for holding a cell phone in his grandmother’s Sacramento backyard;  Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo.; Eric Garner, in Staten Island; Tony McDade in Tallahassee; and Trayvon Martin, a teenager, killed by a neighborhood vigilante who thought he didn’t belong, compounded by the jury’s acquittal. Their stories, and so many more, are unacceptable. The police are supposed to protect us. But they kill too. African-Americans have learned not to call the police in order to protect their own families. I can’t forget the acquittal of four officers here in Albany for killing Amadou Diallo, a Guinean immigrant, in a barrage of forty-one shots for trying to put a key in his door.

The U.S. Supreme Court enabled a century of lynching in 1876 by holding that a U.S. Attorney had no authority to prosecute the perpetrators of the Colfax Massacre.[i] After that, police and the Klan, which also infiltrated the FBI, acted with impunity in much of the country. The Court now does its best to restore the worst abuses of that century of intimidation and impunity.[ii] I recently worked on a brief in support of the family of a Mexican boy, in a cross-border shooting by American officers for playing too near the border. The Supreme Court protected his killer. As Pete Seeger asked, “When will it ever end”?

And yet we can’t get tired, we can’t stop, we can’t let all the abuses this country has tried to stop elsewhere define life for a third of our citizens at home. No one is free when anyone is in chains. I don’t want to have the deaths of thousands of decent people on my conscience. I don’t want my darker skinned friends, colleagues, clients, neighbors, essential workers, athletes, entertainers or any other good people and their families having to worry day and night about eluding people who want to kill them or think they aren’t worth living?

When Yugoslavia started to come apart, we had an exchange student living with us who was from Belgrade. She cried about what was happening to her country – the whole country, Yugoslavia. There was intermarriage, friendship, strong neighborhoods, business partnerships, and none of that protected people. When things start to fall apart, there is no safety. We need to stand up for decent people of all backgrounds. And remember that none of us and none of those dear to us are safe when shooters are empowered, with or without a badge.

— This commentary was scheduled for broadcast on the WAMC Northeast Report, on June 30, 2020.

[i] LeeAnna Keith, The Colfax Massacre: The Untold Story of Black Power, White Terror, and the Death of Reconstruction (Oxford Univ. Press 2008); Charles Lane, The Day Freedom Died: The Colfax Massacre, the Supreme Court, and the Betrayal of Reconstruction (Henry Holt & Company 2008); and United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U.S. 542 (1876), the case that turned a massacre into a century of intimidation and impunity.

[ii] Stephen Gottlieb, Unfit for Democracy: The Roberts Court and the Breakdown of American Politics 189-208 (2016).