American Experience; Reconstruction: The Second Civil War; Interview with David W. Blight, Historian, Yale University, part 4 of 6

so far he is a real is becoming very proactive thousand then when they were justice of the peace clearly was must've seen a bright energetic young maiden who probably was aware of motions and lynch ho ha ha was so young daughter is perhaps a bit of history so we do is known john wojtowicz going this way photography

show and so and clearly is trying to get on with this year old rules that so we are staying in the city basically it's this idea of this young man from getting to know what you think what might have been his views home so there isn't a single mindedness and

eagerness to be part of this it started out on russia's ambitions actually were but he clearly is the creation of this historical moment this extraordinary revolution is a former slave with his tender age because of his leadership skills because of the use of language is carol into mississippi legislation bubble in the us know about john lynch and he says this is roses and visa form or a studio reconstruction are share the radical republican vision of reconstruction he saw government as a lot of the actors use of government something changing people's lives and protecting people you're not just be the protector of the rich or of the hands of the planter class of your sleepovers athlete he

saw our government is the engine of the things he was vacationing is not education for friedman school night he once and that much more public school oh and mississippi and four he's so government as the place where the free people could go and i'm going to find some kind of protection and that's what he was trying to do well he also seems to have been the young man who could make friends and go spend and social issues often called my mother actually meant to be a black marlon reconstruction legislation he was able to talk

well so he was somebody on the severe politics was your sway is a compromise and fighting with your long region are many times that white southerners black sons whoa that would be the ultimate sort of create their niece who was not a lot of reach the stage a team that three of the possibility that he was in his own way it appears the kind of consensus and how he had that sort of political instinct so young it's hard to fully understand why must be one party have won our prize and just really experienced

war in syria was worse was the city's reconstruction and three eighth this is in one of the state's population the president's home state mississippi one of the states and we're one of the

sentences are concerns inspections and fire and what became known as the so called shotgun policies of the democratic party oh delicious so mississippi was both the state of great promise but also slick great reaction for the obvious reasons why when she went for it no worries if they can when we tell stories

now the us navy sixty eight is the first referendum on reconstruction because the reconstruction plan is now being put it wasn't so for instance on the state's republican party is in control cause of course because it showed us that begin would become to cover of allusions reconstruction remarkably the most white supremacist that was prince's collection campaign americans they painted the republicans as quote never painted the republicans has the creators and you precedent so they were forging really

already this call trash collection fortune on the republicans his vision of the reconstruction plans and at sixty eight that election we can see the changes happening in the republican party leadership at for reconstructions rise and fall so france and sixty election he's not party that his visit us the news isn't us the economic growth mission hi and to disprove the road reconstruction which was

to the south of houston who weren't so this is a great transition room in the great tradition it is the first coming out of the democratic party a large national stage in the wake of the civil war a part of it tired of the brush all wells disloyalty of copper has in the polls in this occasional proposing the war is for the democrats to sell some solzhenitsyn sex is part of what's supposed to be right now through reconstruction will be one of the two groups that cultural nation's south oh

yes and there was a sense of dylan's arm especially warm arms as the rooms once offered himself as a key vote what there was a sense of healing and began to set in that cross the north that well maybe you know reconstruction was running its course randy gillespie well may be the result of the warming comes q read john's launch and in the wake of the election were sixteen and eighteen seven reconciliation they need to bring some common would be

good for expansion and growth would be good to go to the west of the country has a new name the indians and western expansion and eventually all was because of chinese immigration and so so if worms and that as he says the government's reconstruction are all has not been completed the constitution has the right to vote is nothing left of the legal and see how that would occur because your millions like them who have now through new trial and suffering

death and civil war and they want to do when the ordeal when will the war real enemy by eighteen sally wilson was finally or there's so many questions raised once was a will that said i know that you're still secure a lot of republicans very nice until it's already happening on the ground so we just kind of a room or by some terrorist thirteen the last we checked and you know he's republican legislative years living like that i know it's like a wave of people consensus that conor o'shea of the way so the democrats that work begins our

question begins in and so this decision we begin in someone's along with a lots of those movies and just plain or refusing to bow in your selections of citizens and refusing to vote in nineteen sixty eight large numbers of words so few people insist that we're going to succeed in this same process of elections but fortunes around the resistance to the revelations to turn to our politicians and forges a real resistance to the beginnings of the growth of song independence in the lead and then it grows in recent times by eighteen

seventeen billion in part can use actually conforms of bombs what could not get you to the polls close that was being achieved homegrown vigilante violence in arizona than sixty six the special exploding the election in nineteen sixty it is one of the most important elements of this counterrevolution was a ku klux klan include groups like them who operated outside of the war without ridden areas of the south will force some reasons to these issues on the claim what

is this is this is very comforting thought about it in two different ways one is that is there is there something about the character how we have been through this morning and also what are they reacting to that well the motivations of the ku klux klan organizations like the band formed in part clearly comes from the depth of the sense of defeat is a secret they haven't lost in many cases the last say they believe the top they believe that former slaves in his will win they believe they are being processed by an outside by the romans by the engines are they are

planets instance origins in tennessee and other towns we're group's ruling confederate veterans gathered together give each of solace to come together to try different ways of resisting what's happening around them and very small groups and engaging those really local isolated acts of violence that's a lot of his union troops or more likely in this report what republicans for office northern teachers and civil war or agent of the transformer action the reconstructions might be taken from school stuart especially

reporting for decades and decades old surgeon was destroyed the political lives of local local republican party of business and so violent there's also though the methods sometimes recent vintage other times louder and more often it was torched and hundreds and hundreds of people died there than who goes on terror which means it's the meeting's only one is the most concentrated you're a terror done by americans other americans in all worries are hundreds of people and single county or even tortured that was an estimated

four hundred mention one time not in state between the end of the civil war in the middle of the eighties before we hear him refer to how you mentioned klan terror and violence became a part if you want a low almost normal politics became a part of election year politics on psalm sixty eight sixty eight so in the game so they're going to have to we're going to say to its credit the final year in certain things in war and comes back uncertainty and certainly one with the passage of the syrians who puts klan that's just which was to federal laws of asian america it is that interesting one selections just those laws to

federal election process in the south and to make it a federal offense and planted a concern was a thorough sense to deny or to prevent the right to vote and says now what the president's doing here in what way incredible to me that we were living in a healthy any name come back and you'd be run out of state to try to prevent them from even being president of the security people you know how do you live in the midst of this incident

will cleanse her woes intimidation torture room are affected hundreds of thousands and almost loans will in the sense that the people who didn't get it the perpetrators of such loans often well known by that we know this from the later hearings and testimony the people who needs and those are the voices that we're going in or the song in some ways you have to see this as aspinwall is rasool says that one so i know how certain

the question is why was no horses and then the readers in washington post and is in the individual whom they did or listeners' attention this standstill unless it was a terrible blow through and the man was show us and frankly not just wasn't tested one of the deepest strain on african american literature poetry fiction and writing and re writing a story of klan violence on black people in south la every african american poet novels of the

twentieth century late nineteenth century and the twentieth century has visited this storm has really is a political show social novel i think i think what you find in evolution is that african americans were in someone's collectively so you can you know the plan for the majority of southern counties during reconstruction never had a common law wife says did in a way the klan attacked and burned the church olive byrne says when they killed twelve people whether torture this region near yuma was tortured for him in iowa as a writer about the french writer so the politics

of the twentieth century who said simply reverses tortured girls jewish remember can really forget the acts of torture and that is what the klan take people out of their houses in the dark knight strikes them out in the room make them rhyme make them sometimes lime rock movie wit women line up with them sometimes the wrong person by sadistic torch detention which was we know his intestine and tension which was to stop these people can get beyond stop these people from trying to bait in them to stop these people from trying to get here and trying to be the city's baseball who close clinton is not just a

citizen it wasn't even words it was to put a black people back into their place as the labor force in the south and not much freedom and to drive out of business plouffe was the republican party that they know how citizens way want to process this on this scale the most vexing was difficult often hidden part of american men are not just in south over this is the place to tell us that we have a moment

society the government wasn't functioning sufficient enough to protect citizens from and others included one to vigilante violence of the lawyers in new face we don't know we want to believe we're a society of security and permanence and whom reconstruction mason's face anew when we were something else and particularly in europe the sixty eight and seventy one million in the mid seventies seventy five seventy six the level of violence viewed as a political weapon compares to many countries and stories we think about the world stage

no no is the question yeah who mm hmm with the

mafia was the sound as gross alone for this though is this saying listen this is the first of an effect on going to the meeting though is that everyone who is an organ women's up in southern georgia and forza is a remarkable man because he is an example of how full of reconstruction politics would be an issue and susan's going to manage a human sense analyst georgy is about the south what i want to become something something better he he really was the kind of republican who who believe in the heart of the republican

vision that said the sun had become biracial some have to protect some degree yet they're not going to be local the last one which was taking on politics in college in the hands of vigilantes the houses and actors read others are lots of lessening was operating the reverend wright in rowing sixty six cents an insane two republican congressmen and saying we've gotta sit here on south may seem to see that all the losses toward them mostly on am one clam violence especially

brazen elections if you can contain a consensus on such a step the forces in its forces in a row read this congratulations through legislation this is true venice italy's mission do to drive with one of his patients in rooms how the surviving american who revived an old forms in the middleweight and so states mississippi louisiana that will revive the surgeons second half walk through

this us now so for a plan to stop it now before mention the hundreds of millions so choose wisely opts in addition to the extent that this is a damaging not a strong republican party in manson's do you eat with that would have been pushing to say that people like anchorman or the kkk no more they were not only the population was earning very few lessons on

some white woman nameless now republicans did work to stop them the plan was led by all a leadership class roots of their office jobs born in georgia he is those changes reconciliation but the kind of violence have a broad base of support i think you can say and since the lessons with us it is

don't mess with me what's the plan at sixty six when the candidates get what womanhood has been very little talk about them will do reconstruction and fashion the reason the justification for compass of the current constitution and from hours of television but at the time their goals were political don't take back control they want to establish what's sometimes the virginia democratic party the dean's virginia as the states in nineteen seventy four essentially you a lot they're

trying to get votes in elections a change in nineteen seventy four which is back in control you know one of these well hey i want to do that and then when they were teenagers to be consistent with some of the most venomous of this testimony and animal scientist at and think you said that if the investigation

well one of the things the government did to respond to the plan was to establish a joint congressional committee seven senators and fourteen members of the house representatives to investigate this level of the only answer is that car and it reduces uncertainty and for nine months in nineteen seventy one to hear seven so that started in washington dc then he moved to north carolina in the conduct of these hearings across the deep south in north carolina south carolina georgia florida alabama mississippi their extraordinary year in most of these questions this was a statement

commission robertson time to study the state plan on calling witnesses of war was really the first such thing an american based public hearing about violence in american society was a cost then we had to something like the truth and reconciliation commission was banal means its function as we come to understand that idea it's also essentially to gather information and perhaps santorum seven decades of people also the victims testify also supporters of this controversy over yukos victims of common bonds with the transportation eight moore lived in so they really worsened dollars in dayton says his patrons

so the division forty volumes covert weapons which remarkable record on the scale of violence and intimidation terry conducted by americans no mention this experience and some of his testimony in this sense that there is a certain degree to which you can remember them understand this is a very anonymous testimony and sometimes understand why you think some people that's why us senators who it was innocence

that's how it was that federal support that and for that reason alone lonely viewed across the south if the league season yeah you know as a union only has really been tried for planets in all the russian jew we won't serve but that won't work for a foreign religion and virtually all were out of prison before the new balance a number of people trying to climb in and the number of people convicted of anything you serve any

contravention new laws set out of reconstruction there's a tremendous legacy and ingest american society had the sundae some way he is we haven't always known where he's you know he's talking about a kkk fascinated by wealth and just innocence idea of a young kid you know growing up in the south here is very excited well thomas dixon grows up because of

asian reconstruction teams and was apparent fascinating and i'm excited so who so scientists question unusual he was of course the way perhaps the most influential of politics clinton is now called the klan's plans for that was that of thomas dixon part of the system nation the president's

reforms the creation of the ku klux klan as the benign in the founders of the saviors of southern society more than anything they wanted to produce because of the power from nineteen fifty dixon does seem to have then i am completely convinced that the settlers were recently victims are of the impression of that sense of it he fashioned among those who will only fashion and narrative the legend about the social necessity so we use sure

sure they were there was chivalrous the night and the fins oh no civilization being blinded by my black aggressiveness and especially in big cities so this isn't easy for me the