The Southern System

Eva Martin, ex-slave, Beaumont Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers' Project, 1936 to 1938 (603) LOC

BY | | Letters From an American

March 26, 2021 Georgia Governor Brian Kemp signed his state’s new voter suppression law last night in a carefully staged photo op. As journalist Will Bunch of the Philadelphia Inquirer pointed out, Kemp sat at a polished table, with six white men around him, under a painting of the Callaway Plantation on which more than 100 Black people had been enslaved. As the men bore witness to the signing, Representative Park Cannon, a Black female lawmaker, was arrested and dragged away from the governor’s office. It was a scene that conjured up a lot of history. Voting was on the table in March 1858, ... Read More

The Shadow Network (Council for National Policy) Is Not Going Away

US Capitol, Pexels, Kendall Hoopes

BY | | Moyers on Democracy

Five years ago, at the dawn of the Trump era, few national observers were focused on the role of the Council for National Policy.  That was not a coincidence; over the past four decades, this coalition of Christian nationalists and fossil fuel interests has deliberately kept a low public profile, maintaining both its meetings and its membership under a veil of secrecy. Although it is registered with the IRS as a tax-exempt “educational” organization, it has advanced an unapologetically partisan agenda, promoting Republican candidates from the radical right and purging moderates.  Key to its success is the expansion of its ... Read More