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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Cogito who wrote (90390)	10/16/2008 5:49:22 PM
From: thames_sider	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 543558

Brooks provides some good factual background in his article, and also puts the words "states rights" in the context of what Reagan actually said. Allen, I don't know if you picked up on the full context there: it missed me on first reading. I was discussing this elsewhere, and Tim and others disagreed, but I think my interpretation possible. Brooks may have been disingenuous in portraying the context as entirely innocent, IMO. Maybe in the specific context of education, such talk of "states' rights" is less innocent than Brooks makes out, and more calculated than callous. Because it seems to me a key place to drop in such a throwaway line. "Brown vs Board of Education" was specifically about segregation in education, and effectively about the state right to run education and other state services in a segregated fashion. And Reagan was an extremely skilled communicator, very aware of his message and its subtext, and surely as aware of US history as I am, especially in this context. So saying that states should have more authority to run their education systems without federal interference sounds to me like a message of understanding to the whites, of disagreement with Brown... Why else stress states' rights in a passage on education, in that venue? I don't believe that Reagan specifically kicked off his 1980 presidential campaign with a states’ rights speech in Philadelphia to send a signal to white racists that he was on their side; nor that the Republican majority in 1980 was built or depended on racism. And I don't believe that Reagan was himself a racist, certainly not by the standards of his day. But on the evidence Brooks puts forward, I'd say it is reasonable inference that Reagan (or at least his speechwriters!) did want to send the message that he wasn't against them and wasn't going to press such issues. The tacit message is surely one of support. (original discussion at Message 2507397 FWIW)

To: Cogito who wrote (90390)	10/16/2008 8:07:34 PM
From: JohnM	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 543558

Allen, The key to this is that the Reagan campaign chose Philadelphia, Miss. to kick off the campaign and the association it had in everyone's mind with the murders of the three civil rights workers in 1964. It's much less about what he said than what he did. I see that TS makes the point about Brown versus Board of Education. Not a bad point. But I think the content of the speech is beside the point; it's the setting and the track record of the Republican Party by that time. This is all, of course, historical arcania but it is important to note what is guilt by association and what is not.