“In the name of the greatest people that have ever trod this earth I draw the line in the dust and toss the gauntlet before the feet of tyranny… and I say… segregation now… segregation tomorrow… segregation forever.” Just a random offense quote. Not made by an Southern general leading a real army as a battle cry during the Civil War to inspire his troops, but a Southern governor leading his figurative army of white Southern men in the one-party run South more than a decade after World War Two. Hitler was defeated, and the German’s said ‘never again’ by making a law against symbolism and hate speech. The united Germany people took it seriously. But the American people have never been united. Having a one party run South from 1901-1965 was a clear sign who won the ideological war after reconstruction. The South was “never” going to surrender.
The quote is just one of many such ones, dozens, made in the post war era showing that the South would not accept black American voting, equal labor laws, desegregation efforts. This one was made by Governor George Wallace, four time presidential candidate. Another post war candidate continually made the same “segregation forever” speeches, Senator Strom Thurmond. These quotes are more offensive to me is a one aspect, that they come from those leaders in charge of making the laws and enforcing them. It shows very clearly they will not make any laws or enforce any that would consider equality and would resist it forever.
Of course you bring many brilliant points and facts to light as always, plugging more gaps in my knowledge of the deep systemic problem of racial inquiries plaguing out country that allow continual racist comments and leaders who make these comments. Hitler co-opted not just the symbolism of the flag but whole platform of eugenics and creating a “master race” form the movement in America that gained momentum from 1900-1920s before he wrote Mein Kampf. He was a great student of the American South, admired how the whites repressed blacks through lynching and other techniques to deny them any power, and ordered an advance copy of Gone With The Wind which he watched with Goebbels. I’m convinced that white supremacy died, whether Hitler escaped to Argentina or died in the bunker (he died). But I’m also convinced the South never lost the Civil War, but “morally” won it by defeating the Northern morality after Reconstruction. The documents made by the North after the war were never obeyed, and still aren’t.