Many great insights here like this one. It’s great also to bring to light quotes of MLKJ that can be used more readily to counter the one quote that conservatives use to look like they support MLK and the Civil Rights Movement even though they want to keep their own silo secure. Some many times white resistance burned down an integrate house from even forming.

One example I came across recently was the 1903 investigation in Alabama into convict leasing slavery started by President Teddy Roosevelt. The investigation ‘dragged’ on because it is hard to prosecute so many and the magnitude of the task became clear—this type of neoslavery was occurring across the whole South, not just the few counties the federal DA in Alabama was doing. The investigations moved in Georgia over the next few years, but the white resistance was so great on the judges and investigators, the threats to prevalent, and the political pressure on Teddy by state senators made him back down and eventually close down the investigation. As a side consequence, Professor DuBois, who did a long term statewide study into the condition of black Americans in Georgia with a whole bunch of his own black investigators funded by the same President, saw his detailed report from state wide personal surveys burned. The only copy sent into DC was burned. I picture him in September 1906 as he sat on his porch with his shotgun across lap, protecting his house and wife and kids inside from the white resistance rioter in Atlanta attacking and wounding or killing black Americans, looking tense, determined, but realizing then just how much that house was already burning King would talk of.

Thanks as always for the insights.