Is Jim Crow 2.0 Real?

Ilya Shapiro’s prescription for democratic elections: make it easy to vote and hard to cheat. Georgia’s new Election Integrity Act does just that, but President Biden still called it “reprehensible” and Delta’s woke CEO still called it “unacceptable.” Shapiro, who directs constitutional studies at the Cato Institute, also writes that “Jim Crow 2.0” in modern America is a Democrat fabrication.

The real Jim Crow was the Democrat Party’s first wave of identity politics; forcing black citizens to pay poll taxes, take literacy tests, and walk past police dogs to vote. It kept white Democrats in power by controlling black voters, while America’s “liberal party” looked the other way. History won’t be kind to Democrats, because they used race to divide a great democracy.

Identity Politics 1.0 – Democrats negated the black vote for 100 years. Through the Reconstruction Act of 1867, Republicans empowered blacks to vote and hold office in the Old South – until Democrats used the disputed election of 1876 to force the (GOP) president to pull Federal troops out of former Confederate states. Democrats then enacted Jim Crow laws to repress black votes (only 3% of Louisiana’s black males were registered to vote in 1900) and enforce segregation.

The great Democrat lie is to blame the “great sin” on Dixiecrats, because even FDR progressives did nothing after 1932. Blacks were less than 3% of the population outside the South, so Democrats ignored them. Blacks were 24.7% of the South, so Dixiecrats repressed them. The table below depicts the electoral-vote math (no black votes in the South and few black voters beyond); therefore, five Democrat administrations got only 16% of black citizens living in Dixie registered to vote by 1952.

1930 US Racial Population by Region

And, why is that? Because Dixiecrats provided the electoral votes that put FDR, Truman, Kennedy, and Johnson in the Oval Office – until Dr. King and Civil Rights forced Democrats to change their politics of identity.

Identity Politics 2.0 – By 1968, Dixiecrats were dead men walking, so the DNC changed identity politics from repressing black votes to preserving black votes. They proclaimed a GOP “southern strategy” beat their candidate (Humphrey), peeling racists off the Dixiecrat bandwagon. The reasoned LBJ’s civil rights laws alienated southern racists, giving Nixon 32 states and 301 electoral votes. Humphrey won only 13 states, but did a racist dog whistle exist?

Probably not, because Nixon won liberal Illinois and lost racist Texas. And, five pro-segregation states voted for former Democrat George Wallace. And, a silent majority resented anti-war and pro-riot Democrats. And, a flawed Nixon exposed Democrats in 1972 as too liberal; not needing one southern electoral vote to win a record GOP landslide (61% of the popular vote and 49 states). And, Reagan would soon expose Democrats as un-electable without 90% of the black vote.

Reaganism (less-government individualism) attracted Catholics, small-business owners, and tax-paying centrists to the GOP. Racism became widely viewed as isolated; such as the Rodney King trial in Los Angeles. Today, black conservatives, such as Charles Payne, rightly (and proudly) point to 50 years of black progress in seven pursuit-of-happiness areas:

• Average life expectancy increased from 63.6 years to 74.7 years
• Average household income rose from $15,800 to $45,400
• Unemployment rate fell from 12% to 6%
• The percentage living in poverty fell from 40% to 18.8%
• The percentage with a high school diploma increased from 20% to 88%
• The percentage going from high school to college rose from 3% to 59.6%
• Voter participation increased from 40% to 62%

Joe Biden claims racial disparities remain (true), but policies like affirmative action were enacted to elevate black citizens – not to stop white progress. Black progress is irrefutable, achieving parity (e.g. voter participation rates) or surpassing 1960 white benchmarks (e.g. life expectancy) in all seven areas. But, when Democrats realized the rising tide message wouldn’t sell in boom economies, the identity message metamorphosed again.

Identity Politics 3.0 – By 2008, the Democrat Party was a European-style coalition of aggrieved identity groups, progressive policy groups, public-employee-union members, and Big Tech elites. They were for globalism and cultural de-construction, un-aware of blue-collar and rural voters, and ashamed of Anglo-American cultural constructs. Thus, Hillary Clinton could tell Democrats in 2016 “racist, sexist, homophobic” GOP voters were a great threat to the world.

Black conservative Robert Sowell accuses Democrats of selling indulgences (innocence of racism) to voters; citizens must be antiracist to be innocent. In Democrat eyes, Stacey Abrams (innocent) was the victim of voter suppression, Tim Scott (guilty) was Uncle Tim for rebutting Joe Biden, Kanye West (guilty) put on a minstrel show by wearing a MAGA hat, and the View’s Joy Behar (not guilty) was actually paying homage to beautiful black women by wearing blackface.

Perhaps Georgia SB 202 triggered Democrats into a regrettable tantrum, especially President Biden. MIT scholars have confirmed the law expands voting hours, keeps ballot drop boxes in tamper-proof sites, replaces signatures with ID numbers, and does NOT deny voters water. Tim Scott (R-SC) called out Biden: “Early voting is easier in Georgia than New York, which is run by the Democratic Party, but the left doesn’t want you to know it.”

Guess what happened? Black Senator Scott’s favorability sky-rocketed in the polls and Democrats flip-flopped. Stacey Abrams has quietly edited the e-version of her USA/Today op-ed to soften the tone. Kamala Harris now says, “America is not a racist country.” Joe Biden now says, “I don’t think the American people are racist.” Mr. Scott gave Americans the fact of the matter: a black man was elected in the Old South to the Senate, conservatives elevated him to GOP spokesman, and America loved it. That’s not Jim Crow 2.0. That’s progress.