Persistent politics of Tulsa race massacre

As the nation reflects on the 100th anniversary of the Tulsa Massacre, in which a White mob razed a prosperous Black community and killed many of its inhabitants, conversations have focused on the economic costs of such racial violence. But to understand where it comes from — and where American society is headed — one must recognise the extent to which the economic and the political have been intertwined.
Racial violence has been a feature of American political economy for at least 150 years. Decades before the devastation in Tulsa and the Red Summer of 1919, White supremacists had been seeking to limit Black people’s access to wealth and prosperity, most prominently by bringing Reconstruction to a violent end. The movement back to antebellum norms that we now call “Jim Crow” required brutal force over several years to reach its full effect. And economic and political suppression of Black Americans was a major goal. After the Civil War, Black politicians strongly advocated increased taxes on land as part of an effort to redistribute wealth to the formerly enslaved. Without the promised “40 Acres and a Mule,” tax policy was the best way to achieve anything close to economic equity. Even as they worked to write new state constitutions, Black delegates argued for aggressive land redistribution. It didn’t happen, despite firm economic foundations and support from both Black and landless White voters. But the mere threat of redistributive policies was enough to move economically powerful Whites to violent action.
Local and grassroots White resistance to Reconstruction-era economic policy took many forms. The Charleston Chamber of Commerce passed a resolution in 1871 encouraging local businesses to stop paying taxes, exemplifying what became a popular method to overthrow local Black political leaders. Some localities systematically removed Black politicians from offices that controlled public finance. Powerful White people infused the news media with baseless stories of Black waste of public dollars, and insinuated that policies aimed at aiding those recently in bondage were doomed to fail. While such strategies worked at the margin, they weren’t enough to discourage Black voters from pursuing a piece of the American dream — access to wealth and credit, non-discriminatory markets and quality education for their children.
Violent action to suppress Black votes was more effective. As many as one in three murders of Black people in Louisiana during the late 19th century are thought to have been politically motivated. One precedent-setting example can be found in the Colfax Massacre of 1873.
On Easter Sunday, April 13, a White mob attacked a group of Black militiamen who had seized control of the courthouse in Grant Parish, Louisiana, to enforce the results of an election in which Black candidates had won the offices of judge and sheriff. The White attackers continued cannon and rifle fire even after their opponents raised a white flag of surrender, then burned down the courthouse with Black people still inside and led off survivors two by two to be shot dead.

—Bloomberg