Dorothea Lange, Farm Security Administration, LC-USF34- 009389-E [P&P] LOT 1680, July 1936, New Orleans
Getting ready for our quick trip to New Orleans, sometimes I read about Louisiana and wonder what the hell were those people thinking. Sometimes I think they’re just like the rest of us only more so. Unfortunately with the Battle of Liberty Place and its monument I’m pretty sure I know what they were thinking, and I’m pretty sure they’re like the rest of us at our worst.
Early in the Civil War New Orleans was a Union target, and Union forces captured the city in April 1862. It remained occupied by federal troops until April 1877, the end of Reconstruction. Before they were dismantled by the Supreme Court, Congress enacted a series of forward-looking civil rights laws to protect and enfranchise former slaves, but after Grant’s presidency, the country’s leadership was too tired or indifferent or hostile to be bothered, and violence to control race relations became a marker of the Post-Reconstruction South. Louisiana did its part.
The Battle of Liberty Place wasn’t the only Louisiana violence (and Louisiana wasn’t the only location where violence became commonplace). In 1866, at the Republican Party Convention in New Orleans, police fired into the crowd killing 34 blacks and 3 whites. In 1868 in Opelousas, St. Landry Parish, an unknown number of blacks were killed after a confrontation between black Republicans and members of the Knights of the White Camelia. In 1873, in Colfax in Grant Parish on an Easter Sunday approximately 150 black men were murdered by white Democrats in the worst instance of racial violence during Reconstruction. Racial violence didn’t end with Reconstruction. Louis Armstrong remembered hiding in his home as a child because white gangs roamed black neighborhoods after the black boxer Jack Johnson defeated the white boxer Jim Jeffries in 1910. In 1900, Robert Charles murdered a white policeman, and then shot an additional 27 whites, with seven deaths. The resulting white riots resulted in 28 deaths and more than 50 casualties, mostly among blacks.
The Liberty Square riot saw 8,400 members of the Democratic White League attacking approximately 4,000 mainly white Metropolitan Police and mainly black state militia (commanded by former Confederate General James Longstreet who was shot trying to stop the riot) over, more or less, a disputed gubernatorial election between Democrat John McEnery (supported by the White League) and Republican William Pitt Kellogg. Eleven police and militia and 21 members of the White League were killed. After three days federal troops arrived and quelled the riot, but it signaled the end of Reconstruction.
Wikimedia Commons, Battle of Liberty Place, Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, 1874
When it comes to Louisiana race violence, two numbers are particularly telling. Largely as a result of violations of racial . . . etiquette, whites lynched 335 blacks between the end of Reconstruction and 1968 (though most lynchings occurred before 1940). Texas had more by the way, 352, and neither state could hold a candle to Georgia, 492, or Mississippi, 539. Lynchings didn’t result in the prosecution of the instigators. At the same time, the number of African American voters declined from a bit more than half of the state’s registered voters in 1880, 88,024 voters out of 173,475, to 1,342 in 1904. The decline was caused largely through laws restricting the rights of African Americans to vote and out-and-out violence. How can anyone wonder why African Americans still see voter ID laws as racist, or that the apparently institutional police violence that spawned Black Lives Matters resonates still? The Civil War was our most violent moment, and we still carry around that violence.
Wikimedia Commons, Michael Begley, Battle of Liberty Place Monument
The Battle of Liberty Place Monument was erected in 1891 by the New Orleans city government. It was removed in 2017. In 1974, the New Orleans City government erected an adjacent marker that stated “Although the ‘battle of Liberty Place’ and this monument are important parts of the New Orleans history, the sentiments in favor of white supremacy expressed thereon are contrary to the philosophy and beliefs of present-day New Orleans.” I like that. I like that New Orleans realized that there was a problem with the Battle of Liberty Place Monument 40-odd years ago.
The world changes, and I think, other than the whole global warming thing and fake news, it’s mostly a better place. Last Saturday Kris and I drove down to Freeport and walked the jetty. We were the only folk carrying fly rods, but since it’s hard to cast off a jetty in high wind they were mostly useless. After 20 or 30 casts I didn’t lose a fly in the jetty granite, but I didn’t catch anything either. On the other hand it’s a terrific walk through a diverse and lively America. And the Liberty Place monument is gone.
Meanwhile we found a great breakfast taco stand in Angleton, Taco Loco #2.
I don’t know where Taco Loco #1 is located. We also found a good bakery in Angleton, the Paris Texas Bakery, on the way back to Houston, almost directly across the street from Taco Loco. The staff was well prepared for Easter.
