I wrapped up my reading of White Poverty this week. The subtitle of the book by Reverend Dr. William J. Barber II is How Exposing Myths About Race and Class Can Reconstruct American Democracy. The excerpt below from Heather Cox Richardson’s Letters From An American substack jumped out at me this morning as hitting on one of the major myths that Reverend Barber highlights in the book:
Since the 1870s, during the reconstruction of the American government after the Civil War, white reactionaries insisted that opening the vote to anyone but white men would result in socialism.
Their argument was that poor voters—by which they meant Black men—would elect leaders who would promise them roads and schools and hospitals, and so on. Those public benefits could be paid for only with tax levies, and since white men held most of the property in the country in those days, they insisted such benefits amounted to a redistribution of wealth from hardworking white men to undeserving Black Americans, even though poor white people would benefit from those public works as much as or more than Black people did.
Dr. Barber names this and gives countless examples of this narrative that led to poor whites voting against their own best interests because of some fear that the earnings from their hard work would go to undeserving Black Americans. Below are a few excerpts to this point.
And whether we’re conscious of it or not, the myths teach us to imagine that (people living in poverty) are Black, while their white neighbors who are also poor are encouraged to see themselves as “working-class.”
If you disaggregate the data on the 140 million Americans who are technically poor or low-income, 24 million are Black. That’s 60 percent of all Black people in America-an incredible burden that reflects the ongoing influence of racism in American life, and one that is shared by a similar percentage of the population in Native American and Latino communities. But when you look at the raw numbers of poor and low-income people, there are 66 million white people-almost three times the number of Black Americans.
And this is what you never hear: most of America’s poor are white.
Anyway, the video below from Republican Representative Glenn Grothman falls into the category of when people show you who they are believe them as he advocates not just for turning the clock back four years to the 45th President but instead going back four decades.
White Poverty was powerful and reminiscent of How We Win The Civil War, which I discussed in my previous post. One of the common threads in each book is a look back at our history without any whitewashing to discuss how we ended up here. In addition, both Reverend Barber and Steve Phillips highlight the work that multiracial coalitions have done to push back against policies that continue to marginalize and disenfranchise tens of millions and maintain white supremacy.
More Summer Reading
One of the best things about the summer for me is being able to do more reading. My list right now is as follows:
Everyone Who Is Gone Is Here - by Jonathan Blitzer (completed)
How We Win The Civil War - by Steve Phillips (completed)
They Came for the Schools - by Mike Hixenbough (completed)
Democracy or Else - by Tommy Vietor, Jon Lovett, and Jon Favreau (completed)
White Poverty - by Reverend Dr. William Barber II
Black AF History - by Michael Harriott
A couple of other lists for summer reading:
Engaging Summer Reads for Teachers | Facing History & Ourselves
Antiracism Summer Reading List – Ash Center at Harvard University
The New York Times also just put out a list of the Top 100 books of the 21st Century