Buffoons, Battle Flags and Civil Rights

Events over the past 30 days – and reactions to them – have cast a light on simmering tensions over attitudes toward race and gender.

On June 16, announcing his presidential bid, real-estate developer and TV celebrity Donald Trump criticized Mexico and immigrants who come to the U.S. illegally. "They're bringing drugs," he said. "They're bringing crime. They're rapists."

On June 18, a gunman – allegedly one Dylan Roof – shot and killed nine black church members, including a state senator, at a Bible study in Charleston, South Carolina.

On June 27, the U.S. Supreme Court in a 5-4 ruling overturned state bans on gay marriage.

And on July 8, a federal judge ruled to cancel the Washington Redskins’ trademark registration, stating the name denigrates Native Americans.

The high court’s decision legitimizing intra-gender marriage (Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Scalia, Alito and Thomas dissented) is, in my view, similar to the overturning of bans on interracial marriage (“miscegenation”). Here’s a shocking factoid: The Supreme Court banned anti-miscegenation laws in 1967, yet such laws had remained on the books in several states into the 21^st Century. Local judges in Alabama continued to enforce that state's anti-miscegenation statute until 1970. In 2000, Alabama became the last state to adapt its laws to the Supreme Court's decision.

The Catholic Church disagrees with my comparison. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops said of the June court ruling: "It is profoundly immoral and unjust for the government to declare that two people of the same sex can constitute a marriage." while in 1948, it was the Catholic Church that stepped forward to successfully challenge California's anti-miscegenation law on behalf of a black-white couple in Los Angeles. 

 

The Confederate battle flag has flown across the South for more than a century. Regarded by some as a symbol of “the southern way of life,” it is a popular icon at NASCAR events and country music concerts. In addition to being widely marketed on everything from shot glasses to bath towels, it is incorporated in the state flags of Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia and Mississippi.

But to many the flag is a persistent reminder of, and symbol of support for, slavery and deep hatred of blacks. The alleged shooter reportedly took photographs of himself draped in the Confederate banner. A survivor of the shootings told CNN reporter Sylvia Johnson that Roof answered one man’s pleas to stop by saying, “No, you’ve raped our women, and you are taking over the country … I have to do what I have to do.”

 

In the wake of the Charleston shootings, Walmart, Amazon, eBay, Sears and other retailers have announced they will no longer sell merchandise with the Confederate emblem. Perhaps more significant, South Carolinas governor Nikki Haley on July 9 signed legislation to remove the Confederate battle flag from the Statehouse. It had flown since 1961, and remained flying to officially protest the civil rights movement.

And then there’s Donald Trump and Redskins owner Dan Snyder, the Tweedle-Dee and Tweedle-Dum of buffoonery.

 

The Donald is one of 16 declared Republican candidates for president. He needs be heard above the noise from a crowded field and he needs to out-conservative the conservatives (as Richard Nixon used to say, Republicans need to take conservative positions in the primaries and use moderate rhetoric in the general election).

Other Republican candidates, with the exception of Ted Cruz, who said he thinks Trump “speaks the truth,” have condemned Trump’s screed and are distancing themselves from him. Jeb Bush said Trump’s comments "do not represent the values of the Republican Party and they do not represent my values." Rick Perry, on ABC's “This Week,” said, "Donald Trump does not represent the Republican party. I was offended by his remarks.” Hispanics make up an increasingly important voting bloc.

 

In the Redskins case, U.S. District Judge Gerald Bruce Lee upheld the ruling of the Federal Trademark Trial and Appeal Board, which determined the team’s name was offensive to Native Americans, making it ineligible under the Lanham Act for status in the federal trademark registry. In response to the ruling, which the team will appeal, Redskins owner Dan Snyder cited the history and heritage of the football team, telling USA Today Sports, “I will never change the name. It’s that simple – NEVER. You can use caps.”

Racism and discrimination is alive and well in the United States. But recent events, or reactions to them, show we are making progress. When the civil rights of gays are upheld by the highest court in the land, when a symbol of slavery and racial segregation is banished from a Deep South statehouse, when the Republican Party distances itself from a fear-mongering racist, and when a federal court backs the repeal of trademark protections for a racist team name, there is hope that we as a nation are becoming, perhaps, just a bit more enlightened.