American blacks had their equality setback for over 70 years at the hands of unethical Democrats. “The Corrupt Bargain of 1877” describes how Democratic segregationists stifled black voters by either bribing or beating them to prevent their voting in the presidential election of 1876.
Republicans also accused the Democrats of hiding or underreporting ballots in three southern states in hopes of gaining the presidency. Eventually a 15-member panel was formed from members of the Senate, the House, and the Justice Department. The meeting was behind closed doors with no recording of the proceedings. This panel rendered their decision under “Compromise of 1877,” also known as the “Corrupt Bargain.”
It gave the Republican Party the nod but forced them to pull federal troops from the South, giving Democrats unabridged control without federal intervention. As a result southern blacks lost their rights and for generations were once again denigrated to second class citizens and “Jim Crow” abuses.
Although the Democrat President Johnson was lauded for signing the Civil Rights Act, it was not a new law. It was merely the acknowledgement of black equality that had already been declared more than 70 years earlier by a Republican President, Abraham Lincoln.
After President Lincoln’s term in office, during the Reconstruction Era, President Ulysses S. Grant, a Republican, made it official by signing the Civil Rights Act of 1875.
The bottom line was that black rights were stifled for generations by Democrats and it is time to realize that the Republican Party always had and always will fight for equality for all, just as they had over 100 years ago.
Joel Kinsman
Peachtree City, Ga.
