White Men's Law: The Roots of Systemic RacismA searing--and sobering--account of the legal and extra-legal means by which systemic white racism has kept Black Americans 'in their place' from slavery to police and vigilante killings of Black men and women, from 1619 to the present. From the arrival of the first English settlers in America until now-a span of four centuries-a minority of white men have created, managed, and perpetuated their control of every major institution, public and private, in American society. And no group in America has suffered more from the harms imposed by white men's laws than African Americans, with punishment by law often replaced by extra-legal means. Over the centuries, thousands of victims have been murdered by lynching, white mobs, and appalling massacres. In White Men's Law, the eminent scholar Peter Irons makes a powerful and persuasive case that African Americans have always been held back by systemic racism in all major institutions that can hold power over them. Based on a wide range of sources, from the painful words of former slaves to test scores that reveal how our education system has failed Black children, this searing and sobering account of legal and extra-legal violence against African Americans peels away the fictions and myths expressed by white racists. The centerpiece of Irons' account is a 1935 lynching in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. The episode produced a photograph of a blonde white girl of about seven looking at the hanging, bullet-riddled body of Rubin Stacy, who was accused of assaulting a white woman. After analyzing this gruesome murder and the visual evidence left behind, Irons poses a foundational question: What historical forces preceded and followed this lynching to spark resistance to Jim Crow segregation, especially in schools that had crippled Black children with inferior education? The answers are rooted in the systemic racism-especially in the institutions of law and education--that African Americans, and growing numbers of white allies, are demanding be dismantled in tangible ways. A thought-provoking look at systemic racism and the legal systems that built it, White Men's Law is an essential contribution to this painful but necessary debate. |
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Page vii
... White Supremacy " 5. " The Foul Odors of Blacks " 77 95 6. " Negroes Plan to Kill All Whites ” 115 7. " Intimate Social Contact with Negro Men " 135 8. " I Thanked God Right Then and There ” 155 9. " War against the Constitution " 173 ...
... White Supremacy " 5. " The Foul Odors of Blacks " 77 95 6. " Negroes Plan to Kill All Whites ” 115 7. " Intimate Social Contact with Negro Men " 135 8. " I Thanked God Right Then and There ” 155 9. " War against the Constitution " 173 ...
Page xi
... White men . To be blunt , the cold hands of dead White men still maintain , through the laws and institutions they created and perpetuated , their grip on power and their legacy of White supremacy , however much disavowed by today's ...
... White men . To be blunt , the cold hands of dead White men still maintain , through the laws and institutions they created and perpetuated , their grip on power and their legacy of White supremacy , however much disavowed by today's ...
Page xiii
... White supremacy ” and to justify the kidnapping and enslavement of darker - skin people through force of arms . But that's what happened , all because of a handful of genes that determine visible attributes such as skin and eye color ...
... White supremacy ” and to justify the kidnapping and enslavement of darker - skin people through force of arms . But that's what happened , all because of a handful of genes that determine visible attributes such as skin and eye color ...
Page xiv
The Roots of Systemic Racism Peter Irons. xiv Preface the need of many White Americans to reserve racial supremacy and “purity” for themselves. Skin color has long been the defining characteristic by which most people view themselves and ...
The Roots of Systemic Racism Peter Irons. xiv Preface the need of many White Americans to reserve racial supremacy and “purity” for themselves. Skin color has long been the defining characteristic by which most people view themselves and ...
Page 76
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Contents
| 1 | |
1 Thirty Lashes Well Laid On | 19 |
2 Dem Was Hard Times Sho Nuff | 39 |
3 Beings of an Inferior Order | 59 |
4 Fighting for White Supremacy | 77 |
5 The Foul Odors of Blacks | 95 |
6 Negroes Plan to Kill All Whites | 115 |
7 Intimate Social Contact with Negro Men | 135 |
9 War against the Constitution | 173 |
10 Two CitiesOne White the Other Black | 195 |
11 All Blacks Are Angry | 213 |
12 The Basic Minimal Skills | 233 |
Rooting Out Systemic Racism | 249 |
Source Notes and Suggested Reading | 261 |
Index | 275 |
8 I Thanked God Right Then and There | 155 |
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American argument Black and White Black children Black students Brown buses Chief Justice citizens civil rights Clarendon County colonial color Confederate Congress Constitution crime decades decision defendants Democrats Detroit disparities Dred Scott Edgewood election equal families Fourteenth Amendment freedom Freedom Rides high school Hispanic House inequality institutions issue Jim Crow laws Judge killed labor later law school lawyers Little Rock lived lynching Marshall Massacre Milliken Mississippi murder NAACP Negro neighborhoods nigger officials opinion Ossian Sweet parents person Plessy police political population President protection public schools race racial Reconstruction Republican ruling school district school segregation Senate sheriff slavery social South Carolina southern Stacy state’s Supreme Court systemic racism Taney Texas Thurgood Marshall Tillman tion Topeka Trump victims violence Virginia vote voters W. E. B. Du Bois Warren White and Black White Men’s Law White students White supremacy Wikipedia wrote