A new report from the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) says that from the end of the Civil War in 1865 until the traditional close of Reconstruction in 1877, at least 2,000 African Americans were lynched. EJI is well-known for its project of erecting historic markers at the sites of lynchings around the country and for an earlier report documenting lynchings after Reconstruction, but this is its first report on the period from 1865 to 1877. According to the report:
Between 1865 and 1877, thousands of Black women, men, and children were killed, attacked, sexually assaulted, and terrorized by white mobs and individuals who were shielded from arrest and prosecution. White perpetrators of lawless, random violence against formerly enslaved people were almost never held accountable—instead, they frequently were celebrated. Emboldened Confederate veterans and former enslavers organized a reign of terror that effectively nullified constitutional amendments designed to provide Black people equal protection and the right to vote.
In a series of devastating decisions, the United States Supreme Court blocked Congressional efforts to protect formerly enslaved people. In decision after decision, the Court ceded control to the same white Southerners who used terror and violence to stop Black political participation, upheld laws and practices codifying racial hierarchy, and embraced a new constitutional order defined by “states’ rights.”
Even as the Civil War was in its final weeks, Confederates began lynching African Americans. For example, a young Black woman named Amy Spain was lynched in Darlington South Carolina in March 1865 for “treason” because she aided United States soldiers.
In addition to detailing hundreds of individual lynchings the report covers 34 “mass lynchings” in which whole groups of Blacks were murdered. The chart below shows the locations of these mass lynchings.
In the coming days, I will offer some thoughts on this report.
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