America’s two post-emancipation reckonings were each betrayed, leaving two strikes.

Evidence

Both moments were betrayed. One was undone by the advent of Jim Crow; the other by calls for law and order and the tax revolt by the so-called silent majority. The cumulative effect of our failure, in both instances, to uproot a pernicious understanding of race weighs heavy on our current crisis. Think of it this way: We already have two strikes. — Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Begin Again, 47

Categorization

• DEFINE: This sketches the structural spine of ‘the after times’: each reckoning is followed by a betrayal that leaves the country worse off, setting up the concept the reader must define.
• XREF: Directly parallels the reader’s earlier material on failed reckonings and the ‘second Reconstruction’ concept in social-movement historiography.