Reagan opened his 1980 campaign at the Mississippi Klan-murder site invoking states’ rights

Evidence

On August 3, 1980, with the Republican nomination in hand, Reagan opened his general election campaign for the presidency in, of all places, Philadelphia, Mississippi, the community where sixteen years earlier, members of the Ku Klux Klan, with the collusion of the sheriff’s office, abducted, beat, and murdered three civil rights workers. Reagan, the master of symbolism, might have used the macabre setting to put to rest any lingering suspicions that his campaign would appeal to racism in any form. Instead, in front of twenty thousand whites, many of them waving Confederate flags and chanting “We want Reagan!,” the candidate invoked the defiant battle cry of George C. Wallace and countless other segregationists: “I believe in states’ rights.” — Randall Balmer, Bad Faith, 150

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Reagan launched his campaign with a states’ rights appeal at a murder site — Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Democracy in Black: How Race Still…, 284; Reagan launched his candidacy in a county where civil rights workers were murdered. — Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Democracy in Black: How Race Still…, 284; Reagan’s states’ rights rhetoric signaled racial backlash — Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Democracy in Black: How Race Still…, 286 (+2 more)

Related

• Reagan launched his campaign with a states’ rights appeal at a murder site (similarity 0.93)
• Reagan launched his candidacy in a county where civil rights workers were murdered. (similarity 0.91)
• Reagan’s states’ rights speech at the fair signaled racial retrenchment to Black Mississippians. (similarity 0.86)
• Reagan’s states’ rights rhetoric signaled racial backlash (similarity 0.85)
• Reagan’s backlash rhetoric repudiated civil rights through coded attacks (similarity 0.84)
• The KKK grand wizard offered Reagan electoral support after his states’ rights speech (similarity 0.84)

Broader Connections

• Reagan launched his campaign with a states’ rights appeal at a murder site #corroborates (1.00) — Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Democracy in Black, 284
• Reagan launched his candidacy in a county where civil rights workers were murdered. #expands (0.95) — Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Democracy in Black, 284
• Reagan’s states’ rights speech at the fair signaled racial retrenchment to Black Mississippians. #corroborates (0.90) — Nikole Hannah-Jones et al., The 1619 Project, 1210
• Reagan’s states’ rights rhetoric signaled racial backlash #expands (0.85) — Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Democracy in Black, 286
• Reagan’s backlash rhetoric repudiated civil rights through coded attacks #expands (0.80) — Michael Omi, Howard Winant, Racial Formation in the United States, 211