Please note, if you’d like to opt out from only the upcoming daily Black History Month Voting Rights Alliance #VRABlackHistory series, please email carnwine@tjcoalition.org. Unsubscribing at the bottom of this email unsubscribes you to all Transformers, not just from this special February Series.
Today’s Series’ introduction highlights the Bacon’s Rebellion in 1676 which compels the creation of the policies based on Whiteness and affects voting rights. This history also represents the evil history of land theft from Native Americans and how even enslaved Africans were used to perpetuate these heinous acts in the middle of fighting for equality. Additionally, this story highlights how an oligarchy was set up in the colony of Virginia, voting rights were restricted to ensure the powerful remained powerful and rich at the expense of everyone else, and when everyone banded together, the oligarchy responded by creating worse racial divides so it wouldn’t happen again- a legacy that became the American slave trade and the structural White supremacy we see today. We will see this tactic repeated over and over throughout history. This article does NOT celebrate Bacon’s Rebellion and the destruction of Native Americans; rather, it gives a historical account of how the United States began so we can understand the role of race in the fight for voting rights and racial equality.
