Orrock LXXXVI XLVIIFrom #sherrilynifill This country has a unique history with the particular terror of masked attackers. The Ku Klux Klan, the violent white supremacist organization terrorized Black people in the American South in the first years after the end of the Civil War and through much of the 20th century. So rampant was Klan violence in the years immediately after the Civil War, that it threatened to derail the promise of the 14th Amendment, which was ratified in 1868 and was designed to ensure that Black people would equal citizens in post-Civil War America.
n the first decade after the end of the Civil War, the violence of the Klan grew to such an alarming level that President Grant encouraged Congress to address the growing problem by passing a statute that would give federal authorities the ability to prosecute those interfering with the constitutional rights of Black people.
Among its other protections designed to ensure access to voting for Black people, the Enforcement Act of 1870 made it a felony when:
…two or more persons to band or conspire together, or go in disguise upon the public highway, or the premises of another, with intent to ….injure, press, threaten or intimidate any citizen with intent to prevent or hinder his free exercise and enjoyment of any right or privilege granted or secured to him by the Constitution or laws of the United States.
The reference to disguise was not accidental. Congress held a set of hearings in 1870 and 1871 to receive testimony about the effect of Klan violence in the South.
Black people courageously stepped forward to tell in their own words what they had endured in towns and hamlets throughout the South. They told of threats, whipping, rape, arson, murder – all carried out by masked and armed bands of men who demanded that Black people do their bidding. Frequently the acts of these mobs were designed to keep Black people from voting, from teaching in newly opened schools, from purchasing land or from demanding to be paid for labor. Whites also testified about how their efforts to assist Black neighbors who faced Klan violence, turned the attention of the mob on them. Local officials were either secretly part of the mobs, or too intimidated to prosecute.
Thomas Drennon, a blacksmith, and wagon maker in Floyd County was asked about masked men who came to his home late at night:
Question: Have any of them ever come to your house?
Thomas Drennon: Yes sir…. they came there last January, I think….as well as I could count them there were about twenty odd; I could not count them all. They were disguised so that I could not see their faces; they had something over their faces, hanging down.[vi]
Caroline Smith described how she, her husband, and her sister-in-law were stripped and whipped by masked men who warned the women not to “sass any white ladies,” and not to speak of what had happened or who their assailants were. Smith explained,
After they had whipped all three of us Felker looked in and said, “Do you know any of us?’ I said, ‘No I don’t.’ I told them a lie for knew them well enough I knew they would kill me if I said I did.
I reference this history not to say that ICE officers are the same as the masked Klansmen who terrorized Black people for so many decades. I raise this history to remind us of the uniquely repugnant nature of masked assault and violations of civil rights that is such a shameful part of our history. … targeting members of racial minority groups. This form of racial terror is part of our national DNA. This alone should compel us to resist actions that stir up its memory.
We know that some of the people who have been set upon by ICE officers are U.S. citizens.[xii] These citizens should be able to vindicate their Section 1983 rights. But against whom? Non-citizens also should not be set upon by gangs of men wearing masks. What guarantee do we have that their assailants are in fact ICE agents? Or that they are law enforcement officers of any kind? Has this Administration authorized masked men to terrorize and round-up migrants and U.S. citizens in the name of immigration enforcement?
We know that some of the people who have been set upon by ICE officers are U.S. citizens.[xii] These citizens should be able to vindicate their Section 1983 rights. But against whom? Non-citizens also should not be set upon by gangs of men wearing masks. What guarantee do we have that their assailants are in fact ICE agents? Or that they are law enforcement officers of any kind? Has this Administration authorized masked men to terrorize and round-up migrants and U.S. citizens in the name of immigration enforcement?