Why Lynching Matters
By now everyone who might remotely have an interest already knows that Jeffrey Lord’s attack on Shirley Sherrod was utterly wrongheaded. His attempt to discredit her story of a relative’s lynching was both factually erroneous and morally obtuse. He’s been rightly vilified by commentators from across the political spectrum, from Media Matters to Radley Balko to his own colleagues at the American Spectator. This kind of brouhaha has a life cycle, and this one has reached its end.
So why did I take the time to write a 1700-word exegesis of an obscure 1945 court case last night, and why am I back at it today?
Because lynching, as it turns out, matters.
Race is, of course, a vexed topic in America today. And it’s one on which reasonable people may disagree. People of goodwill can differ sharply on affirmative action, on the use of race in the census, on the place of the
So why did I take the time to write a 1700-word exegesis of an obscure 1945 court case last night, and why am I back at it today?
Because lynching, as it turns out, matters.
Race is, of course, a vexed topic in America today. And it’s one on which reasonable people may disagree. People of goodwill can differ sharply on affirmative action, on the use of race in the census, on the place of the