Reconstruction Of White Supremacy Summary

Stephen Kantrowitz, in his book Ben Tillman and Reconstruction of White Supremacy tells exactly what the title intends. It represents the story of reconstruction of white supremacy post the Civil War, how the emancipation proclamation struggled to persist in the South, the Jim Crow movements and rebellions, all in context of a man who was not only symbolic to the movements but also the epitome of white supremacy. Even though Kantrowitz uses a biographical approach, it isn't the story of Tillman's life that he depicts but the story of white supremacy and its reconstruction(and politics) in the South through Tillman's life.

Tillman was born on August 11, 1847, into a wealthy slaveholding family and became a wealthy farmer himself. He dominated

the South Carolina politics from the late 1880s until the last years of the twentieth century's first decade. He became the governor of the state from 1890 to 1894 and as a US Senator from 1894 until his death on July 3, 1918. He maintained a national reputation of being the "leading proponent of white supremacy" (p. 3) and propounding the race problem. Kantrowitz presents him as "an ideologue, an organizer, and a terrorist" (p. 3). As a self-styled agrarian rebel, anti-Reconstruction guerrilla and a Democratic activist. Tillman was a vocal advocate of enfranchisement restrictions and so even played a key role in bringing about the 1895 constitutional convention that generated the poll tax, literacy, education, and "understanding" requirements that further depressed voter turnout--and largely disenfranchised black men--in the state for decades to come. And then being elected to the US Senate, he took to the national stage, representing the southern rebel devoted to promote the interests of his region's white farmers against the combined threats of African American equality, federal interference, and aristocratic misrule. More deplorably, he bragged and promoted his successful efforts to disenfranchise African Americans through fraud, murder, manipulation of the laws and legal processes, campaigns of terror and lies. Additionally the conventional "notions that race trumps class" (p. 5) were challenged, as his attacks were not just directed towards Blacks but also towards the poor, landless, insignificant whites. Kantrowitz very thoroughly portrays him as a true politician. And as the rightful representation of a white supremacist.

The book explores the changing nature of white supremacy, class and gender in South Carolina through different movements in the postbellum period.

In the initial chapters, Kantrowitz traces the already existing tensions of white supremacy prior to the Civil war in the South, then the effects of reconstruction in South Carolina, especially Edgefield County, the movements, massacres and the Klu Klux Klan, and how the planters together instigated these terrorizing activities. Then in the next chapter, he shows the continuing political struggle of reconstruction and how it also takes a toll on economy and the agriculture sector in the 1870s-80s, which in turn becomes another basis for the whites to come together to avoid loosing further control. This chapter also portrays the class struggles within the white community and how white manhood came to be redefined among elites and planters alike. The forth chapter shows how Tillman started to take control over politics and the democratic party and proposed a potential solution to such problems was by professing control and white supremacy. The next two chapters talk about lynching, women struggles, the efforts to retain white supremacy by making it into a law and protect the white citizen, and the efforts to disfranchise the non-whites. Then the last chapters, revolves around how Tillman asserted his legacy and strong philosophy throughout the nation, his role as a senator, his impact as popular speaker and the decline in his political

authority.

Kantrowitz has structured an extremely detailed yet a relatively accessible book. His chapters are to the point, and proposes exactly what it intends to. He has sourced profoundly by using old newspaper form South Carolina to give excerpts from Tillman's speeches, letters and interview. Although, there are points when it seems hard to absorb every historical fact.
In addition, it gives a perspective of Tillman's political life and his stand on how he felt about the place of Negroes in a white-dominated society, while contextualizing the political, economical and social struggles and movements in the American south at that time. Its pretty prominent that Kantrowitz focus is not on Tillman, rather he uses him as a vehicle to provide the details about the postbellum period thus the many personal details that are missing seem acceptable.
The book focuses on the dynamics and importance of white supremacy and how it is internalized as an identity of absolute agency and power. The book in many ways portray how desire of power drives man into doing extreme things. Besides, it also illustrates how there was a shift in power structures from race to class in postbellum Amercia. Lastly, this book gives an in-depth perspective of an average white american and his psyche, who struggles to deal with reconstruction and racism.