Carol Anderson: Race and Guns in a Fatally Unequal America

become a sustaining member of the commonwealth  club for just 10 a month join today hello everyone and welcome to today's virtual  program at the commonwealth club of california   i'm melissa murray i am the frederick eye  and grace stokes professor of law at nyu   school of law and i'm also the co-host of strict  scrutiny a podcast about the supreme court   and the legal culture that surrounds it but i  am also a long time resident of the bay area so   it's my absolute delight to be here to moderate  this program for the commonwealth club today   and i'm especially delighted to be  joined by professor carol anderson   she is the charles howard candler professor of  african american studies at emory university   and the author of the provocative new book the  second race and guns in a fatally unequal america   her research focuses primarily on how centuries  of racial injustice have informed the processes   and outcomes of policy making in her new  book professor anderson performs an in-depth   analysis of the second amendment exposing the  highly racialized motives behind its drafting   ratification and subsequent deployment she reveals  how sentiments from early america when enslaved   persons were prohibited from owning carrying or  using a firearm persist to this day as measures   to expand and curtail gun ownership are used to  neutralize punish and subdue the black population   in america we will be discussing a lot in the  next hour and i want to ask for your questions as   well so if you are watching along with us please  put your questions in the text chat on youtube   and we'll be getting to them later in the program  but for now please join me in welcoming professor   carol anderson to the program welcome carol ah  thank you so much for having me melissa thank you   so i i don't even know where to start  this book is so timely so of the moment um   but maybe it's helpful for the listeners to  step back a little and just sort of situate   ourselves with some context the text of the  constitution's second amendment reads as follows   a well-regulated militia being necessary to the  security of a free state the right of the people   to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed  much of constitutional history is steeped in   myth-making in this case the conventional wisdom  posits that the second amendment was like most   of the bill of rights amendments intended as a  response to the encroachments of the british crown   against the colonists in the period preceding  the american revolution and so on this account   the second amendment is really intended to help  americans to keep and bear arms so that they   can rise up against a government that may become  tyrannical against them but as you show in this   book um there might be more to this story than  this david and goliath narrative that we've been   given over the years so can you give us this  additional context for the second amendment   for me the additional context it was looking at  the debates on the constitutional ratification   conventions and and also looking at the  role of slavery and the laws that came up   in order to control the enslaved and so you saw a  series of laws about thou shall not bear arms the   enslaved shall not have the right to bear weapons  they must be kept away from weapons they must   be unarmed disarmed and and the architecture  that came up not only of the laws but of the   architecture of the slave patrols that had the  ability and the the function to go into slave   cabins and look for contraband uh such as books  uh as well as weapons as and then the rise of the   militia and the role of the militia was designed  to control the slave population if there was an   uprising they were there to put that uprising down  and so then seeing the ways that those laws and   that architecture rolled through the colonies  and then through the war for independence and   then through the constitutional convention  and the ratification conventions it was like   wow slavery was was all it infused it permeated  those discussions um i saw the way that the south   bartered hard i mean played a game of hardball  saying you will not have a united states of   america unless we are able to protect slavery and  this is why we get the three-fist clause this is   why we get the 20-year extension on the atlantic  slave trade this is why we get the fugitive slave   clause in the constitution this is also why we  get the second amendment because during that   ratification convention ratification had stalled  and james madison rushes down to virginia which   had been one of the major holdouts and and and he  ran up against the buzzsaw of patrick henry and   george mason and the anti-federalist and they were  arguing that by putting the control of the militia   under the federal government in the constitution  you couldn't trust the federal government to   protect the the slave holders from an uprising  they're like the the north detest slavery   and and we cannot trust them we will be left  defenseless and and they began to push hard   threatening this constitution that madison had  had stitched together that had a strong central   government in there and and so what they did was  they started demanding a bill of rights and and in   in in virginia's ratification subsequent  ratification of the constitution they had   amended in there including their um the right  to a well-regulated militia as part and parcel   of their uh approval of the constitution they  made it clear to madison that they would hold   another push for another constitutional convention  unless they got the protection of the militia   and this is why you get this outlier you  get think about it you get the right to um   free speech a freedom of the press the right not  to have a state-sponsored religion the right to   not be illegally searched and seized not to write  to a free as free and a speedy and fair trial   the right not to have to deal with cruel and  unusual punishment and then you get this the   right to a well-regulated militia for the security  of the state that thing is the bribe to the south   to buy onto the united states of america we  will protect slavery by protecting the militia   so in a lot of ways this book is an origin story  right i'm to use the superhero term and and you   are telling a very different origin story than  the one that we have been conditioned to receive   and it's not just about the second  amendment but about the constitution   and the bill of rights more generally and you  know i teach constitutional law and i begin   every semester by having my students actually read  the constitution and slavery is hiding in plain   sight in the constitution it's all still there  the three-fifths clause is still there all of   the compromises about slavery there is an explicit  clause about the rendition of property back to the   states which is about slavery even though it's  not explicitly stated as being about slavery   but it's all there why have we never made these  connections between slavery and the constitution   and the bill of rights why instead has the  narrative about the bill of rights really   been about these anti-federalists who are so  deeply consumed with this question of individual   rights and the possibility of a tyrannical central  government why haven't we heard before that it's   actually the tyranny of slavery that they want  to preserve and i think that's because our origin   story is just wrapped up in the mythology of these  noble founders who were just steeped in fighting   off the tyrannical regime of the british and so  when you have this very flattened two-dimensional   origin story you don't deal with the complexity  of the reality of what these folks were really   dealing with and the choices that they were making  so for instance when we get this narrative story   about this incredible militia that fought off the  british um that that was there to fight against   domestic tyranny what we don't hear is how george  washington was absolutely beside himself that the   militia was absolutely unreliable during the  war for independence sometimes they'd show up   sometimes they wouldn't sometimes they  fight sometimes they take off running   i mean how do you fight a war when you can't ex  you don't know if your folks are going to be there   and so that was part of the reason why it was put  in the constitution for federal control is that   madison wanted to have that militia more organized  more well regulated um to be more effective and   and we also get the story of this fighting off the  domestic tyranny i mean we've got this this amber   waves of grain kind of origin story um well that  domestic tyranny we had shae's rebellion right   before the constitutional convention where you  had a group of white men who were just furious at   the government for taxation policy so they began  attacking the massachusetts government and when   the government tried to call out the militia to to  quell it the militia was like no i'm not feeling   that and and you actually had then members of the  militia joining in in shae's rebellion so british   merchants had to hire a mercenary army to put  down shea's rebellion so they weren't feeling this   whole thing about a domestic tyranny kind of piece  either what the the militia was really good at   was putting down slave revolts absolutely really  good at that and that and and you think about the   silence in the constitution of slavery that is  the same silence we have had in our histories   um it is the thing that we are ashamed of um  and so the origin story of the greatest nation   ever cannot be rooted in slavery because  one of these things is not like the other   right so just to be clear for the listeners  um there is this narrative about the militia   being sort of animating principle about the around  the second amendment but as you as you show in the   book they never had any expectation that a militia  could stand up to a standing army could ever   defeat the tyranny of the state if the  state were to become tyrannical against   the people instead their investment in the militia  is about this local form of potential thera of   potential charity and that's the slaves that they  are worried will revolt against them and thomas   jefferson i am a graduate of the university of  virginia i have been steeped on jefferson quotes   like its mother's milk and there is a quote from  thomas jefferson that i've actually never heard   of that appears in your book where he talks about  the possibility that his slaves could justifiably   turn against him and he is deeply worried about  this and um and you see other members of that   political community also being worried about the  possibility of enslaved persons rebelling and it's   not an idle fear this is the age of revolution not  only have the american colonists rebelled against   the british the french are about to overthrow  their monarch in a year or two but closer to   home the caribbean nation of haiti has just  experienced a massive overthrow of not only the   institution of chattel slavery but the government  itself by enslaved persons they have taken over   the government of haiti and they've made it their  own and this looms large in the history of the   second amendment and we've never heard of this  either so can you make the connections between   these external events and what happened here  in the united states oh absolutely and so here   this is the age of revolution so one of the things  that happens is this fear that these revolutionary   ideas will carry forward to black people that  black people will think that somehow this idea   of self-determination and self-government uh  this idea about being able to rule yourself   um that that that black people will believe that  that applies to them and haiti verifies this in   ways that just sends shockwaves through the united  states just shockwaves it it this is where you get   thomas jefferson going oh my god if this thing  gets unleashed we have to fear it we must fear   it and the fear that his own enslaved people will  justifiably rise up against him and and you see   this this this coming through in terms of the laws  so that in baltimore as as you have slave owners   fleeing haiti with their enslaved when they get  to baltimore baltimore opens up the public armory   to to white citizens so that they can protect  themselves against these haitian enslaved people   coming into baltimore you have in south carolina  banning actually banning the enslaved from haiti   from being able to come into south carolina and  think about this south carolina is a slave state   i mean south carolina where more than half of  the residents are enslaved and south carolina   banning the enslaved from coming this tells  you about the fear and you have government   government governor pinckney talking about and  this is why we have the militia this is why we   have the militia and you have virginia virginia  is absolutely fearful about haiti and and when   they're coming they're like they're bringing too  many of them here there's too many of them here   and and our our enslaved folk are learning  that to be disrespectful they're they're   they're getting these heirs about them we've got  to protect ourselves and you have gabriel's revolt   um oh i'm jumping ahead one of the things that you  have happening in the united states shortly after   the haitian revolution begins is you have the the  uniform militia act of 1792 and that says that   every white man between the ages of 18 and 45 has  to be part of the militia and has to have a gun so   you're you're seeing the definition of citizenship  um and the the responsibilities of citizenship   wrapped up in the role of the militia gun  ownership and whiteness and you have james madison   writing in a letter going who did you see that  mess in haiti oh by the way our militia act will   be passing soon so you know i don't know whether  it was a subconsciousness speaking or whatever   but to connect haiti and our militia act will be  passing soon that is absolutely essential how do   we keep these enslaved folks down how do we stop  the revolutionary ideas from being from seeping   into our enslaved population where they're going  to rise up and think that they can be free too   and then we have gabriel's revolt in 1800  in virginia and that is a multi-state   i mean sorry a multi-city multi-county uh  planned revolt that they find out about   on the day it was supposed to happen and governor  james monroe is just shook he is just trembling as   he's writing to thomas jefferson i just found out  about this oh we we would have been in blood um if   this thing had really gone off and they called out  the state militia the various militias to go and   round up and hunt down gabriel's gabriel and his  followers and then you have mass public hangings   as a way to send the signal this is what  happens to black people who believe in freedom   this is interesting so the response to gabriel's  rebellion is to make an example of the slaves who   were involved in that uprising we didn't have a  similar response to the whiskey rebellion nor did   we have a similar response to shae's rebellion but  they too sort of were very much a disruptive force   in colonial america what explains the difference  um i really believe it's whiteness whiteness   explains the difference it's also it's the sense  that black people you have to be afraid of them   they are a danger they are a threat to the  security of the united states they are a   threat and a danger to to white citizens in  the united states so we have to put in measures   to subjugate them to protect ourselves in  order to be safe white men are not seen as   dangerous in that kind of collective  sense and so when you had shay's rebellion   um that attacked the massachusetts government  and was going after the armory in springfield   and it required a mercenary army of 4  000 soldiers to put shae's rebellion down   what you then had were just a handful of folks who  were tried and convicted and they received pardons   they received presidential pardons the same with  the whiskey rebellion where you had an attack on   federal law federal officers at the time and  and you had um them tarring and feathering   federal tax officers i mean so this is like  torturing and you have them engaging the us   army in this rebellion this whiskey rebellion  over tax policy at the end of the day what you   ended up with were a handful who were who were  tried and convicted and they received pardons   it was like whereas when you had the enslaved  when you had african descended people rising   up for their freedom the response was we have  got to make a full example of you so that no   one who looks like you believes that they have the  right to be free so we see beheadings happening in   1811 in the revolt in 1811 in louisiana where  they are beheaded and their heads put on spikes   uh to line the road to the plantation as a  warning to the enslaved this is what happens   when you believe that you can be free this is  the stone oh rebellion oh no stono was in south   carolina so this is the charge so many rebellions  right right and this is why you had these uh the   slave owners who were afraid because one of the  things is that they knew that this was wrong they   knew that slavery was wrong when you're looking  at the ways that they're talking about slavery   they know that it's wrong but they're doing it  anyway and so then there's the fear of retribution   that when they get free they're going to do  to us what we have done to them that is why we   have to keep them unarmed and subjugated because  they are an inherently dangerous criminal people   so there are two main contributions to the book  one is surfacing this lost history of the second   amendment this other origin story that has really  been hiding in plain sight and hasn't been talked   about as part of the second amendment the second  contribution i think though is the way in which   the relationship between african-americans and  guns and violence has actually been shaped by the   second amendment and constitutional history that  in fact the social construction of dangerousness   is actually originating in this founding period  but we see the repercussions of it to this day so   you begin the book with a discussion of the police  murders of philando castile and alton sterling   these are both men who are shot and  killed when they are in lawful possession   of firearms like they're not they are exercising  their second amendment rights and yet they are   killed because they are seen to be threatening  can you say more about that right so um and and   actually was the killing of philando castile  that was the genesis for me for for this book   because here you have a black man who was pulled  over by the police the officer asked to see his   id philando castile following nra guidelines  alerts the officer that he has a license to carry   weapon with him but he is now reaching for his  id as the officer has asked the officer begins   shooting philando castile so he wasn't threatening  the officer he wasn't brandishing the gun   he hadn't pulled it out pointing it at anybody  he simply had a license to carry weapon   and he was gunned down and you got silence  from the nra virtual silence it was only when   uh black members of the nra began pushing for  the nra to make a statement and remember this   is the nra that had gone just wild um with  anger at about ruby ridge and about waco   calling federal law enforcement jack booted  government thugs but you'd get nothing like that   when it comes to the killing of black men for  simply having a weapon for simply having a gun   instead what they said was well we believe  everybody has the right to bear arms   but we have to wait for the investigation and  it was that that sense where then journalists   and pundits were saying well don't black  people have second amendment rights and i went   lord that's a great question let me go find out  um and that's what had me hunting back into the   17th century and taking us all the way through  to see about the right to bear arms the right   to a well-regulated militia and the right to  self-defense right so let me backtrack a little   bit it's a perfect um compliment to this but the  idea of black men bearing arms is one that becomes   threatening um and is threatening at the period  of revolution and remains threatening even to   this day but as you note in the book um the  militias that the founders are imagining are   almost holy and exclusively white malicious but  that's not the full range of melissa participation   there are actually black militias at this  period of time and in fact they are incredibly   impactful during this period and as you note at  the battle of new orleans andrew jackson would   not have prevailed and we would not have won the  war of 1812 were it not for the intervention of   this black militia which is incredibly ironic  given what andrew jackson later goes on to do   as a president of the united states but can  you say more about these black militias and   how their service translates or doesn't translate  into a bid for citizenship and to be recognized   as citizens later in the history of the country  and so you have in new orleans this black militia   and they had been there since the early 1700s um  and so wit and under french rule and spanish rule   and so when the us moved in to new orleans or the  louisiana purchase one of the the key pieces was   you had whites in new orleans demanding that the  governor disarm and disband this black militia   and originally this is what he's thinking  you know oh yeah because black men with   guns but he figures out that this black militia  is the best trained the best organized and the   the most efficient fighting force that they have  the white militias they've got lousy officers   they're too spread apart to handle all of the  challenges that are happening in the territory   and so he tries to square the circle with whites  who are demanding the disbanding of this black   militia with the security needs of the area and  so he removes the black officer class of this   militia and installs white officers on top of  them thinking that that would appease whites and   they were like no we want them gone um but then  there was that massive slave revolt in 1811 and   and and the governor claiborne was like oh my god  we need help and he calls on this black militia   to help put down the slave revolt and then notes  how effective and efficient they were in doing so   but they got no love for that effort instead they  were just kind of like go away just go away um   then comes the war of 1812 and as you note andrew  jackson is looking at that that basic armada that   is coming from the british to invade new orleans  and get a hold of the mississippi because if you   can control the mississippi you've got  an incredible gateway to control america   and so that battle of new orleans is absolutely  essential andrew jackson looks around and he sees   that that black militia is an incredible organized  well-run fighting force and he's like i want them   i want them and i will treat them equal  to white men in the army i will pay them   equally i mean so it was all about i will treat  them as full citizens as full human beings   and this was the promise those black men fought  something fierce and he notes he's like i heard   you were good but i didn't realize how good wow  but after the victory after the war he sends them   off to the swamps as a labor battalion to do the  work that white men would not did not want to do   and you have the government in new  orleans then figuring out how to disband   the black militia and so all of those promises  that military service would lead to citizenship   consistently keeps getting denied and that's  one of the the lines that i'm following   so seeing what happens after the war of 1812  what happens after the civil war what happens   after the first world war is that you get black  men fighting for the united states of america   and believing that that is part and parcel of  citizenship that they will come back to be able to   fully experience democracy and instead what  they experience is just this anger this this   how black men with arms must not happen we are  afraid of black men who have learned how to use   weapons black men who have learned how to take up  defensive positions black men who have soldiering   skills are a threat and they must be dealt with  so i think you may actually have a very receptive   audience for this book among the supreme court of  the united states and in particular one member of   the court justice clarence thomas um in a 2010  case mcdonald versus the city of chicago he   wrote a really interesting concurrence that picks  up on some of the themes that you've mentioned   in the book he talks the case is about whether or  not the second amendment can be incorporated to   state governments through the 14th amendment and  he writes a decision about what the appropriate   constitutional vehicle for incorporation should  be but he also notes um that during the period   following the united states civil war there were  a number of massacres and uprisings involving   white private militias against newly freed african  americans and one of the points he makes here is   if those african-americans had been permitted  by the states to bear arms as was their right   as citizens under the second amendment they  would have been able to stand up to these   marauding mobs of white men and and so he  very much is making a connection between the   second amendment and racism but it is to turn the  argument about gun control to say that gun control   is actually bad for african americans so  where does your book come in on this debate   among progressives and gun rights enthusiasts  about how gun control affects these different   communities and in particular the african-american  community that really has been besieged by gun   violence yeah and so where my book comes down  is that as i say this isn't a pro-gun or an   anti-gun book this is a book about black people's  rights and seeing those rights consistently   undermined because of the anti-blackness  coursing through this nation that sees black   people as a threat and so it doesn't matter  whether we're armed or whether we're unarmed   and think about the black folks who were gunned  down because because i was afraid i was afraid   when they didn't have a gun or the black people  who were gunned down because they did have a gun   i was you know they were they were a threat i  was you know i was afraid and so they're killed   my book doesn't deal with that i think about  the ways that you had a a lawsuit by the naacp   that uh challenged gun manufacturers for flooding  the black community with cheap guns that it was   were spiking the homicide rate within the black  community you also had a lawsuit by corps the   congress of racial equality that was against the  us government for the 1968 gun control act which   banned saturday night specials those cheap guns  saying that you took away basically the right to   self-defense from the black community because this  was the gun that they were able to overwhelmingly   to afford and so here it to me it speaks to the  conundrum that we have about guns in the united   and and it requires us to rethink what  real safety and real security looks like   um and and part of the to me the other part of  this discussion because i have run into this is   to say that you know with these guns you know you  got black folks in chicago just killing themselves   you got all of this black on black crime and  and what i say is that yes over 80 percent   of black people are killed by black  people but over 80 percent of whites   are killed by white people but we don't have  the narrative of pathology about whites killing   whites at that rate because so so much again is  focused in on the anti-blackness and the pathology   the criminal the inherent criminality of black  people that that is driving this discussion   and and i also argued in a guardian um op-ed that  we've we're dealing with these twin pandemics   the pandemic of mass shootings and the pandemic  of anti-blackness and that the anti-blackness is   short-circuiting our ability to have real actual  gun safety laws so that what you hear from like   a lauren bobert uh is that if you take away our  guns we will be left defenseless against the gangs   against the drug dealers and against the thugs  and as we know those are synonyms um pejorative   synonyms for african americans that yelling about  defenselessness is the same language that we heard   in 1788 from patrick henry and george mason  we will be left defenseless and that's what   we have to really deal with is this history well  so that's interesting so when justice thomas makes   this appeal for expanded gun rights by linking it  to the ability of african americans to stand up   for themselves in the reconstruction era he's  actually trying to inject african americans   into a narrative about defenselessness that has as  you point out in the book been reserved for white   people and so there is a disjunction between  the tale that he's telling and the way that   dangerousness has been constructed in the  united states and this will always i think   your book makes the point this will always mean  that regardless of how gun rights are understood   and recognized black people will not be included  in this vision right i mean so when you think   about um you know towards the end of the book i'm  dealing with stand your ground the right to open   carry in open carry states and the castle doctrine  and what we're seeing in those is that you've got   disproportionate fear of black people in these  laws that are supposed to be the hallowed ground   of the second amendment so when you look at  stand your ground what stand your ground does   is it expands the concept of the castle doctrine  the castle doctrine says that if you're in your   home and somebody comes in that's an intruder you  have the right to defend yourself you have the   right to ward them off the stand your ground says  expands that to you don't have to be in your house   anywhere where you have a right to be and where  you perceive a threat you have the right to stand   your ground well that perception of threat because  black is the default threat in american society   that perception of threat puts black folks  in the crosshairs and this is why you see   that for whites who kill blacks under stand your  ground they are 10 times more likely to walk with   justifiable homicide than blacks who kill whites  under stand your ground ten times more likely   excuse me four whites who kill blacks they  are 281 percent more likely to walk under   justifiable homicide than whites who kill whites  when blacks are the victims of this violence   it becomes acceptable in the judicial  system because black is the threat um   i also look at it in terms of just  juxtaposing kyle rittenhouse to tamir rice   so kyle ridden house is the 17 year old white  teenager who crosses state lines with an   illegally obtained ar-15 to go to a protest in  kenosha wisconsin so he can defend the property   against these the this antifa uh and blm  whatever um and and the police welcome him   too that's one of the militia as part of a militia  right they welcome him um they're like oh we   really appreciate you guys being here it's hot out  here you want some water so they don't see this 17   year old with an ar-15 as a threat as dangerous  he goes and he shoots down three men killing   two of them seriously wounding a third he walks  back to them with his hands up as if to surrender   to the police and the police go right by him they  don't see him as a threat not even that they don't   see him as a threat they see him as an amplifier  to their own authority he's there to help them   right we appreciate you guys being here wow  but you take tamir rice who was the 12 year   old black child in cleveland in an open carry  state who's playing in the park by himself and   the law says as long as you're not pointing a gun  at someone you can open carry and grant it it was   a toy gun but it didn't have the orange tip on  it but he could he wasn't threatening anyone   the police came and within two seconds they gunned  him down saying he was dangerous he was a threat   kyle rittenhouse is one of the boys tamir rice  is a threat and he is killed within two seconds   so can we inject gender into this and we've mostly  been talking about black men and white men um but   generally the overlay of gender and gun rights is  that guns are necessary to protect the defenseless   women in your household how does this play out  when one of the women is lawfully carrying and   tries to stand her ground and protect her home and  she happens to be african-american so that is the   story of catherine johnston that i tell in the  book and she was a 92 year old woman in atlanta   and she hears it's the middle of the night and  she hears the burglar bars being removed from her   home she is rightfully afraid she gets her rusty  revolver to protect her domain the door slams open   she shoots to protect herself a barrage  of bullets come back in at her it was   the police and they said it was justified  because she shot first so this black woman   92 years old in her home in the middle of the  night did not have the right to protect herself   i mean and that became the narrative until the  narrative was blown apart because it it was clear   then that the police had um ex basically used  torture to to extract a confession from somebody   who gave up her house and that they were then  putting pressure on an informant who ran to the   media to tell the truth about what had happened  but if that had not occurred this would have been   as justified as the killing of brianna taylor  right um can i go back in time a little bit um   a part of the book that i found so fascinating  was the part that takes place here in oakland   california so you note in the 1960s in oakland the  back panthers were incredibly active um setting up   free breakfast programs and very active in arming  the community and but they did so lawfully they   were very observant of the existing gun laws  but they believed that it was really important   for the black community to be armed against police  violence what happened in california to basically   thwart their efforts to keep black people armed  and protected against what they saw as a threat   yeah so the the panthers really arose in response  to the police brutality raining down on that black   community and they had a framework of policing  the police they knew what the laws were about open   carry california had open carry laws they knew  how to open carry they knew what kinds of guns   they had to have and they knew that they had to  be licensed and so and they knew the distance that   they had to maintain from the police as the police  were making an arrest well the police did not like   having these panthers watching them observing them  and and and and basically monitoring them policing   the police and so the police would would stop the  panthers but they couldn't arrest them on anything   because they were following the law they knew the  law uep newton was a law student he knew what the   law said and that is what they were following so  the police ran to don mulford who was a california   assemblyman and said you got to help us here the  panthers are dangerous they are dangerous they are   a threat they are a serious challenge to our being  and mulford's like i got this and so with the help   of the nra they drafted legislation to basically  make the methods that the panthers were using   to police the police that open carry to make  it illegal to make the panthers feel legal   and you had governor ronald reagan who was  eager to sign this legislation because he   had been hearing about these panthers as well and  that they were a threat that they were dangerous   and i thought it was fascinating in this not only  did you have this confluence of conservative nra   assemblymen and ronald reagan working on gun  control when black people are carrying arms but   you also had no movement in terms of getting at  the root cause which was the police brutality   that had driven the panthers to come into  being all right so um if you are an audience   member please feel free to put your questions for  professor anderson in the chat box in the youtube   function we have some terrific questions that  have already come in and your last response really   then speaks to this next question from one of the  listeners what role have gun rights organizations   played in these disparate approaches to gun  control that really do impact individuals on   the basis of race so one of them as you know one  of the major gun rights organizations is the nra   and the role of the nra the nra began in 1871  founded by union soldiers as a marksmanship club   they were absolutely distraught at the lack of  marksmanship that they saw in the civil war so   they spent a lot of time like teaching folks  how to shoot and that was the role of the nra   and then you started seeing greater politicization  happening in the 1960s particularly when it came   to gun control laws um and and again like i  talked about with the malford act they were   there helping to draft that legislation and  they weighed in on the 1968 gun control act as   well which was the one that banned saturday night  specials then it was the the coup in 1977 at the   the nra convention in cincinnati where the the the  kind of politicized virulent right wing took over   and said enough of this this being mamby pamby  about politization we've got to go full bore into   politics and so in that coup this is where you  then see the nra really going after uh politicians   who who are about gun control and in in in backing  like i said when you had wayne lapierre uh at   ruby ridge and at waco where federal officers  are killed shot at for for serving warrants   um and you have the nra backing the folks at  ruby ridge calling those government officers   jack-booted government thugs who are just who have  the right to murder law-abiding citizens and break   into their homes and take their guns i mean you're  getting this this politicized narrative that is   about our freedom our you know the way that we  stop tyranny is that we are armed but you don't   get that language for instance in the killing  of philando castile and there was nothing said   about alton sterling so are you worried professor  anderson um after such a watershed year for racial   justice and i think we can say that 2020 despite  all of the disruption was a watershed year for   racial justice do you worry about backsliding i  mean the supreme court will take up an important   case next term the new york state rifle and pistol  association versus corlet um that will be another   case that really i think seeks to expand the scope  of gun rights in in common use are you worried   about backsliding because i imagine there must be  a world in which the expansion of gun rights um   could be met as enhancing the rights of all  citizens or enhancing the rights of some   citizens over others right and and and what i i  see is the enhancing of some rights over others   um it it again because we have not dealt with  the anti-blackness in american society and we   have not dealt with defining black people as  dangerous as inherently dangerous as inherently   criminal as inherently a threat um and so this  expansion of gun rights will will heighten the   the threat to black people's lives that heighten  the precarity of black life is is what i see   so let me come back to that because there's a way  in which this book the second is very much like   the 1619 project like we cannot hope to address  the disparities in contemporary american society   if we do not go back and understand our origins  and the legacy of those origins on the present day   how do we start these conversations on these  issues with individuals who don't believe   that there are existing racial disparities  in this country i mean we've already seen the   incredible backlash to the 1619 project  which is morphed into a backlash against   critical race theory and you know headline if  your child is learning critical race theory   congratulations because your kindergartner is  actually in law school because that is where   critical race theory is thought is taught um how  do we have those conversations though where we can   actually be honest about excavating our origins if  there aren't people who are ready to hear it and   that has been one of the long battles in american  society has been our history i mean so it is the   way that the civil war morphed from a a war about  slavery to the lost cause that this was about   states rights and this was about economics  without understanding the economics of slavery   it was the role of the united daughters of  the confederacy that transformed our textbooks   so that the the role of slavery just basically got  elided over in terms of the civil war our history   matters and this is the backlash that we're seeing  because we know that history matters we know that   the narrative stories that we tell are powerful  in shaping the way that we understand the world   in the way that we analyze it and and this is why  you're seeing this push i mean it is texas that is   trying to pass a law that says no we're not going  to teach about the clan um and and nowhere you're   not going to teach martin luther king and no  you're not going to teach susan b anthony either   um so if what we're doing is we have this it's  like we talked about that origin story that was   fighting against tyranny and these are absolutely  pure heroic two-dimensional folks um when that's   the story then what we have right now doesn't  make sense and then it allows for the narrative of   when when we're seeing this endemic poverty what  we're seeing is a culture of poverty we're seeing   people making individual choices it means that  you don't have to deal with the systems that   had created this and that sustained it it also  means that we don't have to deal with the systems   that set up fha um to create the inordinate  wealth disparities in the united states it and and   and how do we get there is to begin to to continue  to speak to the truth to speak to the evidence and   to continue to say it and put it out there because  at a certain point at a certain point when the   stuff doesn't make sense anymore when you've got  this flat narrative and it's just not making sense   then you just might go back to looking at no this  didn't happen this way this is how this happened   we have to continue to have those conversations we  have to continue to to be really good historians   um and and and digging in the archives and digging  in the the best work that's out there and pulling   together those streams of thought to see how we  got here because that's the only way we're going   to figure out how to get out well so that point  about methodology i think is really important um   you note that as an historian you are going to  the archives like you didn't come to this with a   predisposition you went to the archives and this  is what you found but it also suggests that it   wasn't that hard to find this in the archives that  it was sort of hiding without even really hiding   it was just there no one chose to surface it what  does that say about our willingness to grapple   with our past if there's all of this information  pointing to clues about our origins but we refuse   to surface them it says a lot about the ways that  we learn to ask questions so much of the questions   for instance on the second amendment are whether  it is about the right to a well-regulated militia   or the right for an individual to bear arms and  that's how the supreme court has talked about it   like whether this prefatory clause has any impact  on the operative clause right and and and so when   it's framed that way then that means you're not  looking at its real origins um that means that you   are framing it in a way that allows you to elide  over um the the roots of what was driving these   folks to think through why we would have the right  to a well-regulated militia for the security of   the state wow um do we talk about the security of  the state when we talk about freedom of religion   the right not the right to to um not be illegally  searched and seized i mean there's a the the way   that we frame it has a lot to do with the ways  that we go to to find the answers and because i   was looking at do black people have the right to  bear arms do they have second amendment rights   that's what that's the frame that i went looking  for so when you say it like that it makes the text   of the second amendment illuminate in a completely  different way i mean a well-regulated militia   being necessary to the security of a free state  as to opposed to an enslaved state like like it's   the free men we're trying to protect right exactly  yeah i mean it's it's incredibly illuminating when   you say it that way and again um really  interesting that this aspect of it has not   become more prevalent more we haven't talked  about it hasn't become more commonplace in our   discussions of it you have done incredible work  though and not just on the second amendment but   on voting rights and and i think this year is  really going to be carol anderson's year because   everything you've written has suddenly coalesced  into being you know of the moment in the cultural   zeitgeist so one of our listeners has been steeped  in the ovra of carol anderson and wants to know   when you wrote one person no vote back in 2018  this is your book about restrictive voting laws   did you imagine that restrictive voting laws  would be enacted as quickly as they were in 2021 and i'm going to go back to my the book  right before one person no vote white rage   and with white rage i talked about whenever  you see this massive attainment of black   citizenship rights is that you  get this massive policy backlash   to undercut those rights when you think about how  in 2020 you had a turnout that was astronomical   because black folks knew that democracy  was on the line so you had like a 60   black voter turnout rate um there were 160  million people who voted you had an incredible   multi-racial coalition who were willing to  deal with a pandemic to vote that coalition what we're dealing with right now is white  rage we are dealing with the the backlash   the policy backlash to people exercising their  right to vote people saying this is the kind of   society that we want and the white rage backlash  is like no you will not have that society and we   will cut down the access to the ballot box that  you used in order to to try to change the dynamics   of this society did i anticipate that they would  move as my brother would say with a quickness um i didn't think they'd moved this fast  but the coalition of forces that were there   made that obvious that this would happen the point you make about um the politics  of backlash it doesn't just translate   into policymaking in in the book the second  you also note that um the massacres that we   are only beginning to hear about now like the  tulsa race riots like the elaine race massacre   um all of those were backlash to the gains the  limited gains that african americans made during   the reconstruction period so this doesn't just  play out in the arena of policy making it then   gets translated into physical violence using the  right to bear arms so i mean there is a through   line between both of these books yes absolutely  and and and there's another through line   which is when i talk about the  policy you see how the policies   sanction that violence that anti-black violence  that give it legitimacy so when we talk about for   instance the massacre at in colfax louisiana where  you had there was an election um there were whites   who did not like the results of that election so  they were storming the the courthouse in colfax   louisiana which was the site of democracy in that  area and there was a black militia protecting   that's that courthouse they were overrun they were  slaughtered of over a hundred black men killed   and and the f and louisiana was so fractious  at the time that it was impossible to to like   charge them the killers with a a state crime so  the federal government comes in and charges them   with violating the third enforcement act which  is the act against white domestic terrorism   which is the ku klux klan act that case goes  all the way up to the u.s supreme court and the   supreme court in the crookshank decision basically  sanctions white domestic terrorism saying well the   the third enforcement act only applies against  state action not private action this is like   so those killers mass murderers get  to walk because the us supreme court   then covers that by saying this act that was  designed for this white domestic terrorism   only applies toward the state not towards  the kkk so that's a great transition to my   last question um which is about the supreme  court so as you say in the crookshank decision   the court basically says that the 14th  amendment only applies as to state action   insulating private acts of racial violence from  any kind of recourse but over the last 50 years   there has been an emerging interest in originalist  interpretation of constitutional text so the idea   here is that judges should read and interpret  the constitution with an eye toward how its   terms would have been understood and experienced  at the time of drafting and ratification and so   the idea is because it is rooted in how  things would have been understood in the past   um you know perhaps originalism is less attentive  to questions of race and racial discrimination   um that exists in our modern day period  that's always been the wrap on originalism   but you are actually offering in the second  an originalist take on the constitution in the   second amendment one that makes race and slavery  central to the founding and to the constitution   itself and so with that in mind how should lawyers  and judges just deploy this new understanding   of the second amendment of the constitution itself  in their efforts to interpret constitutional text   yeah and i the originalist uh slant really seems  to me it to be a way to try to undermine the role   of of racism and race in the united states and  and so by doing what i've done which is to go back   and look at the ways that james madison was  drafting the constitution and drafting the the   bill of rights and the pressures that were  on him then you're having a very different   discussion about the second amendment and you're  seeing that it is steeped in anti-blackness   steeped the bill of rights having there in  the middle of the bill of rights the right   to control and contain black people's rights  the right to deny black people their rights wow   i think that what we need to do is to remove  the second amendment from its hallowed ground   that it currently has that has been nra propped  up by the nra and to treat it the way we treat   the three-fist clause recognizing that this  is a function of slavery it is a function of   the denial of black humanity and a denial of black  people's rights um and really reconceptualizing in   this nation what real safety and security looks  like and also what real citizenship looks like   so i think our listeners should actually have  the last word on this and this one comes from   a listener who is really interested in how you  approach the classroom at emory so when you teach   history to your wide-eyed students down there  in atlanta what surprises them the most about   the history that you discuss and discover together  so much of what i teach is what they haven't had   um even as they come through their ap  courses and so it's it there's this like what   but i also believe that the greatest learning is  what what they're able to bring to themselves what   they're able to define for themselves and  so all of my classes are research courses   where i send them into the archives into the  original documents where they've got to pull   it together and that makes the learning real  it it it makes it their own um and so i had a   student for instance who had asked the question  well why haven't african americans after the   civil rights movement made more progress and i  said that's a great question go to the archives   and in our archives there's a group called  a collection called the neighborhood network   association or something like that and what they  did was they tracked klan members in georgia's   government and in georgia's judiciary in the 70s  and 80s when you begin to track those klan members   with the legislation that they're blocking and  with the judicial decisions that they're making   things become very clear about the roadblocks  to progress and and i could have said womp   womp and sounded like a charlie brown adult but  there was something about my student finding   that information on his own that now it it it's  enlightening for him it's like i get it i get it   well your students are tremendously lucky to have  you as a teacher professor anderson and we are   incredibly lucky to have spent this last hour  in conversation with you about this fantastic   new book so please join me in thanking carol  anderson the author of the new book the second   um this book is available at all major book  sellers um i found it in my local bookstore and i   think you can find it in yours thank you so much  to our audience for watching and participating   live in this program if you'd like to watch more  programs or to support the commonwealth club's   efforts in making virtual programming please  visit commonwealthclub.org online i'm melissa   murray thank you so much for joining us today and  please stay safe and healthy thank you thank you you

Channel: Commonwealth Club of California

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Keywords: CommonwealthClub, CommonwealthClubofCalifornia, Sanfrancisco, Nonprofitmedia, nonprofitvideo, politics, Currentevents, CaliforniaCurrentEvents, #newyoutubevideo, #youtubechannel, #youtubechannels, CarolAnderson

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Length: 64min 30sec (3870 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 30 2021