I’ve been reading lately about the Wilmington race riot of 1898. It’s an amazing, depressingly relevant, story. Apparently, a coalition of progressive whites and blacks in North Carolina had started to win elections and had gained control of the Governor’s office, the state legislature, and Wilmington’s city government. Not happy about this turn of events and feeling threatened and outnumbered, the white supremacists who had been in power set out to put an end to this populist nonsense, and set their sights on the 1898 election. Backed by powerful business leaders and a sympathetic media, they embarked on a statewide campaign featuring inflammatory rhetoric, intimidation, and voter suppression and were able to win back the Governorship and control of the legislature. Most Wilmington officials, however, were not up for re-election in 1898, so the progressives remained in office in Wilmington. This was annoying and important to the white supremacists because Wilmington was the biggest city in North Carolina at the time and kind of a big deal. So they just decided to take it.
Using as pretext an editorial in a black owned newspaper that suggested that sometimes sex between white women and black men might possibly be consensual, they were able to motivate an angry mob into action. On November 10,1898, things came to a head. The mob went on a rampage, killed some (I’ve seen estimates from 10 to 300, no one is quite sure) and chased another estimated 2000, including some white supporters, out of town and burned down the place where the black newspaper was published, and then they went to city hall and, at gunpoint, forced the resignations of the Mayor and the Board of Aldermen. They just took over, their leader appointing himself mayor.
These events, because they were allowed to happen without consequence, were central in setting the stage for the Jim Crow south and stymied the cause of racial justice in the country for decades. The North Carolina legislature’s first order of business in 1899 was to pass a constitutional amendment requiring poll taxes and literacy tests. The Wilmington race riot of 1898 remains the only coup d’état to have occurred in this country (if you don’t count Bush v. Gore).
Incredible story, hard to believe. A story of bullies, who, feeling outnumbered and threatened by free and fair elections, resort to voter suppression, inflammatory rhetoric, intimidation, and ultimately violence to regain and keep power. Hmm