I shall never fight in the armed forces with a negro by my side … Rather I should die a thousand times, and see Old Glory trampled in the dirt never to rise again, than to see this beloved land of ours become degraded by race mongrels, a throwback to the blackest specimen from the wilds.
Robert Byrd, December 1944 letter to Senator Theodore Bilbo, Democrat, Mississippi
Speaker Pelosi ordered that portraits of four former Speakers of the House who served in the Confederacy be removed from the House. Since these men were Democrats I guess maybe it should be considered internal business of the party of the Jackass. However, I was struck by one name, Robert Crisp. He had served in the Confederate Army and was all of 20 at the time the War ended. He did not serve as Speaker of the House until the 1890s at the tail end of his life. Perhaps some slack could be cut for him due to his youth at the time of his service to the Confederacy? I guess not under the unforgiving standard of the ever woke.
Well what about a Speaker who knowingly associated with a former Exalted Cyclops of the Ku Klux Klan, a man who late in his life was still using the n word on video? Perhaps we should make sure her portrait does not remain in the House? I assume that is different, although why I can’t quite fathom why.
SNOW: “Race relations?”
BYRD: “They’re much, much better than they’ve ever been in my lifetime. I think we — this is my personal opinion — I think we talk about race too much. I think there are — I think those problems are largely behind us. I think we can all profit by our mistakes. I think we’ve reached a new plateau and I think it’s going to keep going upward. That understanding and race relations — But I think, I just think we talk so much about it that I think we help create somewhat an illusion. I think we try to have goodwill. My own mom told me, ‘Robert, you can’t go to heaven if you hate anybody.’ If we practice that. There are white niggers. I’ve seen a lot of white niggers in my time. I’m going to use that word. But we’ve all — we just need work together to make our country a better land. And I’d just as soon quit talking about it so much.”
March 2, 2001
As you noted, one of the portraits she removed was of a Speaker of the House who became Speaker THREE DECADES AFTER the Civil War ended — Charles Crisp of Georgia served as Speaker from 1891 to 1895. His “crime” was serving in the Virginia Infantry at the ripe old age of 19-20 years old.
So much for “With malice toward none” …
Curios about Byrd:
He never served in the military, quite atypical for a man born in 1917. About 36 million draft cards which were filled out in the fall of 1940 by men under 50 have now been digitized, but any card he filled out is not in the file. As he had dependent children, he’d have been excused until the fall of 1943, when that particular exemption was suspended. For whatever reason, he was not conscripted at that time (he was just 26 years old and was not working in an armaments factory).
The 2d incarnation of the Klan had a five digit membership in 1919, a seven digit membership in 1922, and a five digit membership in 1935. It formally dissolved in 1944. Organizing klaverns in 1942 was an eccentric thing to be doing, especially in a state with few blacks. The culture of upland Southerners has been such that racial questions do not tend to take up much rent-free space in their heads and it was unusual in the West Virginia congressional delegation post-ward to be antagonistic to blacks on policy questions. He may have been the only one who was during the period running from 1941 to 1971.
Pretty sure Theodore Bilbo was considered obnoxious and outre at the time (outside of Mississippi and even within it). His successor in Congress was John Stennis, who was a distinctly different personality.