In our last blog, we introduced the religious doctrine of providential design. Now, it is time to examine all the ways this religious viewpoint poisoned attitudes in American Christianity toward African Americans in the US for many years. We left off by stating that it absolved slaveholders from individual responsibility for the horrors of slavery. […]
Category: United States History
Providential Design & American Christianity, Part 1
The doctrine of providential design arose in the United States after the Civil War and the end of slavery. It was, perhaps, the most perfect combination of racism and religion ever created in the United States. To understand the full importance of this pernicious doctrine, let us lay out what its beliefs were. How to […]
Ich Bin Ein Berliner and West Berlin
I hadn’t realized the coincidence until now, but June 26 is the anniversary of two extremely important Cold War events involving the German city of Berlin. In 1963, United States president John F. Kennedy told the people of West Berlin “Ich bin ein Berliner.” In English, he said, “I am also a citizen of Berlin.” […]
Colombo, Caboto, and the Importance of Names
It might be safe to write that every American ever born knows the name Christopher Columbus. When I used to teach American History to college students, the combination of Columbus and 1492 was one of two things I assumed every student knew about history. (The other? The name of the current president. Which, come to […]
Chaney, Goodman, and Schwerner Murdered
June 21, 1964 witnessed one of the most chilling events of the Civil Rights Movement, the murders of Chaney, Goodman, and Schwerner. James Chaney and Michael Schwerner were members of the civil rights group CORE, the Congress of Racial Equality, and Andrew Goodman was a summer volunteer to help with their programs. On June 21, […]
The March Against Fear and James Meredith
The other major event in US history from June 6 I’d like to discuss today is the March Against Fear, a protest begun by James Meredith in Mississippi in 1966. Although it may seem rather different than my earlier memorialization of Operation Overlord (see previous blog post), there are, in fact, some connections. These two […]