The Arkansas legislature today can override the governor's veto of a bill to criminalize trans healthcare because they adopted a new constitution in 1874 as part of a white backlash to Reconstruction that dramatically increased local control.
It was their fifth constitution. For the first time after the civil war, segregationist legislators outnumbered pro-Union legislators and they wielded their power accordingly. One act of reactionary backlash 150 years ago begets another today.
Now I'm reading a PhD dissertation on the subject and here's another unsurprising fact: the 1874 constitutional convention was a political reaction to a campaign of white violence against Black people in the state scholarworks.uark.edu/cgi/viewconten… 
If you dig into any power structure in America you'll find white supremacy before you get to the basement.
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