Thread by @michaelharriot

Republicans say they didn’t vote for Ketanji Brown Jackson because she is “soft on crime.”

I can’t believe I am saying this but I agree with Republicans.

We CANNOT have have a Supreme Court justice who is soft on crime.

A thread.

First of all, we have to understand what “Soft on Crime” means. Some people say it’s a dog whistle. But who is really soft on crime?

For most of the history of this country, it hasn’t been who you think

The Jamestown settlers came to Turtle Island (white people nicknamed it “North America”) & slaughtered the natives. But bc they didn’t know how to plant shit, they resorted to cannibalism until indigenous people gave them food

smithsonianmag.com/history/starvi…

To be fair, there was a drought that year, which the indigenous ppl knew was coming because of their long-range weather forecasting.

But the whites weren’t murderers because these dumb cannibals came here to civilize the “infidels and savages” & teach them about God

SAVAGES!

And everyone knows it’s not illegal to kill a Black person if they resisted you. You don’t have to be “soft on crime” when you get to determine what a “crime” is

You know who was soft on crime?

White people

Not just criminals, but the ones that refused to pass anti- lynching laws for a century, the all-white juries in Mississippi & the white women in the temperance movement who said Black men like to get drunk & rape them

But they were not CALLED soft on crime.

So where did this phrase come from?

Well, it all began with this annoying little social problem called the civil rights movement. In the 1960, Southern conservatives refused to back the GOP's integration policy

Republicans got mollywhopped (I don't know who Molly is. All I know is, she does a fair amount of whopping). So in 1961, a segregationist from Arizona and a racist Republican Congressman from NY called a meeting before the ‘64 midterms to came up with what a “Southern Strategy”

They came up@with a great idea:

What if the GOP could get racists to switch parties?

But how? They couldn't just put racists in charge of the party or let a blatant racist run for president and say: "We support Jim Crow now." That would be insanely racist!

Well actually…

That AZ Republican’s name was Barry Goldwater and that NY congressman was William Miller, the actual head of the GOP. And in 1964 the white supremacist superheroes recruited the Thanos of segregation to join their super-racist Superfriends.

Strom Thurmond

Thurmond helped come up with what they called the “Southern Strategy”

Literally the first thing Goldwater did after accepting the GOP nomination was to promise to crack down on the Black outlaws who were protesting for civil rights

A few months later, the VP candidate coined a phrase that he had heard in the NY governor’s race to scare white people.

To be fair, he didn’t say “da Blacks” or “negroes” were taking over the streets. He didn’t even call them “protesters.” He called them…

A mothefucking BREED

And it worked.

No, Goldwater didn’t win. But white conservatives LOVED that racist shit. The GOP won the South for the first time since the Civil War.

To this very day, they Republicans have controlled the South in presidential elections

How?

Well Reagan gave his first speech at the Neshoba County Fair, where white supremacists and “soft on crime” police officers connected to murder 4 Civil Rights workers. What was his speech about?

Or they did this:

I’m not saying they are liars but the party who hates being “soft on crime” is the same party that gave us literal criminals like Richard Nixon and Donald Trump.

But what does this have to do with the Supreme Court?

Well let me tell you one more story

On Monday, Jan. 3 1906, a man attacked a 21-year-old woman told Chattanooga’s Sheriff she had just been raped. She said she didn’t know if the man’s race or how he looked but the Sheriff arrested a Black man named Ed Johnson. 13 witnesses testified he was working at the time.

For 6 hours, the all-white jury was split. But when they went home, they came back the next morning with a unanimous guilty verdict in less than 20 min.

He was sentenced to death. Luckily, the Supreme Court did something unprecedented.

They stayed Johnson’s sentence.

This was too much for the white people of Chattanooga. A lynch mob decided to kill Johnson themselves.

For TWO HOURS he prayed & watched the mob work the bolts loose on his cell

The district attorney & judge knew about the plan & did nothing. THE DOJ eventually indicted 9 men

They were there & saw everything but would said they couldn’t remember who else helped them. Who were these murderers?

Chattanooga Sheriff Joseph Shipp and 8 of his deputies.

they go to court and are found guilty. They are sentenced to…

90 days in jail.

They returned to Chattanooga to a heroes welcome. Seriously, there was a marching band & everything (don’t feel bad. You know they were off beat).

How do I even know about this?

Well, I know a LOT OF THINGS.

For instance, in 6th grade, I learned that the Supreme Court’s job is to interpret the Constitution.

I know when a criminal goes to the SCOTUS, they’re usually trying to determine if rights were violated, not guilt

I know that the SCOTUS doesn’t sentence criminal
I know Republicans are saying this because they can’t question KBJ’s credentials.

I know that KBJ will NEVER be as “soft on crime” as white people have historically been.

And I know it doesn’t matter if she is.

How do I know this?

I’m not smart or anything. When I heard people worrying, I looked it up and found that the Supreme Court had held exactly ONE criminal trial in the entire history of this nation.

U.S. v Shipp

Imagine if America was as hard on racism as white people want it to be on crime