The "culture war", race and those very scary hippie peaceniks

I haven't been quoting Jules Witcover much lately. So I'm going to start making up for it with this one, from Forty years ago, the death of hope The Examiner 04/08/08. Writing of those fabled days of turmoil in 1968, he says:

Many white working-class voters who had supported the civil rights movement’s push against racial discrimination in transportation, housing and voting began to see the drive for economic justice as a threat to their job security in an economy burdened by war.

Nixon, by promising tough imposition of "law and order" against street violence, be it in protest against the war, crime in racially segregated city neighborhoods or labor strikes, was able to tap into wide discontent among many such white, working-class voters. "Law and order" became code for repression of all those long-haired, unkempt "street people" of all ages, colors and causes seen as disruptive rabble.

King’s death, and that of Robert Kennedy two months later, deprived the nation of two rare voices of conscience on both the war and the economic disparity between black and white Americans at home. In 1968, the two men came to understand that the causes were interwoven, and independently they pursued them to their last breaths. (my emphasis)

For more on the "law and order" meme, see my post of 05/06/08.

And, no, despite the whines of the "culture warriors" that did not mean, then or now, that Democrats dismissed the need for effective law enforcement. But it did mean that they recognized some of the ugly demagoguery going on under the cover of that slogan in 1968 and thereafter.

Tags: 1968, culture war, jules witcover