Race Inquiry Digest (January 4) – Important Current Stories On Race In America

Featured – 4 Reasons for a surprising change in racial incarceration trendlines. It’s long been a given that racial disparities plague the nation’s criminal justice system. That’s still true — black people are incarcerated at a rate five times higher than that of white people — but the disparities are decreasing, and there are a number of interesting reasons behind the trend. Read more

The Second Coming of the KKK: The Ku Klux Klan and the American Political Tradition By Linda Gordon – A Review.  For many Americans, the recent movement of white supremacy from the margins into the mainstream has been a staggering development. Read more 

How Ella Mae Wray Seized the Opportunities of 1968. For a young black woman trying to raise three children amid a personal tragedy, the politics of that year were intensely personal. Read more

Bridging black and white: How St. Louis residents are trying to surmount racial inequities post-Ferguson. They see the Midwestern city as a modern Selma, Ala., fueling a new civil rights movement. Read more 

The Supreme Court’s Quiet Assault on Civil Rights. The statute in question was designed to provide a federal remedy against officials who violated the rights of the newly freed slaves or who stood by while others, like the Ku Klux Klan, did so.  Read more 

The NFL Chose to Tank Its Season Rather Than Sign Colin Kaepernick. Billion dollar teams choosing to fail rather than sign Kaepernick is a scandal for reasons beyond wins and losses. Read more 

White voters are moving to the South — and making it more Democratic. In a new article, political scientists Sunshine Hillygus, Seth McKee, and McKenzie Young show that whites who have moved to the South are more likely to be Democratic than lifelong Southerners. Read more 

Florida may restore voting rights to 1.7 million ex-felons: So long, Republicans! An initiative to restore voting rights to ex-felons may be on Florida’s ballot. Will Gov. Rick Scott stop it? Read more 

Federal judge green-lights desegregation housing rule after Carson tries to block it. On January 1st, low-income people will have access to better affordable housing. Read more 

Trump’s Pick to Run 2020 Census Has Defended Racial Gerrymandering and Voter Suppression Laws. The census will determine redistricting and voting rights enforcement. Read more 

Visit our home page for more articles and register your email to receive notification of Race Inquiry Digest updates. Click here for earlier Digests.