Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves might have found a soulmate for his long-pursued quest to ensure the teaching of only positive American history.

During a recent interview by the hosts on Fox News’ morning show, President Donald Trump was explaining his plan to eliminate the U.S. Department of Education and instead send federal education funds directly to the states.

The former president was interrupted by one of the hosts, Brian Kilmeade, who expressed concern that sending money directly to the states could allow liberal cities and states to “just decide we are going to get rid of that history. We have a new history. This is America built off the backs of slaves on stolen land, and that curriculum comes in.”

“Then we don’t send them money,” Trump boldly proclaimed.

This sentiment might sound familiar to some in Mississippi. Nearly every year since taking the office of governor in 2020, Reeves has proposed as part of his budget spending $5 million to create the Patriotic Education Fund.

“No American child should be taught that the United States is an inherently evil nation that solely acts in its own self-interest,” Reeves wrote in his latest budget proposal. “Unfortunately, that worldview is being taught by radical activists in too many schools across our country, and that’s why Mississippi must take proactive steps to ensure this warped ideology does not infiltrate our state‘s schools.”

The Legislature has for years now rejected funding the governor’s Patriotic Education Fund, but Reeves keeps swinging for it.

It is insulting to think Americans cannot learn about the nation’s brutal past treatment of Black Americans, Native Americans and many other groups and still love America. After all, what makes America special is its ideas, its continuing efforts to strive for equality and fairness and, yes, its educational transparency that allows for the true history of our nation to be taught. For many, the heart of America is that we always strive to be better, and part of doing that is understanding what we have done wrong and trying not to repeat those wrongs.

As Rep. Robert Johnson, D-Natchez, the House minority leader, said recently in a television interview, “That history is history. You don’t have to White-wash it. You don’t have to Black-wash it. You just tell the truth.”

But Mississippi has a long history of whitewashing history.

For decades, Mississippi students learned a sanitized version of slavery and later a rose-colored version of the state’s violent segregationist past.

Mississippi historian Charles Eagles wrote in his book “Civil Rights, Culture Wars,” as cited in an Associated Press article, “At the behest of the white elite, the history books (taught in Mississippi schools) preserved ignorance of past inspirational heroes and, more generally, of lost possibilities and forgotten historical opportunities. The state-sanctioned amnesia played a vital role in the perpetuation of white supremacy and racial discrimination.”

In 1962, then-Gov. Ross Barnett, who had been given the authority by the Legislature to select the state’s textbooks, tabbed John K. Buttersworth’s “Your Mississippi” as a Mississippi history textbook.

“All of us ought to be against anything in our textbooks that would teach subversion or integration,” Barnett said. “Our children must be properly informed about the Southern and true American way of life.”

In the 1970s, Tougaloo College sociologist James Loewen and Millsaps College historian Charles Sallis edited a new textbook called “Mississippi: Conflict and Change,” which provided a more accurate telling of Mississippi history.

Still, the then-established Textbook Commission rejected “Mississippi: Conflict and Change,” opting to select the whitewashed Buttersworth book as the state’s ninth grade Mississippi history textbook. A court challenge and the ruling of a federal judge was required to change that decision. The judge ruled that the landmark “Mississippi: Conflict and Change” should be placed on an approved list of textbooks for the state.

That opened the floodgates to more truthful textbooks for Mississippi students. Many of these students, despite learning a more accurate depiction of the state’s and nation’s faults and shortcomings, still grew up to love America and, yes, Mississippi.

The story of Sallis and Loewen and their textbook is important in today’s climate because, after all, there is that old saying: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”

Tate Reeves and Donald Trump sure do not seem to be heeding those words.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

Oct. 26, 1911

Mahalia Jackson, the “Queen of Gospel,” was born in New Orleans. After moving to Chicago, she became one of the first singers to move gospel music from the church to the mainstream, attracting white audiences and selling millions. 

“I sing God’s music,” she explained, “because it makes me feel free. It gives me hope.” 

In 1950, she became the first gospel singer to perform at Carnegie Hall, and 11 years later, she sang at the inauguration ball for President John Kennedy. She became a voice for the civil rights movement. 

In 1956, she performed in Alabama during the Montgomery Bus Boycott, raising money for the movement. But when she returned to Ralph Abernathy’s home, it had been bombed. She continued to perform at events with Martin Luther King Jr., who said a voice like hers “comes not once in a century, but once in a millennium.” 

In 1963, she sang at the March on Washington. When King veered from his prepared text, she urged him to, “Tell them about the dream,” a reference to a speech he had given months earlier in Detroit. His oration became known as his “I Have a Dream” speech — one of the most famous speeches in U.S. history. 

The marches didn’t stop, and neither did Jackson, who saw her music as something that could help “break down some of the hate and fear that divide the white and black people in this country.” Her performance of “Take My Hand, Precious Lord” became King’s favorite. When he was assassinated in 1968, she sang the song at his funeral. 

When she died four years later of heart failure, Aretha Franklin sang the song at her funeral, which more than 50,000 attended in Chicago. 

In her life, Jackson became the first gospel music artist to win a Grammy Award, and after her death, she was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

A “listening session” organized by the Rankin County chapter of the NAACP along with the Department of Justice changed course after attorneys who represent the sheriff’s department and the county sat in, and were asked to leave to prevent victims from feeling intimidated. 

The NAACP had organized the session on Thursday, Oct. 25, at Mount Carmel Ministries in Pearl in association with the Justice Department to provide for a safe space for victims of police excesses by Rankin County law enforcement to speak up. The Justice Department opened an investigation into the patterns and practices of policing in Rankin County last month, after six members of a “Goon Squad” of deputies were sentenced for their role in the abuse and torture of three men. An investigation by the New York Times and Mississippi Today had revealed that the abuse spanned decades, and dozens of Rankin County residents had experienced similar brutality at the hands of officers. 

U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland had called the actions of the “Goon Squad” “a betrayal of their community, a betrayal of their profession.”

The invitation to the listening session urged Rankin County residents who felt that they had been affected by any kind of discrimination, harassment or potential civil rights violations to attend. 

Angela English, president of the Rankin County chapter of the NAACP, said that when she asked the attorneys to leave, they refused, insisting the session was a public event. So instead of inviting attendees to share their experiences with the group as planned, the NAACP arranged for private one-on-one sessions in separate rooms of the church.

“When they realized they weren’t hearing anything, they left after like 20, 30 minutes,” English said about the attorneys. 

She claimed that a Rankin County deputy and a former officer of the FBI were also present. 

In a statement made on Facebook in September, the Rankin County Sheriff’s Department had written that it would “fully cooperate” with all aspects of the Justice Department’s investigation, “while also welcoming DOJ’s input into our updated policies and practices.”

Jason Dare, an attorney who represents the Rankin County Sheriff’s Department, said he was not attending on behalf of the department, but rather in his individual capacity as a member of the Rankin County community. He claimed that he was there to learn.

“That is the most absurd thing I’ve ever heard,” English said. 

“I was just sitting in the back. I was not dressed in anything other than attorney attire,” Dare said. He added that he did not have a badge or gun issued by the sheriff’s department. 

“I’m not sure anybody even knew who I was until I was introduced [to English] and I was asked to leave.”

Dare said he told two Justice Department officials that he planned to attend the listening session a day in advance, and that they didn’t raise concerns. 

Mississippi Today has attempted to reach Neeta Pal of the Department of Justice. This story will be updated if she responds. 

Richard Cirilli, an attorney at Brunini Law who attended the session, had not responded to a request for comment at press time. In 2018 and 2019, the Rankin County Board of Supervisors hired the Brunini firm to lobby on their behalf, according to government transparency group OpenSecrets. The story will be updated if and when Cirilli responds.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.