George Floyd being killed by a
police officer in Minneapolis is not simply about the death of one Black man.
His death also killed an historic but
uneasy alliance among the Democratic Party, labor unions, and the civil rights
movement. The reaction to his death is
ending the last vestiges of the historic New Deal coalition that defined
progressive politics in American for at least 50 years, ushering in an era
where it now appears that the Democratic Party and the civil rights community are
at odds with labor and unions.
Historically, the New Deal coalition
from the 1930s that defined the Democratic Party was composed of labor unions,
farmers, working class, and increasing people of color. It was a coalitional party weaving together a
variety of interests, primarily focused on economic and class issues. From the
1930s to 1960s it fought mostly for minimum wages, workplace safety, and
collective bargaining issues. The
coalition produced significant gains improving the economic lot of its members
and Americans in general, helping shrink, as Thomas
Piketty noted, the rich-poor gap in America. This was the Old Left–class and economic
focused.
Yet a valid criticism of this
progressivism was the blind eye it cast on race. Many New Deal programs such as minimum wage
laws excluded southern Black sharecroppers, or unions were criticized for
excluding Blacks. The Democratic Party
in the South, which dominated that region from the Civil War to the 1960s, was
notorious for the White Primary Supreme Court cases where the former fought
hard to exclude Blacks.
Yet many labor
leaders, including Walter Reuther, president of the United Auto Workers,
and A. Philip Randolph, who led an AFL-CIO member union, were there in 1963
with Martin Luther King, Jr at the historic march on Washington, D.C. With labor’s support, the civil rights
movement produced the 1964 Civil Rights Act, the 1965 Voting Rights Act, and
other major legislation.
But this embracing of civil rights
also fragmented the Democratic Party and progressive politics. Democrats, as President
Johnson foretold when signing the 1964 Civil Rights Act, would lose the
South and they did. First Barry
Goldwater, then George Wallace, and
finally Richard Nixon exploited white racial anxieties regarding the civil
rights movement the summer 1967 riots.
Nixon profited from this backlash, producing what the Edsalls
called a chain reaction that led to the exit of white working-class America out
of the Democratic Party. Ronald Reagan
continued to exploit the race card, and the adoption of civil rights, or identity
politics to its critics, by the Democratic Party at the exclusion of class further
contributed to the split among the Democratic Party, labor, and the civil
rights community. The emergence of the
New Left in the 1960s—focused on racial, gender, and LGBTQ issues—is often seen as a critical facture
point.
Progressive Democratic Party
politics succeeded when it held together labor unions and civil rights. In Minnesota, the birth of the modern
Democratic Party came in 1944 when Hubert Humphrey among others brought the
Democratic ad Farmer-Labor parties together.
Together the DFL advanced, especially in Minneapolis, a progressive
economic agenda but it did not put as
much emphasis on race, not surprising for a state and city overwhelmingly White
until recently. The DFL often gave lip
service to civil rights issues, but Minnesota is a state with among the worst racial disparities in
the nation for education, economics, and criminal justice. But with a rapidly diversifying population
and a growing Black population, Minnesota
but especially Minneapolis was changing.
Minneapolis became
the picture of contemporary Democratic Party politics today. It is socially liberal, headed by a
Millennial Democratic mayor and a 12-person city council, 11 of whom are
Democrats one a Green. But the DFL of Minneapolis
and Minnesota is not the party it was.
Farmers have left for the Republican Party, and even before Floyd’s
death in many parts of the state labor
too has left. For those who are white,
well-educated, and at least middle class, it is a wonderful place to live. But despite the progressive rhetoric, Minneapolis was a tale of two cities, with the
one for the poor and people of color not so wonderful.
Floyd’s alleged murder by a white
Minneapolis police officer turned the city into the center of the “defund the
police,” with nine of its councilmembers supporting this proposal. Floyd’s death is about the hypocrisy on race
in America, even with Democrats. But equally fascinating is how a Democratic
Party city is going after the police union whom it blames for a history of officer
shootings and use of excessive force against African-Americans. Minneapolis’
police chief announced he would no longer negotiate with the union. Minnesota’s Democratic
Governor also locates much of the blame with the union. Former Minneapolis Mayor RT
Rybek sees the union as an obstacle to reform, and even other labor unions,
such as the AFL-CIO
are calling for the current head of the police union to resign. In Minneapolis and across
the country police unions are seen by members of the civil rights community
as hostile to civil rights reform.
George
Floyd’s death is perhaps the final fracturing of the Democratic Party, labor, and the civil rights supporters. Maybe this split needed to happen. But as it does it bodes a dramatic turn
in party politics that complicates the
electoral map for Democrats and progressive politics going forward. Smart politicians such as Donald Trump see this
opportunity and will surely exploit it in the 2020 election.
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