The Day Freedom Died: The Colfax Massacre, the Supreme Court, and the Betrayal of Reconstruction | 
| Author: Charles Lane
Publisher: Henry Holt and Co.
Category: Book
List Price: $27.00
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Avg. Customer Rating:  5 reviews
Sales Rank: 22777
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 352
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.3
Dimensions (in): 9.5 x 6.5 x 1.1
ISBN: 0805083421
Dewey Decimal Number: 976.367
EAN: 9780805083422
ASIN: 0805083421
Publication Date: March 4, 2008
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Product Description
The untold story of the slaying of a Southern town’s ex-slaves and a white lawyer’s historic battle to bring the perpretators to justice Following the Civil War, Colfax, Louisiana, was a town, like many, where African Americans and whites mingled uneasily. But on April 13, 1873, a small army of white ex–Confederate soldiers, enraged after attempts by freedmen to assert their new rights, killed more than sixty African Americans who had occupied a courthouse. With skill and tenacity, The Washington Post’s Charles Lane transforms this nearly forgotten incident into a riveting historical saga.
Seeking justice for the slain, one brave U.S. attorney, James Beckwith, risked his life and career to investigate and punish the perpetrators—but they all went free. What followed was a series of courtroom dramas that culminated at the Supreme Court, where the justices’ verdict compromised the victories of the Civil War and left Southern blacks at the mercy of violent whites for generations. The Day Freedom Died is an electrifying piece of historical detective work that captures a gallery of characters from presidents to townspeople, and re-creates the bloody days of Reconstruction, when the often brutal struggle for equality moved from the battlefield into communities across the nation.
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A Pulitzer or National Book Award for American History Please July 21, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
This book is heartbreaking; and a literary and historical tour de force. A brilliant rendition of a span in the life of only one venue - Grant Parish - just after the Civil War that weaves together in a kind of real time narrative the names, the faces, the backgrounds, the motivations, the hertiage and the beliefs of the participants on this small but emblematic stage of American history.
Around the nucleus of central action at Grant Parish and its environs, Lane captures the participation of the govenor and his allies and the president and other federal officials with an interest in the outcome by staying exactly on point. The facts and the facts alone make this story so compelling.
Informing the narrative is the factual vulnerability of black folk living among their prior masters; the evil hearts and deeds of the former slave drivers; the brave freedmen who dared vote, the sympathetic and sometimes powerful whites, the coalescing and ossifing of people into rigid political parties, election stealing, the struggle for justice almost singlehandedly seen through to the end by Attorney Beckwith; how the fight for justice for the victims of Colfax and hence the future rights of freedman to live in liberty was cast within the narrow confines of limited federal police power, with the resolution left to those very states that would and did resubjugate them. Witness the parsing of statues so as to produce a disconnect between statutory intent and real world application, and most painfully, most painfully, the tremendous vulnerability of black folk for almost 100 years after the Civil War to the arbitrary and capricious private violence of white supremists.
And then there is the pitifully wasted opportunity to apply federal military might to end the bloodshed and the terrorism, even when they are just across the river. But then, it was an awesome task to realign a whole region with the notion of basic human rights and liberty for black folks and it took another century and indeed, federal police power, before they got message and reconciled themselves to equality.
Here we find the roots of what eventually became the doctrine of preemption, here we understand the disconnect and the power of black robed judges formulating their rulings to further privately held political values and not the greater good- that will result in innocents being slaughtered, elections rigged, blacks intimidated and terrorized all without even a glance back at Justice beheaded at Colfax along with the victms, where the victors are left free to prosper and to write their history of lies.
Here we will understand the gap in understanding between whites and blacks in this country and why black people find it so easy to believe the government would betray them. Here we understand the merits of a military "surge" and how it could stop terrorism, here we understand that if we liken the South 138 years ago to Iraq today, how many years and lives and how much military power it will take to reconcile the country among the sunnis and shias, here we understand the messy confluence of ideals of liberty with political opportunism. Idealism unprotected by the righteous application of force to protect the innocent left so many dead bodies around the trench at Colfax, and so many evil doers free to repeat their crimes.
Here we understand that we must pledge our lives to those treasured and hard fought values for which so many paid the blood price during the Revolution, during the Civil War and the Time Till Now: liberty and the rule of law.
 overall good,but... April 30, 2008
1 out of 4 found this review helpful
The topic was well covered in an interesting and informative manner, I learned a great deal about a period in American history you won't learn in school. The book was well written, interesting and thought provoking. However it was slanted. When the republicans maneuvered to remove democrats from office, they were trying to be just, regardless of the legality of their moves (ie trying to impeach the governor, overturning election results, etc.) whereas the democrats involved in the same actions were crucified. Granted by modern standards, the republicans were more politically correct, but the legality of many of the moves was just as suspect and not truly treated as such. History always has a side, and is written to communicate that side, this is fine, but it must be recognized.
A maginficent and tragic tale April 1, 2008
8 out of 9 found this review helpful
This riveting account of a terrible and unknown (until now) part of American history is every bit as riveting as fiction by John Grisham except that it is meticulously researched, and more important...true.
Filmaker Errol Morris says that "there is no truth for you and truth for me, there is only THE truth," and Chuck Lane tells us the sad truth about the murders at Colfax Louisiana and as importantly the disregard for the most central value of a free society, a rule of law not a rule of man.
Readers will learn about the rich and vivid history pf Louisiana, still a frontier for many people who came to find their fortune from the original American colonies.
I cannot recommend a legal history of the United States that is more important for those of us who labor in the law and hope to seek justice through the power of the law.
From their graves the murdered at Colfax are given voice by Charles Lane.
A riveting and meticulously researched account of the Colfax Massacre and its legal aftermath -- a real eye-opener. March 24, 2008
6 out of 6 found this review helpful
I'm an avid history buff and a pretty demanding critic, and I found "The Day Freedom Died" absolutely riveting. I read it on vacation this week and couldn't put it down. Charles Lane has basically unearthed a little-known event -- the brutal slaughter of many dozens of freedmen in Colfax, Louisiana, on or around Easter Sunday 1873, by former Confederates (now Klansmen) desperately seeking to hold back Reconstruction and to prevent blacks and radical Republican whites from gaining local power -- and made it come to life. This achievement is a tribute both to Lane's meticulous and definitive primary-source research and his fast-moving journalistic storytelling. His rendering of the shocking events of Easter Sunday 1873 itself was incredibly dramatic (also so sad). Lane paints stunningly detailed, nuanced, and evocative portraits of the important players in the drama. And he helpfully and clearly puts the events in Louisiana in the context of Reconstruction generally. As a practicing lawyer, former prosecutor, and a fan of legal history, I particularly appreciated that Lane goes way beyond merely reconstructing the massacre itself to discuss its legal aftermath. The second half of the book recounts the federal government's attempt to prosecute the Colfax killers, and how that attempt ultimately, tragically faltered at the Supreme Court, which rendered a decision that effectively gutted the statute aimed at empowering federal prosecutors to prosecute Klan killings. Lane (the Washington Post's longtime Supreme Court correspondent) is uniquely positioned to render such analysis, and he does it beautifully. There are wonderful portraits here of the trial lawyers and the Supreme Court Justices who were key to the Colfax decision, and also a thoughtful analysis of the pertinent constitutional law issues and the Court's resolution of them. Although tackling a narrower slice of legal history, "The Day Freedom Died" reminded me throughout of Richard Kluger's phenomenal book, "Simple Justice." If you are an American history buff and particularly if you are drawn to either Reconstruction or legal history, you'll love this book.
Full disclosure: I'm a college friend of Charles Lane's. But even if I were not, I would still "approve of this message"!
Thoroughly engrossing, impressively researched, and a story that demands to be told March 7, 2008
8 out of 9 found this review helpful
Chuck Lane's "The Day Freedom Died" is the best kind of popular history: thoroughly researched, well-written, and makes for a quick read. As the events of the Colfax Massacre shift from historical happenstance to a law-and-order whodunit to a legal case to a Supreme Court decision, Lane shifts tenses and tones effectively without losing the reader. He effectively conveys the mood of the times and the way that the story of the Colfax Massacre tied into the overall tenor of Reconstruction, and the injustice of its ending.
Perhaps the most disconcerting thing about the book is its language: Lane writes in modern language, but uses the words "Negro" and "colored" throughout the text in accordance with the usage of the times, as he writes in an author's note at the beginning. The choice is jarring for the first few pages, but defensible in the context of the story about the betrayal of Southern African-Americans by an alliance of Southern whites with Northern whites.
The title of the book tells you that what you're about to read ought to make you mad. The day that freedom died and Reconstruction was betrayed is one that should be remembered, and one that should engender outrage. Lane tells the story well and lets the facts speak for themselves. Which they do, loudly, long after the victims were silenced.
(Full disclosure: Chuck Lane is a colleague and a friend.)
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