This essay is part of Mississippi Today Ideas, a platform for thoughtful Mississippians to share fact-based ideas about our state’s past, present and future. You can read more about the section here.
Gov. Tate Reeves is a big proponent of understanding and celebrating Mississippi’s history, sentiments that I heartily agree with. Take for example his recent Confederate Heritage Month proclamation, which mentions the importance of coming “to a full understanding that the lessons learned yesterday and today will carry us through tomorrow if we carefully and earnestly strive to understand and appreciate our heritage and our opportunities which lie before us.”
Although Gov. Reeves’ ambiguous language cleverly manages to say everything while simultaneously saying nothing, we still should ask what he means by urging Mississippians to “earnestly strive to understand and appreciate our heritage.”
After all, he is governor of a state that celebrates Robert E. Lee’s Birthday on the same day as Martin Luther King’s Birthday, Confederate Memorial Day and Jefferson Davis’ Birthday.
These state holidays are part of Mississippi’s heritage, along with its 1861 justification for secession from the Union, which includes the statement that “our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery.” A keen social analyst and purveyor of unintended irony, Reeves has proclaimed April as Confederate Heritage Month while also insisting that there is “not systemic racism in America”.
But now to my modest proposal. Given Gov. Reeves’ appreciation for Mississippi’s history, I urge him to proclaim an annual “Jim Crow Heritage Month” as a companion to Confederate Heritage Month.
Identifying the most appropriate month for this recognition might require waiting until the GOP-dominated Mississippi Legislature redraws legislative districts to diminish Black voter power. Symbolically, though, November would be an excellent choice for Jim Crow Heritage Month, because in November of 1890 Mississippi adopted its post-Reconstruction constitution, which used a poll tax and literacy tests to disenfranchise Black voters. As the president of the convention, S. S. Calhoon said, “We came here to exclude the Negro. Nothing short of this will answer.” Consequently, the percentage of registered eligible Black voters in Mississippi decreased from 67% in 1867 to less than 6% in 1892.
Now, that’s heritage.
Given the Supreme Court’s April 2026 Louisiana vs. Callais decision, one of the “opportunities that lie before us” – in terms of Mississippi’s racial history – is the chance to suppress Black voting power throughout the South. According to the Supreme Court’s majority opinion in Callais, which was written by Justice Samuel Alito, “Because the Voting Rights Act of 1965 did not require Louisiana to create an additional majority-minority district, no compelling interest justified the state’s use of race … and that map is an unconstitutional racial gerrymander.”
Curiously, the Supreme Court’s Callais decision functionally implies that majority-white gerrymandered districts are constitutional, a form of fantastical legal logic that could lead to the end of multiracial democracy in the South.
This predication has been verified in Tennessee, where the state Legislature and governor quickly acted to gerrymander Memphis and eliminate the state’s only Black-majority congressional district – supposedly in the name of partisan politics, although the means and ends appear undeniably related to race in a state that celebrates Nathan Bedford Forrest Day, which honors the founder of the Ku Klux Klan. Louisiana recently followed suit by eliminating one of two Black-majority congressional districts, while Alabama also is preparing to eradicate one of its two majority-Black congressional districts – a move that GOP governor Kay Ivey praised by observing that “For years, we have fought for this outcome, and I am proud to celebrate this win for Alabamians.”
Well, some Alabamians.
One small step for Tennessee, Louisiana and Alabama, one giant step for the GOP in its quest to consolidate power in the South, with each state doing its best to channel Nina Simone’s lyrics to “Mississippi Goddam.”
Bob Thompson (1937-1966), Homage to Nina Simone, 1965. oil on canvas. Minneapolis Institute of Art, The John R. Van Derlip Fund, 89.83 © Estate of Bob Thompson, Courtesy of Michael Rosenfeld Gallery LLC, New York, NY Credit: Photo courtesy of Mississippi Museum of ArtAlabama and Tennessee (and Louisiana) have gotten me so upset, and Mississippi will likely follow.
Given Gov. Reeves’ politics and selective view of his state’s heritage, as illustrated by his 2013 speech to the Sons of Confederate Veterans, which he gave in front of an immense Confederate battle flag; the Republican-dominated state Legislature; and a pile on by GOP candidates for state offices, including Shad White (state auditor) and Michael Watson (secretary of state), it is likely that Mississippi will follow the lead of Tennessee, Louisiana and Alabama, with Congressman Bennie Thompson’s district being an obvious target.
Poll taxes and literacy tests are out for the time being (bad optics, I suppose), but the effects of white-biased gerrymandering on Black voting power could be similar.
Heritage, y’all. History and opportunity, right? So, how about November as Jim Crow Heritage Month in Mississippi?
Of course, there is a different way forward for Mississippi, a possible future that pushes back against the state’s legacy of chattel slavery and Jim Crow laws, and its host of racist governors, from James K. Vardaman to Theodore Bilbo and Ross Barnett. Mississippi could refuse to follow the lead of Tennessee, Louisiana and Alabama.
Instead, “A full (and truthful) understanding (of) the lessons learned yesterday and today” could invoke the heritage of Hiram Rhodes Revels (the first African American from Mississippi to serve in the U. S. Congress), Medgar Evers, James Meredith, the Freedom Riders, Robert Moses, Fannie Lou Hamer, William Winter and the Legislature’s 2020 decision to remove the Confederate battle flag from the state flag.
This noble and courageous heritage could propel Mississippi toward a more equable distribution of political, economic and social power. But that’s wishful thinking and appears unrelated to how Tate Reeves and the GOP leaders in Mississippi imagine the “heritage and … opportunities which lie before us.”
So, cue Nina Simone.
Bio: Christopher Norment holds a PhD in Systematics and Ecology from the University of Kansas and is an emeritus professor of environmental science and ecology at the State University of New York–Brockport. During his career he published over 50 peer-reviewed scientific papers and three science-related books of creative nonfiction, and received awards from the State University of New York for teaching and scholarship. He now lives in Jackson.
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