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Fred W. Morrison Series in Southern Studies
Ben Tillman & the Reconstruction of White Supremacy
Through the life of Benjamin Ryan Tillman (1847-1918), South Carolina's self-styled agrarian rebel, this book traces the history of white male supremacy and its discontents from the era of plantation slavery to the age of Jim Crow.
As an anti-Reconstruction guerrilla, Democratic activist, South Carolina governor, and U.S. senator, Tillman offered a vision of reform that was proudly white supremacist. In the name of white male militance, productivity, and solidarity, he justified lynching and disfranchised most of his state's black voters. His arguments and accomplishments rested on the premise that only productive and virtuous white men should govern and that federal power could never be trusted. Over the course of his career, Tillman faced down opponents ranging from agrarian radicals to aristocratic conservatives, from woman suffragists to black Republicans. His vision and his voice shaped the understandings of millions and helped create the violent, repressive world of the Jim Crow South.
Friend and foe alike--and generations of historians--interpreted Tillman's physical and rhetorical violence in defense of white supremacy as a matter of racial and gender instinct. This book instead reveals that Tillman's white supremacy was a political program and social argument whose legacies continue to shape American life.
As an anti-Reconstruction guerrilla, Democratic activist, South Carolina governor, and U.S. senator, Tillman offered a vision of reform that was proudly white supremacist. In the name of white male militance, productivity, and solidarity, he justified lynching and disfranchised most of his state's black voters. His arguments and accomplishments rested on the premise that only productive and virtuous white men should govern and that federal power could never be trusted. Over the course of his career, Tillman faced down opponents ranging from agrarian radicals to aristocratic conservatives, from woman suffragists to black Republicans. His vision and his voice shaped the understandings of millions and helped create the violent, repressive world of the Jim Crow South.
Friend and foe alike--and generations of historians--interpreted Tillman's physical and rhetorical violence in defense of white supremacy as a matter of racial and gender instinct. This book instead reveals that Tillman's white supremacy was a political program and social argument whose legacies continue to shape American life.
422 pages, Paperback
First published April 24, 2000
11 people are currently reading
267 people want to read
About the author
Stephen Kantrowitz
6 books10 followersStephen David Kantrowitz is Linda and Stanley Sher Professor of History at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
February 26, 2022
Less a biography of a man than a scattershot portrait of Ben Tillman's role in the white South's post-Civil War struggle against black equality and for perpetual white supremacy, Ben Tillman and the Reconstruction of White Supremacy is written in an academic style that, despite being greatly informative, can at times be a slog. The timeline jumps all over the place, Tillman disappears from the narrative for long stretches, and the author seems to want to cram in too much extraneous detail of the racial dysphoria that troubled Tillman's home state of South Carolina, as well as other states. Maybe it's just my personal bias showing, but a more traditional linear biography of Tillman as he bloviated his way through several decades of public life would have probably worked better. All this isn't to say that the book is bad; it just presents a foggy vision of a tumultuous era.
October 4, 2019
Stephen Kantrowitz' reconstruction of the life and career of Senator Ben Tillman is a superb analysis of a conveniently-forgotten American public figure. Tillman's proto-Nazi ravings are not the stuff of turn of the century nostalgia; our romance with the era of The Music Man has terminal Alzheimer's when it comes to the words of the tune. Tillman's career spanned the post-civil war "redemption" and the beginning of the civil rights era. The "troubles" of the 1960s would have gained his contemptuous nod as "fulfillment" of his worst on-stage nightmares.
An important question Kantrowitz successfully answers: why did "revisionist Reconstruction" and Tillman's race-baiting take off in those two decades from 1890-1910? It was not mere nostalgia for the Lost Cause that led to segregation, disfranchisement, the rebirth of the KKK or Tillman's demagoguery. The South was not quite the old Land of Cotton but an urban-industrial society in first development. Urban centers brought in free movement of people and ideas, butting heads in trains or voting stations; competing for new wage jobs; giving birth to populist and socialist movements and organized labor. Race was the card to keep the new ways from infringing on old power structures. Tillman played his hand like a high-roller while spouting the era's populist/progressive platitudes.
Perhaps more amazing to modern readers is how his message transcended his native region, drawing applause in the Midwest, Far West and even in New England. The same urbanization and influx of new people made northern and Midwestern Americans think twice about their untested liberalism. Feeling "mugged" by change they were ripe to revise old attitudes to resist new forces. What may be overlooked, though, is the double standard in free speech. Tillman is allowed, in mass public meetings, to go to the heart of darkness, echoing Conrad's Kurtz: "Exterminate the brutes!" No charges are pressed for inciting to riot, even after Atlanta in 1906. But let any black militant of the period advocate the use of armed force, or an anarchist urge the use of dynamite in labor conflicts, and the police and court system would scramble their repressive apparatus in all-out war, First Amendment be damned.
Kantrowitz also takes to task those who want to smear the progressive label by association with Tillman. Tillman was a racist, so the argument goes; he called himself a progressive; therefore all those calling themselves progressives take on the legacy of Tillman the race-baiter. The McCarthyite circular logic is well-worn, like the "Hitler was a leftist" school. But as Kantrowitz asserts, political terms can mean anything and evolve over time. Tillman's progressivism and anti-imperialism are not embraced by those who embody the terms today; if so, both Pitchfork Ben and W. E. B. DuBois stood on the same side. The absurdity speaks for itself.
A last word for those who think Tillman's rants are basement museum pieces: we're not so far away from their spirit. The hysteria over Barak Obama's birthplace, the pogrom atmosphere over the Ground Zero "mosque," the campaign against "Sharia law," the general rabies of the Tea Party and the fear and loathing of Central American children show us the raw passion of Ben Tillman still lies close to the surface. The points of his fork rest sharp in the American backside.
An important question Kantrowitz successfully answers: why did "revisionist Reconstruction" and Tillman's race-baiting take off in those two decades from 1890-1910? It was not mere nostalgia for the Lost Cause that led to segregation, disfranchisement, the rebirth of the KKK or Tillman's demagoguery. The South was not quite the old Land of Cotton but an urban-industrial society in first development. Urban centers brought in free movement of people and ideas, butting heads in trains or voting stations; competing for new wage jobs; giving birth to populist and socialist movements and organized labor. Race was the card to keep the new ways from infringing on old power structures. Tillman played his hand like a high-roller while spouting the era's populist/progressive platitudes.
Perhaps more amazing to modern readers is how his message transcended his native region, drawing applause in the Midwest, Far West and even in New England. The same urbanization and influx of new people made northern and Midwestern Americans think twice about their untested liberalism. Feeling "mugged" by change they were ripe to revise old attitudes to resist new forces. What may be overlooked, though, is the double standard in free speech. Tillman is allowed, in mass public meetings, to go to the heart of darkness, echoing Conrad's Kurtz: "Exterminate the brutes!" No charges are pressed for inciting to riot, even after Atlanta in 1906. But let any black militant of the period advocate the use of armed force, or an anarchist urge the use of dynamite in labor conflicts, and the police and court system would scramble their repressive apparatus in all-out war, First Amendment be damned.
Kantrowitz also takes to task those who want to smear the progressive label by association with Tillman. Tillman was a racist, so the argument goes; he called himself a progressive; therefore all those calling themselves progressives take on the legacy of Tillman the race-baiter. The McCarthyite circular logic is well-worn, like the "Hitler was a leftist" school. But as Kantrowitz asserts, political terms can mean anything and evolve over time. Tillman's progressivism and anti-imperialism are not embraced by those who embody the terms today; if so, both Pitchfork Ben and W. E. B. DuBois stood on the same side. The absurdity speaks for itself.
A last word for those who think Tillman's rants are basement museum pieces: we're not so far away from their spirit. The hysteria over Barak Obama's birthplace, the pogrom atmosphere over the Ground Zero "mosque," the campaign against "Sharia law," the general rabies of the Tea Party and the fear and loathing of Central American children show us the raw passion of Ben Tillman still lies close to the surface. The points of his fork rest sharp in the American backside.
March 11, 2012
A VERY thoroughly researched book about the leader of segregation in south Carolina from a Govenor in the 1880's through 4 terms as a US Senator. An excellent work to understand the building blocks of racism in America.
July 6, 2007
How do you humanize a bigot and a racist without sympathizing? Kantowitz does somehow. Haunting.
December 12, 2019
I guess it was South Carolina's destiny to be always in the vanguard of reaction, racism, and if necessary separatism. Under John C. Calhoun they said if they could not nullify the tariff in their
home state than they wanted out of the union during Andrew Jackson's presidency. A generation
later they were the first to secede from the union so they could preserve slavery and the God given
right for any white man to own a slave if he could afford one.
Fighting for that right was a large family named Tillman, wealthy plantation owners and the youngest
of several children was named Ben born in 1847. Not for lack of trying, but he was not taken for the
Confederate army. He did however get a cranial tumor along with his left eye. It gave him a fearsome appearance and apparently never wore a patch.
Tillman was one of those southerners who feared the appearance of a newly freed black citizenry.
He was one of the first to use the new method of sharecropping.to keep the former slaves in
economic bondage. He was no Klansman though he supported the Klan whenever. He wore his
racism proudly and openly. He was a founder of a rifle club to protect white rights during Reconstruction. And when President Hayes removed the last federal troops from the south, Tillman was one of those who helped install Wade Hampton as Democratic governor.
Tillman did have a certain sympathy for the poor whites and was concerned they might be going
over to the new Populist party. The Democrats as he saw it were forgetting their roots. He ran
and won for governor in 1890. In his tenure as governor Tillman put in the legal barriers that
disenfranchised black voters until the civil rights era. In 1895 he was elected by the legislature for
the first of four terms as US Senator. By that time the Populists in South Carolina were effectively
co-opted on issues of economics and race.
Tillman in the Senate was a wild man. Using a pitchfork as a prop he threatened to stick in Grover
Cleveland's fat ribs if he didn't abandon the gold standard and embrace silver. After Theodore
Roosevelt had dinner with Booker T. Washington at the White House in 1902, Tillman said it would
take a thousand lynchings to keep blacks in their place. Only black wasn't the word he used.
He did embrace some progressive notions provided they only benefited whites. But it was generally
all about race. Oddly enough in 1912 a Democratic president with southern origins named Wilson
was elected. But by that time Tillman was having health issues and the fire was dying inside him.
While preparing to run for a 5th term Tillman died.
Tillman's sad legacy of racism and hate lived on A younger supporter of his was an attorney
named Frank Thurmond. He had a son named J. Strom Thurmond and we know his contributions
in both major parties to keep South Carolina in the vanguard of racism.
And we have a president now who Tillman would find most congenial.
home state than they wanted out of the union during Andrew Jackson's presidency. A generation
later they were the first to secede from the union so they could preserve slavery and the God given
right for any white man to own a slave if he could afford one.
Fighting for that right was a large family named Tillman, wealthy plantation owners and the youngest
of several children was named Ben born in 1847. Not for lack of trying, but he was not taken for the
Confederate army. He did however get a cranial tumor along with his left eye. It gave him a fearsome appearance and apparently never wore a patch.
Tillman was one of those southerners who feared the appearance of a newly freed black citizenry.
He was one of the first to use the new method of sharecropping.to keep the former slaves in
economic bondage. He was no Klansman though he supported the Klan whenever. He wore his
racism proudly and openly. He was a founder of a rifle club to protect white rights during Reconstruction. And when President Hayes removed the last federal troops from the south, Tillman was one of those who helped install Wade Hampton as Democratic governor.
Tillman did have a certain sympathy for the poor whites and was concerned they might be going
over to the new Populist party. The Democrats as he saw it were forgetting their roots. He ran
and won for governor in 1890. In his tenure as governor Tillman put in the legal barriers that
disenfranchised black voters until the civil rights era. In 1895 he was elected by the legislature for
the first of four terms as US Senator. By that time the Populists in South Carolina were effectively
co-opted on issues of economics and race.
Tillman in the Senate was a wild man. Using a pitchfork as a prop he threatened to stick in Grover
Cleveland's fat ribs if he didn't abandon the gold standard and embrace silver. After Theodore
Roosevelt had dinner with Booker T. Washington at the White House in 1902, Tillman said it would
take a thousand lynchings to keep blacks in their place. Only black wasn't the word he used.
He did embrace some progressive notions provided they only benefited whites. But it was generally
all about race. Oddly enough in 1912 a Democratic president with southern origins named Wilson
was elected. But by that time Tillman was having health issues and the fire was dying inside him.
While preparing to run for a 5th term Tillman died.
Tillman's sad legacy of racism and hate lived on A younger supporter of his was an attorney
named Frank Thurmond. He had a son named J. Strom Thurmond and we know his contributions
in both major parties to keep South Carolina in the vanguard of racism.
And we have a president now who Tillman would find most congenial.
February 27, 2019
I don’t fully understand what Kantrowitz is doing in this text—is he trying to frame the arguments of one of the South’s most violent and offensive white supremacists as a more nuanced argument than it appears to be? Or is he merely trying to characterize Tillman as something more upscale than the poor white Southerners he claimed to represent? If Kantrowitz is writing this in the vein of Woodward’s ode to Tom Watson, he makes Tillman somewhat unredeemable from the very beginning of the text, burying in sedimented resentment from his childhood onward. Is there a way to read the absolute stalwart refusal to budge on any kind of policy that would help blacks in any other way? There is much to see in Tillman that reminds one of Trump, but it’s not clear how this illuminates an aspect of Populism that is more logical or defensible than what other scholars have already established. Needs clarification…
January 2, 2022
I can only stomach a few pages and chapters at a time. I now call Tillman the father of white supremacy. He led the charge to take away the rights and equality African Americans worked, fought, and earned during Reconstruction. We are still living in the Ben Tillman era. All of the issues we are facing racially, politically, and socially are the result of Ben Tillman’s white supremacy beliefs.
I’m learning just how vicious and inhuman red shirts, klansmen, and racists can be!!!!
I’m learning just how vicious and inhuman red shirts, klansmen, and racists can be!!!!
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February 18, 2023Well researched book that chronicles one of the principal architects of the Jim Crow South.
March 10, 2017
The book does a lot of discussion with a body of scholarship that I'm not familiar with - that of Reconstruction, the so-called Redemption and the US Populist movement.
Otherwise, meet a rich white man who convinced poor whites that he was their ally against northern bankers and their only protection from murderous minorities. A man whose opponents saw him as a boor but his very boorishness turned all their attacks against him away. Then when he obtained power, he promoted an agenda that helped rich whites over the poor. Sounds familiar.
He also helped create the restriction of the vote that still has ramifications today where somehow the 15th & 19th Amendments apparently do not give universal right to vote, spread his gospel of violent white supremacy throughout the nation, and revived the doctrine of states' rights.
(And once again, the horrid reminder that every open white supremacist has always found a friendly audience in Wisconsin.)
Otherwise, meet a rich white man who convinced poor whites that he was their ally against northern bankers and their only protection from murderous minorities. A man whose opponents saw him as a boor but his very boorishness turned all their attacks against him away. Then when he obtained power, he promoted an agenda that helped rich whites over the poor. Sounds familiar.
He also helped create the restriction of the vote that still has ramifications today where somehow the 15th & 19th Amendments apparently do not give universal right to vote, spread his gospel of violent white supremacy throughout the nation, and revived the doctrine of states' rights.
(And once again, the horrid reminder that every open white supremacist has always found a friendly audience in Wisconsin.)
January 5, 2021
Few books will ever reach so deep into the heart of human evil than this book. It is a biographical account of the rise of Ben Tillman whose political career dominated South Carolina in the Reconstruction period. You may already know Tillman but this book helps guide an understanding of his place in American history and how his influence is deeply entrenched in modern US politics. Only by understanding exactly how he operated and affected American history can we eradicate his influence that still persists.
"Ben Tillman and the Reconstruction of White Supremacy" is well written and well researched. The most interesting detail is how Tillman feared African Americans. The fear was not because he thought they were incapable, but quite the opposite. He was greatly convinced that all that was needed was fair political and economic conditions and education for the rise of a section of the population that had been enslaved. He was well aware that his actions made sure through force, corruption and terror that such a rise would not occur in his lifetime and well after.
The carnival of violence that scarred the American South were largely encouraged by the success of Tillman's campaign of terror. He sabotaged any hope that South Carolina could develop its industry and compete with the other states, because of his actions. He impoverished South Carolinians White and Black because of his racist hatred, refusing to develop the state because such changes would create equality with Black Americans. Far from being a friend of the common man he worked to disenfranchise, delude and degrade all sections of society. While he oppressed the Black population with terror, he fooled largely the White population into willing poverty by making them drunk on his vile racist hatred.
I am reminded by reading this book of what President L. B. Johnson said of Tillman, "He might have been president. I'd like to sit down with him and ask how it was to throw it away for the sake of hating."
"Ben Tillman and the Reconstruction of White Supremacy" is well written and well researched. The most interesting detail is how Tillman feared African Americans. The fear was not because he thought they were incapable, but quite the opposite. He was greatly convinced that all that was needed was fair political and economic conditions and education for the rise of a section of the population that had been enslaved. He was well aware that his actions made sure through force, corruption and terror that such a rise would not occur in his lifetime and well after.
The carnival of violence that scarred the American South were largely encouraged by the success of Tillman's campaign of terror. He sabotaged any hope that South Carolina could develop its industry and compete with the other states, because of his actions. He impoverished South Carolinians White and Black because of his racist hatred, refusing to develop the state because such changes would create equality with Black Americans. Far from being a friend of the common man he worked to disenfranchise, delude and degrade all sections of society. While he oppressed the Black population with terror, he fooled largely the White population into willing poverty by making them drunk on his vile racist hatred.
I am reminded by reading this book of what President L. B. Johnson said of Tillman, "He might have been president. I'd like to sit down with him and ask how it was to throw it away for the sake of hating."
June 14, 2020
A really well written biography of an indisputably horrible man. Often Kantrowitz lets Tillman's vileness speak for itself which is nice as a biography of such a man could easily turn into a quagmire of denunciation which, while justified & correct, would also swamp any analysis. In other words, it would be easy to write about about how awful & irredeemable Tillman was, but it wouldn't be very enlightening. Because of this, Kantrowitz is able to reveal that Tillman & post-reconstruction white supremacy was about more than just trying to bring back a regressive past (though let us not forgot that this INDEED! was one of the goals of the architects of Jim Crow), but was also a cynical political move to gain power in the south more generally through fear. Humm... using fear of 'others' & racism for political power & advantage and dressing it up in populism. Sounds familiar...
January 23, 2016
Very interesting. Should be read by anyone who wants to learn more about race relations during the time of Reconstruction.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews