Politicians like Governor George Wallace of Alabama, the man who authorized state troopers to beat and detain civil rights protesters on that very bridge in 1965, famously reached office by amplifying the racial anxieties of white voters. Wallace legendarily admitted that his political career took off after he focused on citizens’ fears of Black people instead of on infrastructural improvements to the state: “You know, I tried to talk about good roads and good schools and all these things that have been part of my career, and nobody listened. And then I began talking about niggers, and they
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