After a long day of work, James Byrd Jr., a black man, accepted a ride home from three white men. Three white supremacists, he realized a moment too late. They beat him, chained him to the back of their truck, and dragged him for more than a mile down a desolate country road. Jasper, where Byrd lived and died, is just a four-hour drive from the living room where my mother and I sat that evening. Separated by a heavy silence, we watched the local news reporter’s mouth twist and morph to find the right shape for the word “dismembered.” I
