President Ulysses S. Grant was outraged. The killings were bad enough. What the court did, however, was nearly unforgivable. For all the Southern talk about “civilization” and “Christianity,” he railed, Colfax was nothing but “bloodthirstiness and barbarity.” Yet now, with the Enforcement Act shredded, “no way can be found … to punish the perpetrators of this bloody and monstrous crime.” The Supreme Court’s 5–4 decision not only meant that the “Colfax murderers … walked off scot-free,” but the ruling also sent “a powerful message to white supremacists that they could slay blacks without any
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