March for Good Trouble

Review by Bill Doughty––

We remember Civil Rights icon John Lewis, whose life and legacy are being commemorated and celebrated this week.

"March: Book Three" is written by John Lewis and Andrew Aydin with art by Nate Powell (Top Shelf Productions; 2016). It's a powerful "graphic novel" of nonfiction, and this is the best in the series.

The book opens with an explosion –– the bombing of the Sixteenth Avenue Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, resulting in the murders of four young black girls: Addie Mae Collins, Carole Robertson, Cynthia Wesley, and Denise McNair.

In the aftermath of the killings and in the midst of taunts of "2-4-6-8; we don't want to integrate," a group of white Eagle scouts, coming from a Ku Klux Klan rally, shot and killed 13-year-old Virgil Lamar Ware. Then, police shot 16-year-old Johnny Robinson.

It was 1963. John Lewis was only 23 years old and already a student leader in America's civil rights movement and an acolyte of Martin Luther King, Jr.

Like MLK, Lewis preached and practiced Gandhi-influenced nonviolence –– even in the face of deadly violence. Alabama Governor George Wallace had declared "segregation forever" and was quoted in a newspaper saying, "What this country needs is a few first-class funerals."

Lewis reflects on his grief over the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, a man who had pledged greater civil rights. It took Kennedy's successor, President Lyndon B. Johnson, to achieve JFK's goal. (Both presidents were Navy veterans.)

In "March 3" we are introduced to women of the movement and see the pivotal role they played in demonstrating, protesting and marching: Fannie Lou Hamer, Margaret Moore, Ella Baker, Amelia Boynton, Diane Nash, Annie Lee Cooper, and of course Rosa Parks. Another women, Viola Liuzzo, was shot dead while helping shuttle demonstrators.

Brave women and men, black and white, stood up to face heavily armed paramilitary police, some in an armored personnel carrier. Lewis was called an "outside agitator," even though he was as much an Alabama citizen, as was the sheriff. He and his fellow students, teachers and other demonstrators wanted free and equal access to the voting booth.

This book is a march through history, with stark images of violence and transcendent images and words of victory. Lewis's optimism, humility and grace shine through, as we see the passage of the Civil Rights Act, Summer of '64 in Mississippi, Bloody Sunday, March to Montgomery, and signing of the Voting Rights Act in 1965.

This book shows Lewis's steadfast resilience and commitment in the face of severe beatings, lengthy arrests and constant threats. His demands for federal assistance ––not reliance on individual states' justice systems –– eventually paid off. So did his steadfast belief in nonviolence, "making good trouble –– necessary trouble."

LBJ said, "It's all of us who must overcome the crippling legacy of bigotry and injustice. And we shall overcome."

"March 3" poignantly includes memorable moments from January 20, 2009, the day Barack Obama became the first African American president. 

One of the illustrations is of United States Navy Band "Sea Chanters" chorus performing the national anthem.

Another is of Obama handing Lewis a thank you note, "Because of you, John" –– signed Barack Obama.

See Navy Reads posts related to or honoring John Lewis, namesake of USNS John Lewis.

An Armed Forces Body Bearer Team carries the flag draped casket of Rep. John Lewis, Dem.-Ga., at Joint Base Andrews, Md., July 27, 2020. DoD personnel are honoring the congressman by providing military funeral honors to his congressional funeral events. (U.S. Air Force photo by Airman 1st Class Bridgitte Taylor)

An Armed Forces Body Bearer Team carries a flag-draped casket of Rep. John Lewis at the U.S. Capitol, Washington, D.C., July 27, 2020. The remains will lie in state on the East Front Steps of the Capitol for a public viewing. (U.S. Army photos by Spc. Zachery Perkins)

People First, Mission Always

A Turkish army soldier briefs U.S. Army Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal on the situation at a police check-point in Kabul province. (PO1 Mark O'Donald)

Review by Bill Doughty––

The military adage "mission first, people always" is reversed in real life and on the best teams. It's about people, first and foremost.

"Good people purposely and proactively put people first in their decision making," writes Anthony Tjan in "Good People: The Only Leadership Decision That Really Matters" (Penguin Random House, 2017).

Raising Commitment core value banner at Norco (Greg Votjko)

Missions cannot be planned, trained for, or carried out successfully without good people of good character –– starting  in leadership positions.

Good leaders put good people for their teams. They continually seek to improve themselves; they instill core values; they strive for balance; and, they believe goodness is something that needs to be habitual and practiced even when no one is looking.

They are not in it only for themselves.

Putting goodness into practice means, in part, being a mentor. Tjan challenges readers to strive to provide inspiration and positive influence to at least ten other people. Using an eclectic group of people, he shows how they can share the "North Star" of good character.

He describes how the great Navy veteran jazz artist Clark Terry ("known by his friends as CT"), then in his eighties, mentored a 20-year-old musical prodigy named Justin Kauflin. Terry was losing his eyesight due to diabetes; Kauflin was blind.

CT had mentored Quincy Jones decades earlier; Quincy heard Justin play piano at CT's home and sponsored him. And Jones introduced Justin at the 47th Montreux Jazz Festival. See the video of a performance dedicated to Clark Terry:

The bond between Justin and Clark Terry is chronicled in "Keep on Keepin' On," a documentary, which opens with a letter CT once wrote to young Kauflin, and published in "Good People":

"Dear Justin, challenges are a part of life. As you know, your mind is a powerful asset. Use it for positive thoughts and you'll learn what I learned. I believe in your talents and I believe in you."

Clark Terry and Justin Kauflin provide a good "soundtrack for this book." (By the way, if you like laid-back quiet jazz, check out jazzgroove.org.)

Other folks featured, mentioned or quoted in "Good People" –– in no particular order –– include Tom Brady, Bono, Tippi Hedron, Brené Brown, Dalai Lama, Coach John Wooden, Herbie Hancock, Charlie Chaplin, JFK, Lee Kuan Yew, C. S. Lewis, Alice Waters, Warren Buffet. Trader Joe's Doug Rauch, and Jet Blue's David Neeleman. We get their advice for success in life, business and other fields.

Capt. Dee Mewbourne, left, then-commanding officer of the aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower, and then-Rear Adm. Phil Davidson, commander of Carrier Strike Group 8, speak with and Gen. Stanley McChrystal, then-commander of the NATO International Security Assistance Force and U.S. Forces Afghanistan, on the bridge of Dwight D. Eisenhower, June 17, 2010. McChrystal was on a battlefield circulation visit to the ship during Operation Enduring Freedom. (PO1 Mark O'Donald)

For example, here's how Gen. Stanley McChrystal puts people first through systemic flattening of the organization and empowerment beyond delegation:

"You might be surprised to learn that for many years, the key military leader in charge of America's war on terror was a strong proponent of open, distributed leadership. When now-retired four-star general Stanley McChrystal took the leadership of the Joint Special Operations Command in 2003, he quickly saw that the military's traditional, hierarchical, highly centralized command-and-control model would fail to defeat al-Qaeda in Iraq. The only way to beat al-Qaeda would be to transform the military into an open, collaborative network that moved power out from the center to enable people in the field to engage in autonomous decision making. So in the midst of the war, McChrystal dismantled existing decision-making structures and implemented a faster, flatter, and more agile organizational model. In McChrystal's 'team of teams' approach, transparent communication of information became more important because each person was empowered to be a potential decision maker. It wasn't delegation –– it was truly equally distributed decision making that required soldiers to open up and trust their colleagues to make the right decision at the right time. No wonder high-ranking military personnel like McChrystal identify 'soft' values –– like humility, empathy, openness, and compassion –– as critical predictors of soldiers' success."

That's the heart of the advice in this book: be good, choose well, and choose "good."

Tjan creates a pyramid, charts and lists to illustrate and inspire. He publishes Benjamin Franklin's thirteen virtues. At least one –– #4 Resolution –– is a "found haiku:"

Resolve to perform

what you ought; perform without

fail what you resolve

Tjan resolves that "These three cornerstone qualities of goodness are our anchors in the pursuit of goodness:" truth, compassion, fulfillment and gratitude.

Sen. Tammy Duckworth, of Illinois, is interviewed by Command Master Chief David Twiford, command master chief of Recruit Training Command (RTC), Great Lakes, Aug. 12, 2019, about her experiences and philosophy. (Mass Communication Specialist Second Class Camilo Fernan)

The emphasis on character is at the heart of Senator Tammy Duckworth's philosophy and "the values we hold dear — respect, compassion, and tolerance." Duckworth served in Iraq as an Army National Guard helicopter pilot. She lost both legs and partial use of her right arm in a rocket-propelled grenade attack. She served as U.S. Assistant Secretary of Veterans Affairs before her election to the Senate. At the VA she became known for her caring outreach to veterans.

While reading Tjan's book I thought of her and other strong-yet-compassionate leaders –– well-read leaders –– who focused on people of character in order to meet the mission.

General James Mattis, former Secretary of Defense, said, "Reading is an honor and a gift from a warrior or historian who—a decade or a thousand decades ago—set aside time to write." His list of recommended books include titles by Max Boot, Barbara Tuchman, Ulysses S. Grant, Nelson Mandella, George P. Shulz, and Will and Ariel Durant, among others.

Like General James Mattis, Tjan knows good, thoughtful leaders are readers. "Read broadly, read deeply," Than advises. "The more you read, the better you think."

One of the many books he highlights is "Adrift," a memoir by Steven Callahan, who was a naval architect and lifelong seaman.

"The book, originally published in 1986, chronicles Callahan's experience alone and lost at sea for seventy-six days, clinging to a survival raft, and remains among the most amazing stories of grit, resilience, acceptance, and, ultimately, triumph that I've ever read," Tjan says.

Callahan battled sharks, changing weather conditions, and hunger. Because he was well-read on survival at sea he knew how to "create his own ecosystem," distilling water, spearing fish, and fighting off sickness. All the while, he dealt with ever-changing situations with agility, stoicism, and a positive resilience.

Tjan's own book is filled with memorable examples of principled core values, critical thinking, and inspiring servant leadership.

As with a lot of business books, sometimes the advice comes across as simplistic common sense, but the optimism and hopefulness here are timely and appreciated in this summer of 2020: people first, mission always.

Beware the Slime

Review by Bill Doughty––

Slimy charlatans can rise to power and start mass movements with frustrated followers, crazed fanatics and true believers.

In "The True Believer" (Harper & Row, 1951) gifted thinker and writer Eric Hoffer describes how mass movements –– including authoritarianism and totalitarianism –– can get started and perpetuated. Hoffer worked on docks as a longshoreman, but he read and studied voraciously to become a respected American philosopher and educator.

Eric Hoffer, longshoreman philosopher

An epigraph from the Bible opens "The True Believer" with words from Genesis 11: "And slime had they for mortar." Hoffer examines the slime using the magnifying glasses of history and psychiatry.

Written just six years after World War II, Hoffer's book analyzes how fanaticism can take root and flourish. Examples come from Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, and Marxist Communism as well as other movements that prey on frustrated and disenfranchised people who feel victimized and in need of something to believe in. 

Hoffer explains his use of the word "frustrated" to mean those who feel their lives are spoiled and wasted –– in need of another group to hate, blame and attack.

"That the relation between grievance and hatred is not simple and direct is also seen from the fact that the released hatred is not always directed against those who wronged us. Often, when we are wronged by one person, we turn our hatred on a wholly unrelated person or group. Russians, bullied by Stalin’s secret police, are easily inflamed against 'capitalist warmongers;' Germans, aggrieved by the Versailles treaty, avenged themselves by exterminating Jews; Zulus, oppressed by Boers, butcher Hindus; white trash, exploited by Dixiecrats, lynch Blacks [see my recent post on the Wilmington coup of 1898, the year of Hoffer's birth, coincidentally]. Self-contempt produces in man 'the most unjust and criminal passions imaginable, for he conceives a mortal hatred against that truth which blames him and convinces him of his faults.'" [quoting Blaise Pascal]

According to the editors of Time, who republished Hoffer's book in 1963, "The True Believer" was on President Eisenhower's reading list, and Ike heartily recommended it to others. Hoffer was born in 1898 and died a few months after being awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Reagan.

The book examines not only the rise of charlatans and fanatics but also the acquiescence of a passive public that can allow that rise to occur. Hoffer contends that "true believer" mass movements are not likely to originate in free and healthy democracies. Also fanatics are not apt to come from within an ordered and structured military, although one could argue that's exactly what happened in Japan at the turn of the 20th century and through World War II.

True believers are blind to reason. Faith in their cause requires a rejection of verifiable data and facts. True faith, he says, is suspension of belief in reality –– not faith to move mountains but unyielding belief there are no mountains even when there are.

"A peculiar side of credulity is that it is often joined with a proneness to imposture," Hoffer writes. "The association of believing and lying is not characteristic solely of children. The inability or unwillingness to see things as they are promotes both gullibility and charlatanism." 

Fanatics trust their hearts, not their minds; they put their feelings over rational thinking. "They ask to be deceived," he writes in chapter 13. They can see symbols of the past as sacred and unchangeable. "Preoccupation with the past" stems from "a desire to demonstrate the legitimacy of the movement."

"The followers of a mass movement see themselves on the march with drums beating and colors flying. They are participators in a soul-stirring drama played to a vast audience—generations gone and generations yet to come."

True believers and fanatics will be "ready to die for a button, a flag, a word, an opinion, a myth," a ribbon and a greater purpose. 

And, if they are willing to die for a cause, they will be willing to kill for a cause. In the case of some mass movements, that means killing innocent civilians.

Hoffer writes, "Hitler dressed up 80 million Germans in costumes and made them perform in a grandiose, heroic and bloody opera." Hitler's henchman Rudolf Hess reportedly told new Nazi Party members in 1934, "Do not seek Adolf Hitler with your brains; all of you will find him with the strength of your hearts."

History shows that charlatan leaders of mass movements are often hateful, paranoid and amoral, if not immoral. Fanatic followers are easily swayed.

"The fanatic is perpetually incomplete and insecure. He cannot generate self-assurance out of his individual resources—out of his rejected self— but finds it only by clinging passionately to whatever support he happens to embrace. This passionate attachment is the essence of his blind devotion and religiosity, and he sees in it the source of all virtue and strength. Though his single-minded dedication is a holding on for dear life, he easily sees himself as the supporter and defender of the holy cause to which he clings. And he is ready to sacrifice his life to demonstrate to himself and others that such indeed is his role. He sacrifices his life to prove his worth. It goes without saying that the fanatic is convinced that the cause he holds onto is monolithic and eternal—a rock of ages. Still, his sense of security is derived from his passionate attachment and not from the excellence of his cause. The fanatic is not really a stickler to principle. He embraces a cause not primarily because of its justness and holiness but because of his desperate need for something to hold on to. Often, indeed, it is his need for passionate attachment which turns every cause he embraces into a holy cause. The fanatic cannot be weaned away from his cause by an appeal to his reason or moral sense. He fears compromise and cannot be persuaded to qualify the certitude and righteousness of his holy cause. But he finds no difficulty in swinging suddenly and wildly from one holy cause to another. He cannot be convinced but only converted. His passionate attachment is more vital than the quality of the cause to which he is attached."

Hoffer at San Francisco Public Library

Some may take offense at Hoffer's sanctimonious and righteous tone and his sweeping generalizations about the psychology of leaders and mobs. He says devout atheists are religious people, for example, and the swastika and hammer-and-sickle are religious symbols like the cross. He writes, "It is easier for a fanatic Communist to be converted to fascism, chauvinism or Catholicism than to become a sober liberal."

The opposite of a fanatic, Hoffer contends, is a "gentle cynic." Justice, open-mindedness and unity –– not retaliation –– can counter hate and division. Sounding like Sun-Tzu, he writes: "To wrong those we hate is to add fuel to our hatred. Conversely, to treat an enemy with magnanimity is to blunt our hatred for him."

Hoffer gives examples of good and "practical men of action" –– leaders such as Lincoln, Gandhi and Churchill –– to counter fanatics. Moral integrity, he says, is not a monopoly of true believers; freedom is worth fighting for and defending. Authoritarian mass movements rely on the passivity of a weak electorate or complacency of a lazy citizenry. 

"The first glimpse of the face of anarchy frightens them out of their wits. Not so the fanatic. Chaos is his element ... He shoves aside the frightened men of words, if they are still around, though he continues to extol their doctrines and mouth their slogans. He alone know that innermost cravings of the masses in action... Posterity is king; and woe to those, inside and outside the movement, who hug and hang on to the present."

Good leaders can create positive, creative movements with good, informed people. "The self-confidence of these rare leaders is derived from and blended with their faith in humanity," Hoffer writes, "for they know that no one can be honorable unless he honors mankind."

This is a recommended Navy Reads choice for those interested in defending the Constitution, preventing the rise of fascism/totalitarianism, and in developing good leadership. It's also a good companion to works by Hanna Arendt, Mary Wollstonecraft, Martin Niemöller, Bernard-Henri Lévy, and Madeleine Albright.

Unlike fake charlatans and fanatics, good and honorable leaders "are not tempted to use the slime of frustrated souls as mortar in the building of a new world."

Eric Hoffer, critical thinker and writer

'Wilmington ... Rise of White Supremacy'

Review by Bill Doughty

White supremacists –– men who considered themselves to be "victims" of history –– committed gross atrocities in Wilmington, NC, at the end of the 19th century. Through violence and intimidation, they prevented blacks from voting. Then, after a rigged election, red-shirted whites of the Democratic party went on a riot, killing as many as 60 black Americans, attacking members of the Fusionist part, setting fire to a black newspaper office, and banishing hundreds of blacks from their homes.

The details of the tragedy are captured in "Wilmington's Lie: The Murderous Coup of 1898 and the Rise of White Supremacy" by David Zucchino (Atlantic Monthly Press, 2020). And the terrible truth is that the Navy was tied directly and indirectly to the events.

White supremacists burned a black-run newspaper office and posed for photos before a murderous rampage in Wilmington, NC, in 1898.

"The naval commander, George L. Morton, ordered his men to prepare to deploy to North Fourth and Harnett Streets to assist in 'quelling the negro riots,' as he put it." (though Zucchino presents evidence that it was the whites, not blacks, who initiated the killing rampage.)

Morton sought and received permission from the county deputy sheriff and then informed Governor Russell by telegram of the order to deploy Naval Reserves into the streets. "The Naval Reserves now had authorization –– from a white Republican –– to secure the peace with every weapon at Morton's disposal, including the Hotchkiss rapid-fire gun delivered two days earlier."

"In response to commander Morton's telegram, Russell's adjutant general wired back: 'Your action ordering out naval reserves to preserve the peace is approved by the Governor, who directs that you place yourself under orders of Lieut. Col. Walker Taylor.' Between them, the infantry and the Naval Reserves were able to deploy 140 trained and armed white men. Russell's decision was pivotal: he gave a committed white supremacist unchecked authority to unleash state troops against black citizens –– the very men whose votes had put Russell in office."

A History of Institutionalized Racism

Confederate General Braxton Bragg

The election and riot came just a generation after the end of the Civil War. "The U.S. Navy had unleashed upon Fort Fisher the heaviest naval bombardment in history at the time. The fall of the fort in January 1865 had closed all access to the port of Wilmington, the Confederacy's last functioning seaport." Fort Fisher had been lost by the South's General Braxton Bragg (later to be the namesake of Fort Bragg).

"The closing week of the Civil War brought chaos and upheaval to Wilmington. In late February 1865, great fires rose up, belching oily black smoke across the city. Supplies of rosin, turpentine, and cotton bales were set alight –– not by invading Union troops, but by fleeing Confederates. General Braxton Bragg and his army had managed to move most of their matériel out of Wilmington to use during their retreat, but Bragg ordered the remaining supplies put to the torch to keep them from the enemy."

In 1898 Wilmington's industries still relied on naval stores: tar, pitch and other related products made from North Carolina's pine trees. Many of the dirty hard jobs involved dockside labor. Wilmington supported the Spanish-American effort, and celebrated the return of troops with a parade and display of the American schooner William M. Bird and British steamer Hawkhurst. Naval officers marched in the parade.

A key instigator of the election fraud and attacks on blacks was, amazingly, a future Secretary of the Navy selected by segregationist President Woodrow Wilson: Josephus Daniels. In the late 1800s Daniels –– who was an unapologetic white supremacist –– ran an influential newspaper that published incendiary editorials, outright lies, and offensive political cartoons (including the fear-mongering cartoon at the beginning of this review).

Daniels and other racists played on the feelings of victimization former Confederates felt after free blacks achieved the right to vote and came into power. 

Josephus Daniels as Secretary of the Navy (NHHC)

White power demonstrators used Navy guns to intimidate black voters. When some blacks tried to buy guns Josephus Daniels published an article about the attempt. He also praised voter suppression and intimidation. He warned of black suffrage, incompetent leadership, black rapists, and miscegenation in 1898 propaganda.

"More than a century before sophisticated fake news attacks targeted social media websites, Daniels's manipulation of white readers through phony or misleading newspaper stories was perhaps the most daring and effective disinformation campaign of the era. It reached a climax that fall in Wilmington –– a special target for Daniels because of its majority black population. 'A reign of terror was on' in the city, he warned."

White militia and other gunmen burned down the office of the office of the town's black-owned newspaper. They fired guns into black homes and then confronted a group of blacks who came out to protest the violence. Some of the blacks were armed with old pistols and rifles. They were no match for the white supremacists.

"The whites ordered the blacks to disperse. They refused and cursed the white men again. It did not take long for the standoff to erupt in violence. Moments later, four white men unleashed a fusillade from a .44-caliber navy rifle, two 16-shot repeating rifles, and a double-barreled shotgun loaded with buckshot. Three black men toppled to the wood-slatted walkway. Two bled to death there, one on the walkway beneath the awning of Walker's grocery and the other after tumbling into the gutter nearby. They were identified as Charles Lindsay and William Mouzon. The third man crawled inside a nearby home and died on the floor. Other men ran from the corner in all directions, pursued by whites shooting wildly at their fleeing figures."

It was the start of a killing campaign that left dozens of blacks dead in streets and ditches, many shot in the back.

Red-Shirt, hatted militia intimidated black voters, closed black businesses and murdered dozens of blacks in Wilmington, N.C.

A Legacy Lasting Decades

Zucchino describes the long-lasting influence of the "murderous coup":

"The killings and coup in Wilmington inspired white supremacists across the South. No one had ever seen anything like it. Wilmington's whites had mounted a rare armed overthrow of a legally elected government. They had murdered black men with impunity. They had robbed black citizens of their right to vote and hold public office. They had forcibly removed elected officials from office, then banished them forever. They had driven hundreds of black citizens from their jobs and their homes. They had turned a black-majority city into a white citadel."

President McKinley refused to condemn the coup, and an investigation by officials went nowhere.

"Well before U.S. Attorney Bernard shut down his investigation in Raleigh, Josephus Daniels and Furnifold Simmons [a racist politician who would eventually become a U.S. senator] had concluded that the federal government had no interest in punishing election violence in North Carolina. They knew that no white man in the state would be prosecuted for killing blacks. No Red Shirt would face justice for threatening blacks or whipping them in their homes. No Democratic poll worker would be held accountable for stuffing ballot boxes. Murder, fraud, and voter intimidation had been effectively legalized, so long as the targets were black."

Zucchino outlines how white supremacists expanded their campaign of election fraud, including "two schemes to disenfranchise black voters: the poll tax and literacy test." They practiced gerrymandering and use of a grandfather clause, ostensibly to protect white "uneducated voters." The effects of depressed voting and a white power structure lasted for decades and kept Democrats in control "until the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s had driven Southern white conservatives into the segregationist states rights wing of the Republican Party."

Zucchino writes, "In 1972, North Carolina elected its first Republican U.S. senator in seventy-four years –– Jesse Helms, an ardent segregationist who once mailed postcards to black residents warning that they could be prosecuted for fraud if they tried to vote."

Lowering the Mississippi state flag in a transfer of authority ceremony, Cont. Op. Base Speicher, Iraq, March 10, 2010. (Spc. J. Zullig)

The coup and murders of Wilmington of 1898 occurred in the same timeframe that the Mississippi flag was installed (1894); Jim Crow segregation was instituted (1899); and hundreds of monuments, including statues, were erected to honor the Confederacy and promote white supremacy (late 1800s and early 1900s).

Confederate Navy Adm. Franklin Buchanan

Another white backlash came after the First World War in the wake of greater integration, especially within the military. As whites felt victimized in job and housing markets, despite their historical privileges, they installed more monuments, namesakes, and flags.

Buchanan Hall at the U.S. Naval Academy, Annapolis, named for Confederate States Adm. Franklin Buchanan, was given that name in 1976, two years after CNO Adm. Elmo "Bud" Zumwalt retired. Zumwalt brought revolutionary changes to the Navy in racial and gender equality.

This summer Defense Department officials said they are open to renaming Confederate-namesake facilities, but President Trump said he "won't even consider" authorizing changes to Confederate namesakes.

Josephus Daniels, a supporter of the Ku Klux Klan, served President Wilson as SECNAV from 1913 to 1921. Daniels oversaw the Navy through World War I and the 1918 influenza pandemic. Franklin D. Roosevelt, a future US president, served as Daniels's Assistant Secretary of the Navy; when Roosevelt became president he appointed Daniels as ambassador to Mexico.

In 2006, Daniels's former newspaper, "News and Observer," published a powerful mea culpa and exposé of the white supremacists' crimes. Author Zucchino spoke with Daniels's grandson as well as other family members of key figures involved in the Wilmington coup. The results of those interviews are enlightening and relevant in 2020.

Two weeks ago Daniels's great grandson, Josephus Daniels III, had the statue of his original namesake removed from display in Raleigh, North Carolina.

Zucchino's research for "Wilmington's Lie" includes the works of numerous historians and academics as well as original-source contemporaneous newspapers, letters, memoirs, reports, documents and even sermons. It's interesting to see the complicity of Christian church leaders before, during and after the attack. Several white pastors actually took up weapons against black people. Surprisingly, black pastors preached complacency, saying the whites' attack was understandable as the "wrath of God."

In 2008 the people of Wilmington installed a monument to commemorate the tragedy of 1898 and memorialize the murders of the black citizens. An attempt to create a monument in Wilmington ten years earlier during the centennial year was unsuccessful and an "incendiary topic," according to Zucchino: "One white man vowed to tear down any monument to the dead."

And Now ... Michael Jordan

Sixty five years after the the events of 1898 Michael Jordan was born (1963). When he was a toddler he and his family moved to Wilmington, where he attended elementary school and high school. In 1981, as a freshman at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, Jordan helped lead the Tar Heels basketball team (named after a naval store) to national championship in 1998; one hundred years after the coup.

Then-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Martin E. Dempsey meets Michael Jordan April 17, 2014.. (D. Myles Cullen, DOD)

The timeline between horrors of 1898 and the rise of Michael Jordan (bookended by Martin Luther King, Jr. and President Barack Obama) is similar to a timeline between Josephus Daniels (bookended by abolitionist SECNAV Gideon Welles and progressive CNOs like Adm. Zumwalt and Adm. Mike Mullen –– as well as SECNAV Ray Mabus). These timelines reveal not only the great successes of civil rights, but also the relative nearness-in-time of atrocities, prejudices and failures of justice.

An understanding of how much –– and how little –– time has passed may help us empathize with others and evaluate our progress toward justice as symbols of the Confederacy are rejected, including the St. Andrew's cross "stars-and-bars" flag, emphatically banned by Navy and Marine Corps leaders.

But there's much more progress needed: Last week the police department of Wilmington, NC, fired three veteran police officers after a lengthy investigation into their expressed threats regarding black citizens and officials. One of the police officers, Michael Kevin Piner, said he would buy an AR-15 military-style rifle to be ready for a "civil war" against black people to “wipe ‘em off the f***ing map. That’ll put ‘em back about four or five generations.” According to investigators, Piner used the the n-word and said, "we are just gonna go out and start slaughtering them" and "God I can't wait."

One wonders: Are past and recent successes and failures ironically creating more "victims" –– feelings of victimization that give justification for violence? Victimization-justification has happened time and again throughout history: Shia vs. Sunni Muslims, Christian Crusaders, Nazi Germany, former Soviet Union Russia, Communist Party of China, and North Korea vs. the free world.

With enough education, including the compelling history presented by Zucchino in "Wilmington's Lie," perhaps we can find humility; engender respect; and counter hate, spite, and any violence committed in the name of misplaced beliefs or outright lies. It starts with core values of honor, courage and commitment.