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Boston Globe
14-06-2025
- Politics
- Boston Globe
Trump's military deployment in California is a radical departure from history
For now, the Trump administration's military deployment is authorized under a section within Title 10 of the US Code that allows the president to federalize the National Guard to help execute federal law in specified instances — namely, to repel invasion or suppress rebellion. However the text of the statute states that any orders for such federalized troops are to be issued through a state's governor. Newsom's objection to Trump's move, then, is grounded in principle — rebuffing Trump's challenge to his authority by reasserting state sovereignty and the division of power between state and federal government. Advertisement Going forward, however, the Trump administration is Advertisement Bush invoked the Insurrection Act in 1992, but again, he did so upon the request of the California governor. While the Insurrection Act has been sparingly invoked, Bush's move was consistent with prior applications in similar contexts. When state governors have requested federal military intervention under the act, they have consistently done so amid inflamed racial tensions that erupted into violent civil unrest. Such instances include the clash in the 1850s between pro- and anti-slavery forces known as Bleeding Kansas, Chinese expulsion campaigns by white mobs in Washington in the 1880s, the Detroit riots of 1943 and 1967, and the riots in Baltimore, Chicago, and Washington, D.C., following Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination. If Trump invokes the act now, he would probably do so unilaterally — in a move that, at least since the turn of the 20th century, would depart from unilateral invocations by past US presidents. In the limited instances when past presidents have invoked the act unilaterally and deployed federal troops over the objection of the state governor, they have done so to enforce the constitutional rights of citizens that were being violated by the state governors themselves — all of whom weaponized states' rights to preserve the Southern 'way of life,' a euphemism for resisting federally mandated desegregation. Advertisement Not incidentally, examples of the use of the Insurrection Act involve federal military enforcement of the civil rights of Black Americans, such as the First Amendment right of civil rights protesters to march from Selma to Montgomery following the brutal assault by Alabama state troopers on marchers known as Bloody Sunday. The Insurrection Act was also applied to enforce the desegregation of public schools in Arkansas, Mississippi, and Alabama — highlighted, respectively, by the military escort of the Little Rock Nine into Central High School, the showdown between federal troops and white segregationists at the University of Mississippi, and the National Guard's deployment in response to Governor George Wallace's stand in the University of Alabama's schoolhouse door, where he was physically blocking two Black students from enrolling. When past presidents took such unilateral action, they did so hesitantly, as they were sensitive to the public perception of overstepping federal power and encroaching upon state authority. Before eventually deploying Advertisement In 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson had communicated his strong preference for Wallace to assume his own authority over the Alabama state National Guard to protect protesters marching from Selma to Montgomery, but Wallace refused. When Johnson ultimately invoked the Insurrection Act, By contrast, the Trump administration is displaying a propensity to flout state authority and boost federal military power — a situation that is especially remarkable given that belief in minimal federal interference in state affairs is supposed to be one of the hallmarks of conservative politics. In January 2017, during his first administration, Trump threatened to Although Trump eventually stood down from his threatened invocation of the act in 2020, the administration's recent threats, together with ICE raids, are ushering in a new era of conflict with states' rights. Democratic state governors now seek to protect the civil rights of citizens and noncitizens alike from Trump's exercise of federal power to 'Make America Great Again.' Advertisement Newsom, in his attempts to shield the
Yahoo
09-06-2025
- Yahoo
Blood on the prairie: When neighbors became killers near Fort Scott
(KODE & KSN) — The Four State region is rich with history, but like any land rich with history, locals and historians often worry there are some key pieces always at risk of being forgotten if generations are not communicating them. The Marais De Cygne massacre is one of those points in history that historians say should not be forgotten and may not be well known to many Four State residents. The famous saying 'those who do not know their history are doomed to repeat it', if true about the Marais De Cygne massacre, makes it imperative the massacre is not forgotten, as it was the last major act of violence during the Bleeding Kansas period preceding the Civil War. May 19, 1858, was the day. Georgia native Charles Hamilton had led his 'band 'O boys' of about 30 'border ruffians' across the border from Missouri into the Kansas Territory. The men captured 11 unarmed abolitionist free staters near Trading Post, Kan. The captured abolitionists did not know the extent of the danger they were in, as the majority of them knew Hamilton and had no reason to suspect he intended to do them harm. Hamilton and his men led to group to a ravine, where Hamilton, said to have fired the first and last shot, ordered his men to open fire on the group. Five were killed, five were seriously injured, and one was able to escape without being injured or killed. One of the wives of the captured men had followed the gang to the site and attempted to perform life-saving aid on the critically wounded and dead. Later on, more locals would come to assist her and to help with the transport of the dead and wounded. Hamilton's motives behind the attack were mainly attributed to being run into Missouri by the controversial Union Colonel James Montgomery, a Jayhawker whose actions led Hamilton to hate him, and, in his anger, Hamilton sought revenge. Historians say all 11 of the men captured and shot at were non-violent abolitionists. It is said the gang planned the shooting at a place called the Western Hotel, a place James Montgomery attempted and failed to burn down June 5 of that year. The massacre shocked the nation, and was one of the largest publicized incidents that helped ignite the spark that would erupt into the Civil War. Today, historians say the massacre serves as a reminder that politically motivated small-scale violence and revenge practices can lead to a nation at war if its citizens are not careful. Of the roughly 30 men involved in the massacre, only one was ever brought to justice for the crime. On a spring day in 1863, a Bates County, Missouri man named William Griffith was recognized and arrested for his involvement. Griffith was hanged for the crime on October 30, 1863. Today, the massacre site remains open to the public as a state historical site. Those interested in visiting the site and its exhibits can visit the Kansas Historical Society website for more information. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
