In last Sunday’s “Odds and Ends” I called your attention to Casey Michel’s piece at Politico, “What Ulysses Grant Can Teach Joe Biden About Putting Down Violent Insurrection.” Today I want to call your attention to a similar piece at The Washington Post by Civil War historian Judith Giesberg. Here is a taste:
There is one president whose portrait doesn’t hang on the walls of the Oval Office, but from whom Biden can learn: Ulysses S. Grant.
As both men entered office, they faced growing threats of White supremacist violence and pressing questions about how much federal power they should harness to combat it. Philosophically, the former general had no qualms deploying force. Grant unleashed the full force of federal power against Native Americans; by one estimate, during his presidency, the U.S. Army fought more than 200 battles against Indigenous people seeking to protect themselves, their land and their culture from White settlers and U.S. corporate interests.
Read the entire piece here.
