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African American labor leader and civil rights activist A. Philip Randolph made this distinction in 1958 by labeling what came to be called backlashes as “counterrevolutions,” purposeful efforts to undo and reverse social change. In doing so, he reversed the backlash framing that posited civil rights activism as their cause. Instead, he described backlashers as the active, not passive, agents of reaction: “Just as the counter revolution against the Civil War revolution nullified the 13th Amendment to the Constitution of 1865, the 14th Amendment of 1868, and the 15th Amendment of 1870, the second counter has begun in massive and ominous dimensions.” For Randolph, backlashers acted to “nullify” civil rights advances; they were not forced to do so.
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Kevin M. Kruse (Myth America: Historians Take On the Biggest Legends and Lies About Our Past)