LatinaLista — All day long, the US Census has issued one press release after another for the next series of data they have finished compiling for a few states to start their redistricting processes because of a change in their total populations.
So far, what the 2010 Census has uncovered is less of a revelation and more of a validation that members of the greater Latino community already knew — many states owe their increase of congressional seats to the increase in their local Latino populations.
This proof in the numbers is unsettling to some people who view Latinos as “undesirables.” They don’t make much of a distinction between foreign born and natives. This kind of attitude has resulted in some regions of the country having a very tense kind of relationship with their Latino communities.
One of the states where the tension just increased is Mississippi.
The U.S. Census reports that Mississippi had a 106 percent increase in their Hispanic population.
Given Mississippi’s violent history with blacks, one can only imagine how some residents are taking this news. Well, from a story that emerged today, they aren’t taking the news lying down — in fact they want to drive home a particular point.
The Mississippi Division of Sons of Confederate Veterans wants to sponsor a series of state-issued license plates to mark the 150th anniversary of the Civil War. One of those license plates would honor a man by the name of Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest.
Most wouldn’t know the name of this Confederate general but everyone recognizes an organization of which he was an early leader — The Ku Klux Klan. He was even a Klan Wizard after the war.
Forrest, a Tennessee native, is revered by some as a military genius and reviled by others for leading an 1864 massacre of black Union troops at Fort Pillow, Tenn…
Sons of Confederate Veterans member Greg Stewart said he believes Forrest distanced himself from the Klan later in life. It’s a point many historians agree upon, though some believe it was too little, too late, because the Klan had already turned violent before Forrest left.
The license plate honoring Forrest would be issued in 2014. Yet, a Facebook page has been created to counter the push to honor a guy who clearly disliked people of color.
A reality that now exists in a state that can’t turn back time, and when it comes to having a political voice in Washington, shouldn’t want to.
