Gov Spanberger of VA has ended tax breaks for confederate groups in her state. @hcrichardson.bsky.social (as ever) brilliantly outlines historic events - which derailed Reconstruction (& reconciliation of past injustices). This work must continue! April 15, 2026 open.substack.com/pub/heatherc...

Dark Side of the Moon stayed on the Billboard 200 chart from its release on March 17, 1973, through Oct. 8, 1988 - three times longer than the Confederacy.

Witnessing power (trying to) erase history in real time.

The DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel said the Presidential Records Act is unconstitutional, contradicting decades of Supreme Court precedent. Why they got it wrong, from former OLC Assistant Attorney General Chris Fonzone:

It's so funny to me that right-wingers love to pretend to love the Middle Ages and the Crusades and all that and then complain that the Pope shouldn't get involved in politics.

President Eisenhower at Dartmouth College, 6/14/1953: “Don't join the book burners. Don't think you are going to conceal faults by concealing evidence that they ever existed. Don't be afraid to go in your library & read every book, as long as that document does not offend our own ideas of decency.”

If you don’t know about this, you need to read up. It’s the single bloodiest massacre in the history of Reconstruction, and it was perpetrated to overthrow the results of an election. It was emblematic of the sabotage of Reconstruction. And SCOTUS nullified the prosecution of those responsible.

We didn't clear house following Reconstruction or following the Civil Rights Movement and we absolutely have to do it next time.

I think the Founding Fathers would have executed the entire administration 🤷

If only

In addition to the historical record, PRA records of the present incumbent would have immense bearing on any impeachment and/or criminal proceedings.

Happy Confederate Surrender Day from Minnesota where we still have your goddamn flag and we’re not giving it up. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/28th_Vi...

ill say this for bluesky, youre never gonna miss an anniversary for a day the confederacy ate shit

“Slaves living in the President’s House experienced a greater modicum of autonomy than elsewhere in the South such as to explore the city and sometimes even attend the theater, with Washington buying the tickets.” Explain that to Oney Judge.

Trump was elected to wipe the trauma of the first black president from American history, a task which included scrapping the nuclear deal that had the US in a much better strategic position than before this needless, unconstitutional war of choice against Iran

Impossible to disagree with a single word that Ben Rhodes (Obama era NSC official) is saying here:

JUST IN: American Historical Association & American Oversight sue Trump, accusing him of seeking to 'override' Supreme Court by defying Presidential Records Act. Doc: storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us... Earlier: www.politico.com/news/2026/04...

You'll never get magic like this with AI.

But shall this crazed old man be tamely suffered to drag a whole ship’s company down to doom with him?

People need to pay close attention to this OLC opinion on the Presidential Records Act. As @joshgerstein.bsky.social points out, nothing less than our own history is at stake. www.politico.com/news/2026/04...

Nixon just clapped.

Lawrence O’Donnell made a great point. Nixon won his 1972 re-election in a landslide, winning 49 states. In 1974 he resigned. By 1976, you couldn’t find anyone who would admit to supporting him. Looking forward to history repeating itself.

Just a reminder that that problem is Republicans. This could all end today if they wanted it to.

This is my favorite climate change chart. Japanese monks, aristocrats, and emperors kept meticulous records of cherry blossom festivals for 1,200 years and accidentally built the world's longest climate dataset.

Everyone pony the fuck fpr the librarian who just got sacked for refusing to remove LGBTQ books from the kids' section of the library.

BREAKING: Judge Leon finds Trump likely lacks the authority to build the ballroom, blocks Trump admin from building unless Congress actually gives that authority. "[N]o statute comes close to giving the President the authority he claims to have." storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

Our president is now referring to the National Trust for Historical Preservation as a “group of radical left lunatics” That’s where we are Future radical left lunatics: The Art Linkletter Fan Club, the Milwaukee Knitting and Crochet society, and Mrs Torver’s 3rd grade class at Madison Elementary

it's come to this ... on its 250th anniversary, America is now begging the Royal Navy to help out.

Gerald Ford vetoed naming a post office after himself.

No matter how much it's talked about, it's still not talked about enough that the Supreme Court agreed to hear a case on whether the words in the 14th amendment mean what the words in the 14th amendment mean.

#nokings lined up on US 29 leading into to DC

Why is protecting a universal birthright citizenship principle so critical? Historians @marthasjones.bsky.social and @katemasur.bsky.social shed light on one answer with the words of Abraham Lincoln:

Saw this on FB

Only the best people in charge of the records.

Cue the "I told you so" replies.

Much of reactionary politics today is best understood as a Confederate restoration project.

They're proudest to carry on his legacy of racist mass removals.

I think we're going win, but I want to win hard enough that we start paying artists to paint murals in post offices again. (This time the post offices are also banks.)

If things like universities, democracy, and the humanities exist in 30 years, there are going to be some fascinating dissertations written on the political culture of authoritarianism in 2020s America.

The British tried but couldn't destroy the White House in 1814, so the present occupant and his synchophants are trying again.

Yarrow Mamout (c.1736-1823), enslaved in Maryland from West Africa, was literate in Arabic and a faithful Muslim his whole life. He owned property and paid taxes in Georgetown DC when Chas. Willson Peale painted him in 1819.

For example: www.philamuseum.org/objects/319114

At CBS News, where staffers are apparently barred from reading history books, the hostilities between Iran and the US don’t begin until 1979.

Follow-up question should have asked her to justify why it was a sole-source contract? No one else was qualified to carry out duffel bags of cash?

Paul Noth, The New Yorker

There's a reason Andrew Jackson's portrait is on display in the Oval Office: Chief Justice "John Marshall has made his decision, now let him enforce it!"

I have a new essay out this morning about Black History Month, remembering in a moment when those in power want us to forget, and the importance of seeing people in the past as people www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/0...

Getting shown up in the arena of elite impunity by *the British monarchy* is an incredible “America at 250!” achievement

We wanted to understand how rugged English-Scots-Irish culture has shaped America. So we talked to three white South African billionaires at a sex party in the Bahamas.

Federal court orders Trump administration to restore historical panel exhibits at President’s House in Philadelphia. Happy Presidents Day.