By Clay Wirestone | opinion editor
Good morning! I’d like to introduce our summer intern, Baya Burgess. A Lawrence native, she’s a 2026 graduate of the University of Kansas. Her bio continues: “She has been reporting since she was 15 years old. Baya covered student news and culture for three years and was a multimedia editor for one year at KU’s student-led newspaper, the University Daily Kansan. She loves to document the people around her and strives to make their stories known.” Welcome! Now, the newsletter.
Dave Kendall
OPINION
Kansas abolitionists demanded equality. As a new regime of discrimination descends, will we?
By Clay Wirestone
On the ground floor of the Kansas Statehouse, you can find a plaque bearing the grim visage of abolitionist John Brown. Alongside his face are printed these words:
I, John Brown, am quite certain that the crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away but with blood.
Two floors up, you can see Brown depicted in the famed John Steuart Curry mural, a rifle in one hand and a Bible in the other, dead soldiers at his feet.
You don’t have to know much about John Brown as a historical figure to understand from these two examples that he was no incrementalist. He saw a gaping wound in society: the horror of chattel slavery. He decided that he would do something about it and led his fellow Americans in doing so.
We now live in a moment where the hard-fought gains of the Civil Eights era of the 1950s and ‘60s are being slowly but surely eradicated by a hostile U.S. Supreme Court and racist Southern state legislators. The Louisiana v. Callais decision, handed down only last month, allows Southern states to redraw electoral districts to eliminate the participation of Black voters.
Partisans will, of course object, that that’s by no means what the court ruled and by no means what is happening.
They are, of course, wrong. They are on the side of bigotry and injustice.
Timi Carpenter / Kansas Reflector
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Getty Images
Kansas Dillons stores among those cited in Clean Air Act violations, receive $2.5 million penalty
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US Senate votes to advance resolution limiting Trump war in Iran as Cassidy flips
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UPCOMING EVENTS
Kansas Reflector staff will participate in the following free public forums.
6:30 p.m. June 12, Kansas Museum of History in Topeka. Opinion editor Clay Wirestone will join a panel discussion: "From the Desk of William Allen White: What Can Journalism Today Learn from the Sage of Emporia?"
5:30 p.m. June 16, Bradbury Alumni Center at Washburn University in Topeka. Editor-in-chief Sherman Smith will lead a discussion on the proposed constitutional amendment to elect Kansas Supreme Court justices. Host: Kansas Appleseed. Register here.
6 p.m. June 24, Groover Labs in Wichita. Editor-in-chief Sherman Smith will lead a discussion on the proposed constitutional amendment to elect Kansas Supreme Court justices. Host: Kansas Appleseed. Register here.
6 p.m. June 25, Clint Bowyer Community Building in Emporia. Editor-in-chief Sherman Smith will lead a discussion on the proposed constitutional amendment to elect Kansas Supreme Court justices. Host: Kansas Appleseed. Register here.
7 p.m. June 27, Park City Senior Center. Host: Park City Community Pride.
2 p.m. Sept. 27, Red Rocks Visitor Center in Emporia. Host: Red Rocks.
If you're interested in having us talk in your town, email Sherman Smith at [email protected].
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