A HERITAGE OF WHITE SUPREMACY

Is It Any Wonder? America’s March Toward White Supremacy

Is it any wonder that America finds itself lurching toward white supremacy, Christian nationalism, and even theocracy? Is anyone truly surprised that a country with such a past now teeters on the edge of authoritarianism under the banner of racial and religious supremacy?

A Nation Built on Stolen Land and Bloodshed

The United States was not born in innocence. Its foundation rests on stolen land, seized from Native peoples through conquest and deceit. Entire nations were erased. What we politely call “westward expansion” was in fact genocide, carried out with cold determination until the continent was subdued.

This was no isolated sin. It was the blueprint. Violence, justified by a sense of divine destiny, became the pattern of American growth. From its first breath, the nation equated whiteness with citizenship, dominance, and entitlement.

Slavery: America’s Original Wealth Engine

Slavery was not a flaw on the margins of America’s story; it was the cornerstone. Enslaved labor built its economy, generated its wealth, and entrenched a racial hierarchy that has never been dismantled. Even the Civil War tore the country apart and did not deliver genuine equality. Reconstruction was sabotaged, Jim Crow rose in its place, and systemic racism was woven into the nation’s fabric.

Women, too, were excluded from full citizenship. For most of the nation’s history, they lacked the right to vote, to own property independently, or to exercise legal autonomy. The ideal of liberty was narrow, reserved for white men.

The Illusion of Progress

Yes, progress has been made: emancipation, suffrage, civil rights. But progress has always been followed by backlash, by retrenchment of power, by attempts to restore white male dominance under new guises. Today’s resurgence of Christian nationalism is only the latest iteration of an old pattern, an effort to sanctify inequality with scripture, to declare that God ordains autocracy.

White Supremacy in the Modern Garb

Now, in the 21st century, we face a movement that marries white supremacy with authoritarian politics and religious zealotry. It is a movement that claims divine sanction for exclusion, discrimination, and the erosion of democracy. It seeks to replace government of the people with rule by a chosen few, cloaked in the language of faith but driven by the thirst for power.

We should not be surprised. The soil has always been fertile for such growth. Genocide, slavery, exclusion, and systemic discrimination were not aberrations; they were precedents. Today's America is not an accidental departure from its ideals but a continuation of its unresolved history.

The Bleak Question

So we must ask: is there an answer? Can a nation that has never fully atoned for its crimes, that has never truly dismantled its systems of racial hierarchy, find a way forward now that authoritarianism openly wears the mask of white supremacy and Christian nationalism?

The answer, if there is one, will not come easily. It requires more than condemning the past—it requires confronting the present with honesty, refusing the comforts of denial, and demanding a democracy that is more than symbolic.

Conclusion: No Surprise, No Excuse

Is it any wonder we are here? No. The wonder is that so many still cling to the myth of innocence. The wonder is that so few are willing to see the straight line between our history and our present.

If America succumbs to white supremacy, it will not be because of an unforeseeable tragedy. It will be because the nation refused to learn from its own beginning. After all, it mistook myths for truths and let the old poisons fester until they consumed us again.

William James Spriggs