No Representation, No Revenue: The Battle for Black Political Power in America
By John M. Williams, President and CEO, Akron Urban League
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” George Santayana*, The Life of Reason, 1905
This is not a warning about what might happen. It is a description of what is happening now, in the United States of America, in the year 2026. Black Americans are being systematically stripped of political representation by the same branch of government charged with protecting it, and the playbook being used is one this country has run before, with catastrophic results.
Santayana's warning has never been more relevant than it is today. On April 29, 2026, the Supreme Court ruled 6–3 in Louisiana v. Callais, effectively invalidating Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 by striking down a Louisiana congressional map that gave Black voters — nearly one-third of the state's population — two of six congressional seats. For those familiar with Reconstruction's history — the expulsion of Black legislators, the refusal to seat elected Black congressmen, the organized suppression of Black electoral victories — the decision looks less like a new legal judgment and more like a replay of a calamity the nation claims to regret.
The title is literal. Three times this country has expanded Black political power. Three times it has taken it back. The First Reconstruction ended in 1877 with federal withdrawal and Klan terror. The Second — the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act, and the Fair Housing Act — ended in 2013, when Shelby County v. Holder stripped federal enforcement from the laws that made them real. The Third ended on April 29, 2026. The pattern is not accidental. It is a cycle. And every cycle has been followed by resistance.
A quote often attributed to Mark Twain, though its precise origin is disputed, says: “History doesn’t repeat itself, but it often rhymes.” While Santayana attributes repeated mistakes to ignorance, Twain highlights the pattern. In 1869, Congress declined to seat John Willis Menard, the first Black person elected to the House, citing future President James Garfield that “it was too early to admit a Negro to the U.S. Congress.” Fast forward to 2026, when the Supreme Court invalidated a district map that ensured proportional representation for the same state’s Black population. Though words differ, the pattern remains: rejection with similar rhythm and a warning from history about what could happen next.
The main problem for the nation goes beyond just legality. When citizens are systematically denied representation through coordinated legal and legislative suppression, history shows that conflict, rather than silence, is the likely outcome. This conflict takes different forms beyond physical violence. Today, it can include economic boycotts, Black athletes supporting community organizations, the Divine Nine withdrawing chapters from universities that ignore Black students or organized economic pressures on states trying to silence Black voices in politics. Although resistance methods change over time, the core issues remain the same.
George Santayana (1863–1952) was a Spanish-born American philosopher, essayist, and Harvard University professor.
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To understand why these strategies are so important, it's essential to identify the two historical moments they most closely resemble—both of which ended in upheaval, not silence. The American Revolution was fueled not just by muskets but by the principle of democratic legitimacy—the idea that no government should rule over a people it refuses to represent. The colonists were furious that Parliament imposed laws affecting their lives without giving them representation. This deliberate and organized exclusion served as the spark that ignited the revolution. Instead of choosing patience, the founders opted for resistance.
The comparison to today is structural, not metaphorical. African Americans pay taxes across every U.S. jurisdiction, funding the government system that is now diminishing their influence in selecting leaders. After the ruling, NPR identified at least 15 congressional districts — mostly majority-Black, from Louisiana to the Carolinas — now vulnerable under the Callais logic. The Brookings Institution confirmed that figure and added that Black Voters Matter estimates up to 191 Black-held legislative seats could be eliminated in a single redistricting cycle. Justice Alito's majority opinion stated that “allowing race to play any part in government decision-making represents a departure from the constitutional rule” — dismissing the fact that race specifically created the disenfranchisement systems the Voting Rights Act sought to dismantle. Framing this as colorblindness in a historically race-based system does not achieve neutrality; it hides inequality beneath the language of equality. Justice Kagan's dissent was unambiguous: states can now “without legal consequence, systematically dilute minority citizens' voting power.” Santayana would recognize the move instantly: erasing history to repeat it.
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That pattern did not end with the Revolution. Ninety years later, after the bloodiest war in American history, the nation was given a second chance to honor its founding promise and squandered it in ways that make the present moment unmistakably familiar. The Civil War’s aftermath provides an even more chilling template: Black Americans who were elected to serve, who appeared at the doors of legislative chambers, and were turned away, not because they had lost, but because the white political establishment refused to recognize their victories.
The current scope of disenfranchisement far exceeds a single court ruling. The Thurgood Marshall Institute reports that one in nineteen Black adults of voting age is disenfranchised, which is 3.5 times higher than among non-Black adults. The National Urban League's 2022 State of Black America: Under Siege called the surge of state-level voter suppression laws “the most serious legislative attack on voting rights since Reconstruction.” Shortly after the Callais ruling, Florida lawmakers approved a new congressional map that explicitly referenced the decision. This movement isn't leading toward armed insurrection but toward a strategy of economic pressure, legal attrition, and widespread noncooperation designed to increase the political costs of disenfranchisement beyond its benefits.
Redirect Black Athletic Talent
A key form of resistance lies in Black athletes’ control over where they choose to compete. Jemele Hill noted in The Atlantic that most schools earning over $100 million annually from athletics are predominantly white institutions, with Black men comprising just 2.4% of the undergraduate population at Power Five schools. Black talent subsidizes institutions that do not equitably invest in Black futures. The NAACP's 2024 letter to the NCAA urged Black student-athletes to reconsider attending Florida public universities after DEI programs were dismantled. “If these institutions are unable to fully support those athletes,” NAACP President Derrick Johnson said, “it's time they look elsewhere.” Many prominent universities made this choice voluntarily, without legal mandate — Harvard, Cornell, Northwestern, Notre Dame, Vanderbilt, Ohio State, Michigan, Florida, North Carolina, the University of Alabama system, Indiana, Virginia, and the entire University of California system, among more than 450 campuses tracked by the Chronicle of Higher Education. That choice has a price. It is time to collect it.
Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin issued an even more pointed statement. A self-described Alabama fan, Woodfin said publicly that if Alabama passed its anti-DEI laws, he would have “no problem organizing Black parents and athletes to attend institutions outside the state where diversity and inclusion are valued.” He didn't stop there. “If supporting inclusion becomes illegal in this state,” he added, “hell, you might as well stand in front of the school door like Governor Wallace” — a deliberate reference to George Wallace's infamous 1963 stand at the University of Alabama to prevent Black students from enrolling. Woodfin was connecting the dots: from Wallace's doorway to today's legislative erasure of DEI, the hostility toward Black presence in Alabama's public institutions has never truly gone away. It has only taken a different form. The form today is a Supreme Court opinion. The time for watching is over. The time for choosing is here.
HBCUs are prepared to welcome students, and Black students are already making their enrollment choices reflect their preferences. Black athletes must follow! For example, the University of Florida’s sports programs alone generated over $177 million in one year, primarily fueled by Black athletes. They have the power to redirect this money. The aim isn't immediate equality; instead, the focus is on gaining leverage. The Montgomery Bus Boycott did not dismantle segregation in a quarter. It made the cost of maintaining it unbearable. That is the model. That is the moment.
The Divine Nine: Withdraw Institutional Endorsement
The nine historically Black fraternities and sororities known as the Divine Nine have nearly four million members worldwide, including undergraduate and alumni chapters. These are Alpha Phi Alpha, Alpha Kappa Alpha, Kappa Alpha Psi, Omega Psi Phi, Delta Sigma Theta, Phi Beta Sigma, Zeta Phi Beta, Sigma Gamma Rho, and Iota Phi Theta. The Divine Nine must withdraw their undergraduate chapters from PWIs in states that have redistricted Black communities out of representation or eliminated DEI programs. Not eventually. Now! Having a Divine Nine chapter provides cultural legitimacy, attracts students, and benefits from strong alumni networks, which PWIs also gain from. Withdrawal would be a clear denunciation of institutions that prioritize political gains over the well-being of Black students. Publicly stating that chapters in targeted states are reassessing their university relationships and setting specific benchmarks to retain chapters would pressure institutions that rely on Black talent and prestige, making it a move they cannot ignore.
Boycott the States
The most powerful lever costs nothing but intention: spend elsewhere. When North Carolina passed its "bathroom bill" in 2016, the state lost an estimated $3.76 billion in economic activity, including the NBA All-Star Game and NCAA championships. The law was repealed. In 2025, the Target Fast contributed to a stock price decline by 33%. A Tesla boycott cut net income by 71%. A Disney campaign erased nearly $5 billion in market value. Political scientist Erica Chenoweth has established that when just 3.5% of a population — 12 million Americans — sustains nonviolent economic resistance, governments almost never hold their ground. Black consumers hold $1.6 trillion in annual spending power. That is not a statistic. That is a weapon. And it must be directed at professional sports as well.
This movement must involve professional sports. The NFL, NBA, MLB, and WNBA teams in states that have aggressively weakened DEI and redistricted Black communities - Florida, Texas, Georgia, North Carolina, Tennessee, and across the Deep South - rely heavily on Black consumers, Black culture, and Black athletic talent. Teams including the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Jacksonville Jaguars, Miami Dolphins, Orlando Magic, Miami Heat, Atlanta Falcons, Atlanta Hawks, Atlanta Dream, Dallas Wings, Carolina Panthers, Charlotte Hornets, Dallas Cowboys, Houston Texans, Houston Rockets, Houston Dash, Texas Rangers, Tennessee Titans, and Memphis Grizzlies all operate in states whose legislatures have systematically moved to diminish Black political influence. Refusing to buy tickets, jerseys, merchandise, or streaming packages for these franchises is not a sacrifice — it is a statement, transforming market behavior into resistance against the ongoing effort, since Reconstruction, to deny Black Americans political power not in Washington but in their own communities. But the most powerful act of resistance does not belong to the fan. Black professional athletes, who comprise upward of 80% of NFL rosters, 75 to 80% of NBA rosters, and approximately 70% of WNBA rosters, have the standing, the platform, and the leverage to publicly declare they will not sign or re-sign with franchises in states that have dismantled DEI, eliminated Black political districts, or suppressed Black civic participation. In MLB, players of color make up approximately 40% of rosters, though Black players specifically represent under 7%, a disparity that itself demands its own reckoning. This is not a fantasy. It is a choice available right now to players entering free agency, negotiating contracts, and deciding where to build their careers and their families.
This call is not only for men. The WNBA led the 2020 voting rights campaign that every other major league eventually followed. Black women did not wait for permission, and they should not wait now. WNBA players refusing to play in Texas, Florida, Georgia, or North Carolina would send a signal the sports world cannot dismiss. Elite female college athletes choosing HBCUs over anti-DEI PWIs would redefine what excellence in women's athletics looks like and force the Power Five to answer for the choices its member schools have made. The precedent is established. In 2020, the Milwaukee Bucks refused to take the court in protest of Jacob Blake's shooting and brought professional sports in America to a standstill for three days. In 1968, Smith and Carlos raised their fists on the Olympic podium, changing history with a gesture. Black athletes, men and women, have used their platforms and their labor to move this country before. A declaration from even a dozen prominent Black free agents that they will not play in states that have dismantled DEI and erased Black political districts would force owners to call governors, commissioners to negotiate with legislatures, and the market to speak in a language no politician can ignore. The players hold more power than they know. All of them. The question is whether they are willing to use it.
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The scholarship is unmistakable. Carol Anderson's One Person, No Vote (Bloomsbury, 2018) establishes that what we are witnessing is not system failure — it is the system working as designed. Eric Foner's Reconstruction: America's Unfinished Revolution (Harper & Row, 1988) documents exactly how it was dismantled before: through violence, law, economic coercion, and federal retreat. James Loewen's Lies My Teacher Told Me (The New Press, 1995) explains why most Americans don't know any of this, because it was deliberately removed from their education. Marc Morial, President and CEO of the National Urban League, has named what is happening now: a “coordinated right-wing effort to entrench Republican power by dismantling voting rights and disenfranchising voters of color” that “poses an existential threat to American democracy.” As someone who has spent decades working at the intersection of civil rights history and civic action, I can tell you: the historians are right. The civil rights leaders are sounding the alarm. The only question is whether the rest of us are listening.
The United States has faced crossroads like this before. In 1776, the founders chose resistance over submission. By 1865, Reconstruction aimed to uphold democracy, but forces of retrenchment violently undermined it for a decade. In 1965, the Voting Rights Act marked the most recent effort to honor the republic's founding ideals. By 2026, the Supreme Court is working to undo it. These chapters did not end because grievances disappeared; they ended because moral, political, and economic forces shifted power. The tools of resistance are known and accessible: redirect athletic talent; withdraw the Divine Nine's institutional endorsement; impose economic penalties on states diminishing Black representation; and sustain legal challenges that accumulate into structural change. None of this is radical. All of it is proven. The only variable is will.
The window is not permanent. Redistricting maps are being redrawn now. Legislative sessions are underway now. Free agency decisions are being made now. Enrollment decisions for the 2026–2027 academic year are being made now. The answer to Santayana's challenge will not be written in a future we can afford to wait for. It is being written in the decisions made in the next twelve months — in boardrooms and locker rooms, in chapter houses and courthouses, in the spending choices of more than 40 million Black Americans who hold $1.6 trillion in purchasing power and have not yet been asked to use it as the weapon it is. The ghosts of 1776 and 1865 are not waiting patiently. They are watching impatiently. And history, which does not forgive those who refuse to remember it, is taking notes.
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” – The question is not whether the warning applies. It is time we finally heed it.
