Orlando Mass Shooting Not Deadliest in American History

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THE WALL STREET JOURNAL:

Orlando Mass Shooting Not Deadliest in American History

By

ARIELA GROSS

Jun 14, 2016 4:49 pm ET

Ariela Gross is the John B. & Alice R. Sharp Professor of Law & History at USC Gould School of Law and author of “What Blood Won’t Tell: A History of Race on Trial in America.” She is on Twitter as @arielagross.

 

The massacre at the Pulse Nightclub in Orlando was a horrific tragedy. But it was not unprecedented – and it was not the “deadliest mass shooting in American history,” as many have called it.

 

To call it that is to forget the last hundred years of U.S. history of mass violence fueled by racial hatred and homophobia. Although precise numbers of deaths are impossible to specify, at least 100 African Americans were killed in East S​t.​ Louis, Ill., in one bloody night in July 1917; anywhere from 55 to 300 blacks were massacred in Tulsa​, Okla.,​ in 16 hours in June 1921; and dozens more were killed in Rosewood, Fla., in January 1923. And of course, more recently, 32 died in the 1973 bombing of the UpStairs Lounge, a gay bar in New Orleans.

 

It’s important to put the Pulse shooting in historical context not to minimize the terror wreaked by a disturbed and bigoted individual’s