Wyoming’s Racist Equality Day History
As of the 2020 World Population Review data, Wyoming is the fourth whitest state in America at 94.11%. Wyoming is sparsely populated and predominately rural. Wyoming’s state moniker is the “Equality State,” yet equality is not evidenced in opportunities for people of color or women. However, this state was the first territory to give women the right to vote. Wyoming is 50th out of 51 states (+DC) in gender wage gap disparity. Taking into consideration race, Wyoming ranks dead LAST in the race wage gap in America! Welcome to the Equality State.
Wyoming does not celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day. It celebrates Equality Day/MLK Day. It cannot celebrate the man who fought for civil rights and equality but celebrates equality instead. Circular reasoning is mind-numbing. This celebration of MLK Day was years in the making, and in the end, a compromise was made to add Equality Day, not to offend the white, predominately male, legislature.
Liz Byrd, the first black woman in the Wyoming state legislature, worked tirelessly to ensure the passage of Martin Luther King Day in Wyoming. She brought it before the state legislature NINE times. It passed only with the addition of Martin Luther King Jr./Wyoming Equality Day. I cannot imagine the racism and sexism Liz Byrd faced while advocating for change in the state, a state where she was born. She was denied entrance to the University of Wyoming in 1944, most likely because of segregation. In a piece on Wyoming History, a legislator from Carbon County, sadly, the county where I reside, summed up the patronizing, racist sentiment during Byrd’s tenure in the legislature:
“Longtime Carbon County Rep. Loren H. “Teense” Willford of Saratoga, a Republican, served in the House from 1987–2002 and on the Transportation and Highway committee with Byrd in 1987. Although their different political persuasions often put them on opposite sides of issues, he remembered her as “very conscientious and a very caring person” who “always voted for the best interests of her constituents.” He said that while he served in the Legislature, Byrd “never missed a vote.” Willford had voted against the Martin Luther King bill, he said, not because of anything against Dr. King, but because he believed that such a state-recognized holiday should instead honor someone who had actually been in Wyoming — for example, Chief Washakie or frontiersman Jim Bridger.” (Jim Bridger was a white trapper who fought Native Americans….and married several).
Today I read MLK’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail, Rep. Willford is the white moderate King admonishes:
“I must make two honest confessions to you, my Christian and Jewish brothers. First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action”; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a “more convenient season.” Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.“
White moderates complain about Colin Kaepernick’s kneeling. White moderates view the BLM protests as riots and the assault on the Capitol protests. White moderates tell me to ignore the guy in Baggs, the town 20 miles from me, who flies the confederate flag because “he’s not right in the head.” White moderates think Wyoming is the Equality State, contrary to all available facts. White moderates allow the status quo.
It’s time Wyoming acknowledges its racist history. It’s time my neighbor takes down his ode to racism flag. It’s time to speak out against injustice.
Blessed Martin Luther King Jr. Day Wyoming!
