Nikki Haley’s difficulty articulating the cause of the civil war – the war that began in her home state of South Carolina – has put that issue in the headlines just days before the first votes are cast in the Republican nomination contest. While Haley was caught trying to be too clever by half in refusing to name slavery as the cause of the nation’s bloodiest conflict, the controversy has had the unintended effect of framing what is facing the country’s voters in 2024.

This year’s election is, in fact, a continuation of the unresolved question of the civil war era: will the country continue to move towards fostering a multiracial democracy, or will it aggressively reject its growing diversity and attempt to make America white again?

Haley’s entire career has consisted of trying to walk the tightest of tightropes. She is a woman of color operating in a political party whose driving forces are white racial resentment and misogyny (and, increasingly, homophobia and transphobia). On the one hand, she is eagerly embraced as a high-profile party symbol who serves as a strong rebuttal to accusations of racism and sexism (“See, we’re not racist and sexist, we have a woman of color as our governor!”). On the other hand, white racial resentment serves as fuel for the Trump movement to the extent that no presidential candidate can hope to win the nomination without bending a knee to the Confederate cause.

This high-wire act was most prominently on display in 2015, when a white man who had proudly posed with pictures of the Confederate flag walked into the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal church in South Carolina, declared, “You rape our women. And you’re taking over our country. And you have to go,” and proceeded to murder........

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