After the Civil War, Congress passed an act to establish the Freedmen's Bureau, which sought to provide resources to displaced Southerners including recently freed Black Americans. Intrinsic in its foundation was the idea that after the abolition of slavery, it was the responsibility of Congress to right the wrongs of our nation's ugly past. But in a new extended essay for New York Times Magazine, Nikole HannahJones argues that in the decades since the civil rights era, the national ideal of colorblindness has been coopted, and is now being used in an organized effort to stall and even undo civil rights era efforts to advance racial progress. The end of affirmative action is another symptom of that backlash against racial progress.

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