"There Is Something about Mitt Romney’s Relationship with African-American Voters that Is Just Uniquely Depressing"

"The story of the Republican Party’s arc on race is well known—from the party of the abolitionists and the Emancipation Proclamation to the party of the 'Southern Strategy' and Willie Horton. What helped make Romney’s appearance in Houston so charged is that he himself personally embodies that shift more explicitly than many of his fellow Republicans. His father George retained the progressive outlook on race of the moderate northern Republican—he walked out of the 1964 GOP convention over the rejection of a civil-rights plank and marched in Detroit in support of Martin Luther King Jr.’s marches hundreds of miles to the South."

Alec MacGillis at The New Republic compares George and Mitt Romney on civil rights.