During Monday’s meeting of the Lowndes County Board of Supervisors, Harry Sanders and Leroy Brooks engaged in a tiresome exchange about which of the two is the “real racist.”

We’ve seen this all before, of course. It’s reached the point that I’d be inclined to let it pass without comment.

After all, Sanders has established his racist bona fides beyond debate, putting an exclamation point on his views with his now infamous “blacks are dependent” statement after a debate about moving the Confederate monument outside the courthouse in June.

As for Brooks, he has raised the issue of racism many times before and, on more than one occasion, when there was little supporting evidence. But calling out perceived racism isn’t racism any more than calling someone tall makes the one making the observation tall.

If there is any evidence that Brooks has spoken or acted in a bigoted way, I’d like to hear it. I’ve yet to see or hear any evidence of it.

But if you take away the noise, there’s something of relevance to be noted here.

The Sanders-Brooks exchange came after Brooks raised the matter of filling the board president seat vacated by Sanders in August. Since then, board vice-president John Holliman has been running the meetings. Brooks nominated Jeff Smith, the board’s other Black member, but no action was taken.

The logical replacement for Sanders would be Brooks, now in his 37th year on the board, if experience counts for anything.

Apparently, it doesn’t. Brooks knows it, too. He gave up seeking the board presidency two terms ago.

Instead, he is suggesting Smith, now in his third term, for the position.

Suddenly, for the first time in memory, the board debated qualifications for the position of board president. In the previous officer selections I have observed, which occur at the beginning of each four-year election cycle, there was never any discussion of what made someone qualified for the position. It was assumed, correctly, I believe, that if someone was qualified to sit on the board, that person was qualified to run it. To suggest otherwise is an insult to Smith, in particular, and to the voters in general.

Brooks has been passed over numerous times for both president and vice president on a board that has consistently featured a 3-2 white majority. Jeff Smith, the other Black board member, has been rejected for vice president three times now.

In January, when the board elected two white supervisors to president (Sanders) and vice-president (Holliman), I wrote the board decided the matter along racial lines.

A week later, Trip Hairston, newly elected to the board, approached me during a break in the board meeting. He wanted to stress that the offices had been chosen along political lines (the three white members are Republican, the two black supervisors are Democrats).

Both things are true, of course. The larger question is: Which is relevant?

I maintain that race is the relevant factor here, especially given Brooks’ aforementioned seniority.

In the uproar that followed Sanders’s outburst in June, Holliman and Hairston said all the right things. Although Holliman initially defended Sanders, he subsequently denounced Sanders’ comments. Hairston was very clear in his condemnation and said Sanders should be removed as board president.

Those words came when it was politically expedient. Then, with crowds of 100 or more protesting right outside the courthouse door, the pressure to rebuke Sanders was enormous and the cost to Holliman and Hairston negligible.

Things are much different now. There are no crowds carrying signs and chanting outside the courthouse. For the most part, supervisors have resumed normal operations with little scrutiny.

Four months ago, Holliman and Hairston had much to say about racism and social justice.

What are they saying about it now? Better yet, what are they doing about it now?

On Monday, Hairston said the board presidency shouldn’t be decided “on skin color alone.”

Does Hairston truly believe that Smith has no other qualifications?

If that’s not a direct insult to Smith, I cannot imagine what one would be.

So I have a pretty good idea of how this is going to play out.

When the board votes to select a new board president — again, along racial lines — we’ll know where Holliman and Hairston really stand.

If we don’t know already.

Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].