Historian looks at Mississippi Medicaid through Rep. Robert Clark’s early advocacy

Editor’s note: Historian Derrion Arrington reflects on early positions taken by Robert Clark, who in 1967 became the first Black Mississippian elected to the state Legislature in the 20th century, and how those issues championed by Clark are being addressed today.

Mississippi’s struggles with Medicaid are deeply tied to the state’s broader history of social, racial and political tension.

When President Lyndon Johnson established Medicaid nationally in 1965, it marked a landmark federal expansion to provide health care for low-income Americans. The program coincided with sweeping civil rights reforms, placing the provision of basic health care at the center of debates about equality, federal authority and social justice.

In Mississippi, resistance to Medicaid reflected long-standing patt