“The 1619 Project” continues to provoke national debate about race and history.
Tag Archives: Civil Rights Movement (1954-68)
A Revelatory Tour of Martin Luther King Jr.’s Forgotten Teachings
The political theorist Brandon Terry explores the nonviolent philosophy of Dr. King.
In Boston, ‘The Embrace’ Honors Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s Legacy
The bronze sculpture, by the artist Hank Willis Thomas, symbolizes the hug Dr. King and Coretta Scott King shared after Dr. King won the 1964 Nobel Peace Prize.
A Year After a Fiery Voting Rights Speech, Biden Delivers a More Muted Address
On Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday, the president assured an audience at Ebenezer Baptist Church that its side in the struggle would, indeed, overcome someday. Just not anytime soon.
Once Told to Move to the Back of the Bus, Jesse White Became an Illinois Institution
Mr. White, 88, is retiring as Illinois secretary of state after a career that took him from the pews of Martin Luther King Jr.’s church to statewide office.
Congress Honors Emmett Till and His Mother With Gold Medal Vote
Emmett, whose killing shaped the civil rights movement, and Mamie Till-Mobley would posthumously receive the body’s highest civilian honor if President Biden signs the bill.
How Will History Remember Jan. 6?
History is not just what happened. It is the meaning we make out of what happened and the story we tell with that meaning.
A Pastor and Politician Who Sees Voting as a Form of Prayer
Raphael Warnock, a son of Savannah public housing who rose to become Georgia’s first Black senator, secured a full six-year term and a spot among Democrats’ rising stars.
To Understand New Extremism, Look to History
Some of the forces protecting European nations even as far-right candidates thrive are not in play in the United States, and particularly not within a Republican establishment vulnerable to a takeover.
Harlem Mourns the Rev. Calvin Butts III
Congregants and neighbors remembered a pastor who they said was determined to fight racism and lift up the Black community.
New York to Pay $26 Million to Men Wrongly Convicted of Killing Malcolm X
Muhammad A. Aziz and Khalil Islam spent more than 20 years in prison after the civil rights leader was assassinated in 1965. He had broken with the Nation of Islam.
Kari Ann Lake’s Hijacking of Martin Luther King
Like Donald Trump, she is invoking the civil rights icon in self-serving ways.
There Is a Way to Make America Safe for Democracy
What if we let majoritarian democracy actually take root?
Charles Sherrod, Civil Rights Pioneer in Rural Georgia, Dies at 85
He brought his deep Christian faith and his commitment to grass-roots organizing to the small town of Albany. He never left.
When Segregationists Offered One-Way Tickets to Black Southerners
The “reverse freedom rides” of 1962 were meant to provoke Northern politicians, and have drawn comparisons to the recent flights of migrants to Martha’s Vineyard.
The Fiery Brilliance of Obama’s Lost Book Manuscript
At Harvard Law, he wrote a blistering manifesto he never published. Its searing advice could help Democrats escape their current political quagmire.
Let’s Talk About the Economic Roots of White Supremacy
It’s not just about racism.
Glenn Youngkin Is Playing a Dangerous Game
The governor believes he needs to cater to and actually support election questioners and deniers to have a shot at leading the Republican Party.
Education in America: School Is for Making Citizens
Public education requires lessons about history and also contact with and context about other Americans: who we are and what has made us.
Mississippi Grand Jury Declines to Indict Woman in Emmett Till Murder Case
Carolyn Bryant Donham had accused the 14-year-old boy of whistling at her in 1955. His killing helped galvanize the civil rights movement.
Eli N. Evans, Who Wrote About Jews in American South, Dies at 85
His book “The Provincials” mixed memoir, travelogue and history to tell the story of a culture that many people never knew existed.
Nichelle Nichols Helped Show America a Different Future
As Lieutenant Uhura in “Star Trek” and an advocate for inclusiveness in the U.S. space program, Nichols made an indelible impact on our collective imagination.
Among Pro Athletes, Bill Russell Was a Pioneering Activist
Russell marched with the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., spoke out against segregation in Boston public schools and backed Muhammad Ali in his opposition to the Vietnam War.
Jackie Robinson Museum Focuses on Civils Rights and Baseball
Robinson accomplished a great deal on the field, but a museum celebrating his life — that will have a ribbon-cutting this week — puts as much focus on his civil rights work.
Shed No Tears for Carolyn Bryant Donham
Emmett Till’s accuser said she “always felt like a victim as well as Emmett.” Don’t feel sorry for her.
Man Exonerated in Malcolm X Murder Sues New York City After Talks Collapse
Muhammad A. Aziz filed the $40 million claim on Thursday, seeking redress for a conviction that overshadowed 55 years of his life.
Willie Lee Morrow, Barber Who Popularized the Afro Pick, Dies at 82
He built an empire around hair care products aimed at African American consumers, including a softener that inspired the Jheri curl.
Civil Rights Veterans Should Get Veterans Administration Benefits
Those who fought for America’s democracy should be treated as the war heroes they are.
Our Racial Reckoning Could Have Come Sooner. What Made 2020 Different?
The murder of George Floyd, a pandemic and social media released a storm.
The Expansion of Democracy Is What Does the Trick
There are minorities whose interests are harmed by majority rule. But they are not minorities as we tend to think of them; they are elites.
In Los Angeles, a Tree With Stories to Tell
At the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, each champion received a baby oak tree. In Los Angeles one of them is still alive, a witness to a forgotten chapter of Black history. But it is threatened with destruction to make space for luxury apartments.
In the U.S., Backlash to Civil Rights Era Made Guns a Political Third Rail
Other countries changed course after massacres. But American political protection for guns is unique, and has become inseparable from conservative credentials.
‘Misoginia de la era colonial’: en los fallos sobre los derechos de las mujeres se cita a un juez del siglo XVII
Tanto en India como en el borrador del fallo Roe v. Wade en Estados Unidos, todavía ocupa un lugar preponderante un juez inglés que escribió que las mujeres estaban obligadas por contrato a los maridos.
The 17th-Century English Judge Behind Abortion and Rape Rulings Today
Both in India and in the Roe v. Wade draft ruling roiling the United States, Lord Matthew Hale — an English judge who wrote that women were contractually obligated to husbands — still looms large.
Alice Walker Has ‘No Regrets’
Walker has grappled with some of the thorniest issues of 20th-century America. She’s also taken troubling stances. She has now opened up and shared her diaries, giving readers a window into her life.
Doris Derby, Civil Rights Era Photographer, Dies at 82
She was an artist who was studying anthropology when she became an activist in the civil rights movement and a rare woman to document Black life in photos.
U.T. Austin Acquires Archives That Give Insight Into the 1960s
The papers of Richard Goodwin, a speechwriter to John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson, and his wife Doris Kearns Goodwin, a presidential historian, shed light on decision-making at crucial moments in American history.
How Are We Still Debating Interracial Marriage in 2022?
The Ketanji Brown Jackson hearings unleashed some deeply retro Senatorial opinions.
The Artists Turning Nina Simone’s Childhood Home Into a Creative Destination
Rashid Johnson, Julie Mehretu, Adam Pendleton and Ellen Gallagher are working both to preserve and transform the North Carolina house where she was born.
Can William Barber Reignite the Religious Left?
This is a man on the grandest of missions: to save this country from itself, to insist that morality ought to decide policy.
The Staten Island House Where Black History Lives
A 90-year-old former schoolteacher’s collection includes Muhammad Ali’s boxing shoes and Tuskegee Airmen headgear — but it also features Ku Klux Klan toys.
Autherine Lucy Foster, First Black Student at U. of Alabama, Dies at 92
Her career there lasted only three days; attacked by mobs, she was suspended and then expelled. Today, a campus building is named in her honor.
Barack Obama: What Trayvon Martin Taught Us, 10 Years Later
Not every killing connects with the culture and activates a mass movement. This one did.
In Twilight of Life, Civil Rights Activists Feel ‘Urgency to Tell Our History’
Young people who marched and organized during the civil rights movement are now in their 70s and 80s. With fewer and fewer remaining, historians rush to record their stories.
Antagonist, Activist, Operator, Survivor
A.J. Baime’s “White Lies” explores the life and times of the civil rights figure Walter F. White.
Older Americans Fight to Make America Better
We don’t want to leave the world a worse place than we found it.
Rabbi Israel Dresner, Civil Rights Champion and King Ally, Dies at 92
He was jailed multiple times in the South during the 1960s and made human rights his lifelong cause, following the Jewish doctrine of “tikkun olam” — to repair the world.
‘Civil Rights Queen,’ the Story of a Brave and Brilliant Trailblazer
Tomiko Brown-Nagin’s book is the first major biography of Constance Baker Motley, the first Black woman to serve as a federal judge, among other achievements.
Book Review: ‘South to America,’ by Imani Perry
In “South to America: A Journey Below the Mason-Dixon to Understand the Soul of a Nation,” Imani Perry straddles genres to find her own — and our — South.
Three Black Senators Play Outsized Roles in Voting Rights Debate
Senators Cory Booker, Tim Scott and Raphael Warnock brought vastly different perspectives to proceedings that highlighted the Senate’s striking lack of diversity.