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How John Lewis Put a Legacy of Heroism to Use

As the civil-rights era receded, his personal heroism loomed larger. But movement politics didn’t easily translate into party politics.
State troopers and deputies stand at the entrance to a University of Alabama building in Tuscaloosa on the day in 1963 that George Wallace, Governor of Alabama, said he would defy a Federal order making it mandatory to admit two African American students.
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We Must Remember Tuscaloosa's 'Bloody Tuesday'

Black citizens fought for justice and were met with violence. They persevered.
A 1963 photo of Martin Luther King Jr. addressing the thousands of people gathered at the Lincoln Memorial during the March on Washington.
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Campus Protests Are Called Disruptive. So Was the Civil Rights Movement

Like student protesters today, Martin Luther King Jr. and other 1960s civil rights activists were criticized as disruptive and disorderly.
Martin Luther King Jr. giving a speech.
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The Problem With Comparing Today's Activists to MLK

Media coverage of the civil rights movement is a reminder that the deification of King has skewed public memory.
A statue of Martin Luther King Jr. stands larger than life in the center of the frame; two small figures view it in the foreground

The Struggle for Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Memory

How political misappropriations of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s legacy fuel right-wing movements.
Bayard Rustin speaking at an event.

Eclipsed in His Era, Bayard Rustin Gets to Shine in Ours

The civil-rights mastermind was sidelined by his own movement. Now he’s back in the spotlight. What can we learn from his strategies of resistance?
Still from "Rustin" film, on steps of Lincoln Memorial.

The Real History Behind Netflix's 'Rustin' Movie

A new film finally spotlights Bayard Rustin, the gay civil rights activist who organized the 1963 March on Washington.
Civil Rights march for jobs and freedom.

The Hidden Story of Black History and Black Lives Before the Civil Rights Movement

On upending the accepted narrative of the movement.
Black and white photo of Civil Rights protests with crowds picketing.

The Ambitions of the Civil Rights Movement Went Far Beyond Affirmative Action

We should find inspiration in their goals today.
Black and white photo of communists marching in front of the White House to demand the release of the Scottsboro Boys.

The Civil Rights Movement Was Radical to Its Core

The Civil Rights Movement was a radical struggle against Jim Crow tyranny whose early foot soldiers were Communists and labor militants.
Portrait of Medgar Evers.

The Day The Civil-Rights Movement Changed

What my father saw in Mississippi.
Heather Booth playing guitar for Fannie Lou Hamer.

Why Fannie Lou Hamer Endures

She’s mostly remembered for one famous speech. Her actual legacy is far greater than that.
African Americans boarding an integrated bus, following the Supreme Court ruling ending the Montgomery bus boycott in 1956. The boycott inspired many US socialists to throw themselves wholeheartedly into the civil rights struggle.

Socialists Organized in the 1950s Civil Rights Movement

In 1950s America, the Cold War was raging, but socialists were playing key roles in the early civil rights movement.
Civil Rights March on Washington, people holding signs calling for integration

How White Violence Turned a Peaceful Civil Rights Demonstration Into Mayhem

Winfred Rembert on protesting in the Jim Crow South and getting arrested.
Bob Moses at SNCC

The Quiet Courage of Bob Moses

The late civil-rights leader understood that grassroots organizing was key to delivering political power to Black Americans in the South.
Bayard Rustin, A. Philip Randolph, and John Morsell hold a press conference in 1963

A Vision of Racial and Economic Justice

A. Philip Randolph and Bayard Rustin knew the fates of the civil rights and labor movements were intertwined. The same is true today.
Martin Luther King Jr.

What Dignity Demands

A new book persuasively places Malcolm X and Martin Luther King at the center of each other’s most dramatic transformations.
Julian Bond

What Julian Bond Taught Me About Politics and Power

Lessons about organizing from the SNCC co-founder.
The burning bush from Exodus, against a background of Egypt and the American South.

The Roots of the Black Prophetic Voice

Why the Exodus must remain central to the African American church.
A line of Black men sit and stand in a half circle. They all where Pullman Porter uniforms.

How Black Pullman Porters Waged a Struggle for “Civil Rights Unionism”

Led by A. Philip Randolph, Black Pullman porters secured dignity on the job — and laid the foundation for the modern Civil Rights Movement.
James Baldwin.

The Vow James Baldwin Made to Young Civil Rights Activists

How James Baldwin confronted America's most exceptional lie.
NOLA Resistance Oral History Project title card featuring images of the civil rights movement.

NOLA Resistance Oral History Project

This oral history project records testimony from individuals who were active in the fight for racial equality in New Orleans between 1954 and 1976.
A group of men gather at a headquarters of the Communist Party USA following a protest demanding pay raise and an end to police brutality, US, circa 1920. Hirz / Archive Photos / Getty

How McCarthyism and the Red Scare Hurt the Black Freedom Struggle

Union activists linked the struggle for black equality in housing, employment, and at the ballot box, to the broader struggle against capitalist domination.
Civil rights leader Wyatt Tee Walker addresses a crowd at St. Phillips AME Church in Atlanta.

How Civil Rights Leader Wyatt Tee Walker Revived Hope After MLK's Death

In a sermon two weeks after MLK's funeral, Walker urged young seminarians to be hopeful and take action for making change happen. His sermon has valuable lessons today.

Odetta Holmes’ Album One Grain of Sand

Odetta’s artistry was a weapon in the Civil Rights struggle, and was crucial to the era’s politics.
Martin Luther King Jr. and Coretta Scott King.

“A More Beautiful and Terrible History” Corrects the Fables Told of the Civil Rights Movement

A new book bursts the bubble on what we’ve learned about the Civil Rights era to show a larger movement with layers.

One Night on the Mountaintop

Martin Luther King Jr. came to Memphis 50 years ago to help 1,300 black sanitation workers on strike. Ozell Ueal was one of them.

Memories of Mississippi

SNCC staff photographer Danny Lyon recounts his experiences in the early days of the civil rights movement.

A White Mother Went to Alabama to Fight for Civil Rights. The Klan Killed Her for It.

What motivated Viola Liuzzo to take up the cause of justice hundreds of miles from her home?

What the Civil Rights Movement Has to Do With Denim

The history of blue jeans has been whitewashed.

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