Frederick Douglass

The bonfire was a public spectacle for Black people, as well as any white dissenters. It was a calculated warning.

The author of a book about William Still unearths new details about the leading Black abolitionist—and reflects on his lost legacy.

Enslaved women’s experiences with war must be extended to include the everyday warfare of slavery.

The senator from Massachusetts and the birth of the Republican Party.

The famous historian makes the claim that the demigods of American historical mythology can help us carve paths through our forbidding 21st-century wilderness.

Tying the fight for equal rights to the founders and the Constitution has worked before.

Ken Burns’ account of prohibition tells a popular story of booze in America. The historical record is far more sobering.

Clashes between sovereignty rights and civil rights reveal an uncomfortable and complicated story about race and belonging in America.

The leader of a would-be South Carolina slave rebellion was hanged 200 years ago. A new account is a must-read.

Freedom and prosperity are the most effective cure for the scars of slavery and racism.

The pro-life movement needs to know that such culture wars result not in outright victory for one side but in reaction and compromise.

Looking back at the short but deep friendship of John Brown and Harriet Tubman, who gave their lives to the abolitionist cause.

A haunting exploration of “My Old Kentucky Home” reveals how a minstrel song rooted in slavery became a nostalgic American icon embedded in consumer culture.

An accounting of racist murders in nineteenth-century America.

The struggle for progress is always two steps forward and at least one step back.

Emily Bingham’s new book explores the roots of the Kentucky Derby’s anthem. It may not be pretty, but it’s important to know.

Black Americans continue to fight for access to the public school systems their forebears created, against a history of white backlash and appropriation.

When Charles Sumner died in 1874, a bill he had sponsored two years earlier threatened to overshadow his legacy.

On the Black doctors who received their medical degrees and a new sort of freedom in Europe.

Denmark Vesey expressed the Bible’s anti-slavery messages.