Restarting the Civil Rights Movement
Ask most Americans to name the most powerful image of the civil rights movement, and it would probably be Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. at the Lincoln Memorial sharing his dream of a color-blind society. The masses at the Aug. 28, 1963, March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom and his landmark speech symbolized a powerful, united movement that was forcing change on America.
Truth be told, that historic Kodak moment didn't truly reflect the movement that everyone, from folks at the conservative Fox News Channel to the hip-hop generation to the White House, lays claim to today. The civil rights struggle was fragmented and contentious and had serious internal divisions.
But the need to dream and do remains. "Today we face a new set of challenges," says Brian Smedley of the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, a Washington, D.C., think tank devoted to issues of concern to African Americans, "and one of the most significant challenges for the movement today is to somehow tackle the notion that the United States is now color-blind or post-racial."
Here's a history lesson according to Wade Henderson, president of the 60-year-old Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights: Were there no NAACP, founded in 1909, there would have been no Martin Luther King Jr. to answer the call in Montgomery in 1955 and no March on Washington in 1963. And if that had not happened, there would be no Barack Obama accepting the Democratic Party's nomination for president on Aug. 28, 2008, and there would be no President Obama about whose effectiveness those concerned about a civil rights agenda are now debating.
Ask Mary Frances Berry, former chair of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission and a longtime history professor at the University of Pennsylvania, or Roger Wilkins, professor emeritus of history at George Mason University, if there is a discernible civil rights movement in 2010 and they will say no....
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Truth be told, that historic Kodak moment didn't truly reflect the movement that everyone, from folks at the conservative Fox News Channel to the hip-hop generation to the White House, lays claim to today. The civil rights struggle was fragmented and contentious and had serious internal divisions.
But the need to dream and do remains. "Today we face a new set of challenges," says Brian Smedley of the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, a Washington, D.C., think tank devoted to issues of concern to African Americans, "and one of the most significant challenges for the movement today is to somehow tackle the notion that the United States is now color-blind or post-racial."
Here's a history lesson according to Wade Henderson, president of the 60-year-old Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights: Were there no NAACP, founded in 1909, there would have been no Martin Luther King Jr. to answer the call in Montgomery in 1955 and no March on Washington in 1963. And if that had not happened, there would be no Barack Obama accepting the Democratic Party's nomination for president on Aug. 28, 2008, and there would be no President Obama about whose effectiveness those concerned about a civil rights agenda are now debating.
Ask Mary Frances Berry, former chair of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission and a longtime history professor at the University of Pennsylvania, or Roger Wilkins, professor emeritus of history at George Mason University, if there is a discernible civil rights movement in 2010 and they will say no....