>> Adrienne Cannon: Good evening and welcome to the
Library of Congress. My name is Adrienne Cannon. I am the Afro-American History
and Culture Specialist in the Manuscript Division. Tonight's special event,
Celebrating the NAACP Records at the Library of Congress,
features a presentation by Gloria J. Browne-Marshall,
author of "The Voting Rights War: The NAACP and the Ongoing
Struggle for Justice" accompanied by a related
display of NAACP items from the recently processed part 10 of the NAACP records
in the Manuscript Division. I want to thank Elizabeth
Schreiber-Byers and Jamal Gordon for their help with
organizing the event. I also want to thank the management
of the Manuscript Division and Senior Archive Specialist
Michael Folkerts and Nate Tribble, who led a team of
18 staff processing part 10 of the NAACP records, which became
available for research use in November 2023. I hope you all had a chance to
see the wonderful display that Nate and Mike curated
in the adjacent room. Finally, I want to thank the
NAACP for its stalwart support of researchers over the years and for entrusting
the Library of Congress with the stewardship of
the organization's records. The Library of Congress
acquired the NAACP records as a gift from the association
in 1964, with the help of
attorney Morris L. Ernst, a founder of the American
Civil Liberties Union and friend of Arthur Spingarn, the NAACP's
counsel and president. The first boxes of non-current
records arrived in November 1964. The library continues to
receive new additions to the collection incrementally. The NAACP records now consist
of approximately 4 million items dating from 1842 to 2019. The records encompass a wide
variety of materials, including manuscripts, photographs,
prints, pamphlets, maps, broadsides, sound
recordings, and films. Every phase of the NAACP's many
activities can be found in this rich and diverse collection. part 10 of the NAACP record
spans the years 1911 to 2019, with the bulk of the material
dating from 1960 to 2010. It was derived from 20
accessions received by the library starting in the 1990s. It focuses on activities at the
branch level, especially in Mississippi and other southern
states, from NAACP region five, primarily from 1963 to 1978,
and covering major civil rights events and issues, including
the Jackson movement and the death and legacy of Mississippi
Field Director Medgar Wiley Evers. Other files from the
1970s and 1980s expand upon programs represented in earlier
parts of the collection that address economic reciprocity
for African Americans, health and wellness issues, education initiatives,
and energy policy. Files from the 1990s document
the renewed focus on voter empowerment,
police brutality, and environmental justice. part 10 added
nearly 900,000 items. In more specific terms, 2,369
archival boxes to the process, NAACP records in the Manuscript
Division, and expanded the already voluminous online
finding aid by 450 pages. The NAACP records rank annually
among the most heavily used by researchers, and with this
new infusion of source material, will likely keep
the collection atop the rankings for years to come. I will now proceed to
introduce successively the Librarian of Congress,
Doctor Carla Hayden, Mr. Leon W. Russell, Chair of the
NAACP National Board of Directors, who will deliver remarks. I will then introduce Professor
Gloria J. Browne-Marshall, who will deliver
her presentation. [Applause] Carla Hayden was sworn in as
the 14th Librarian of Congress on September the 14th, 2016. [Applause] Doctor Hayden, the first woman
and the first African American to lead the National Library,
was nominated to the position by President Barack Obama on
February the 24th, 2016, and her nomination was confirmed
by the US Senate later that year on July 13th. Her vision for America's
National Library collecting all Americans to the Library of
Congress has redefined and modernized the library's
mission to engage, inspire, and inform Congress and the
American people with a universal and enduring source of
knowledge and creativity. During her tenure, Doctor
Hayden has prioritized efforts to make the library's and its
unparalleled collections more accessible to the public through
her social media presence, events, and activities. She has introduced new
audiences to the many libraries treasures, from the Frederick
Douglass Papers to the contents of Abraham Lincoln's pockets
on the night of his assassination, to James Madison's Crystal
flute, made famous by Lizzo. By investing in information
technology, infrastructure and digital efforts, she has
enabled the American people to explore, discover and engage more with this treasure trove
of America's stories maintained by the Library of Congress,
even if they never visit the library buildings in and
around Washington, D.C. With support of a $15 million grant
from the Mellon Foundation in 2021, Doctor Hayden launched the
Of the People Initiative, which is creating new opportunities for
more Americans, especially black, indigenous, Hispanic or
Latino, Asian American and Pacific Islander, and
other communities of color underrepresented in the
library's collections to engage with the library and
add their perspectives to the library's collections. The initiative has three
programs that invest in community based documentarians,
fund paid internships and fellowships to engage the
next generation of diverse librarians, archivists, and
knowledge workers and invite underserved communities and
institutions to create digital engagements with
library collections. Prior to her current role,
Doctor Hayden was the CEO of the Enoch Pratt Free Library in
Baltimore, Maryland since 1993. She was a deputy commissioner
and Chief Librarian of the Chicago Public Library
from 1991 to 1993, and Assistant Professor of Library
and Information Science at the University of Pittsburgh
from 1987 to 1991, and Library Services Coordinator for the Museum of
Science and Industry in Chicago from 1982 to 1987. She began her career with
the Chicago Public Library as a Young Adult Services Coordinator
from 1979 to 1982, and as a Library Associate and
Children's Librarian from 1973 to 1979. Doctor Hayden was President of
the American Library Association from 2003 to 2004. In 1995, she was the first
African American to receive the Libraries Journal Librarian
of the Year Award and recognition for her outreach
services at the Pratt Library, which included an after school
center for Baltimore teens offering homework assistance
and college and career counseling. Doctor Hayden received
a B.A. from Roosevelt University and an M.A. and PhD from
the Graduate School of the University of Chicago. Among her numerous civic and
professional memberships and awards, Doctor Hayden is an
elected member of the American Philosophical Society and the American Academy
of Arts and Letters. And it is now my distinct
pleasure to introduce the 14th Librarian of Congress,
Doctor Carla Hayden. [Applause] >> Dr. Carla Hayden:
Wow. Thank you, Adrienne. Thank you so much. That was really something. And when you hear that
as you know you get older, as you go along. But also
that's the type of introduction that you would want
your mother to hear. So thank you. Thank you. And welcome all of you
to the Library of Congress. We're honored to have all of
you here with us tonight to celebrate the NAACP records
and a more appropriate setting could not be found. The Library of Congress
is the first national cultural institution in America,
and the chief repository for the nation's creativity and history. And it has gathered for many
years materials that tell the story of women and
men of African descent. As part of the library's
commitment to preserving the entire scope of
American history. You may know that the
Library of Congress is generally regarded as one of the leading
centers for the study of African American experience, from
the colonial period to the present. And I must say, and Adrienne, I think and Janice
Ruth from Manuscripts would also agree that few public institutions
can approach the scale and the depth of the
library's collections. As Adrienne said, in every format
from books, manuscripts, maps, newspapers, prints,
music, photographs, films and sound recordings. These
comprehensive collections include the Chronicle of the 20th century
Civil Rights Movement, and the cornerstone of the
library's resources for the study of the Civil Rights Movement
is the NAACP collection. As Adrienne said, it ranks
annually among the most heavily used by researchers in
all of the collections at the Library of Congress.
That includes the papers of 23 presidents, 38 Supreme Court justices and
notable people throughout history. So the NAACP records
were among the first collections identified by the library in a
multiyear funding request to Congress to support the
essential work to make necessary to make these unprocessed,
special format materials available to the public. Dedicated funding, and some
also from the Ford Foundation, allow the library to hire additional archival
staff to tackle. And it says here tackle
because when Adrienne was describing all of those boxes, imagine this room
filled with boxes, to really make sure that
the records were available. So I want to add my personal
congratulations and thanks to the Manuscript Division for
organizing and making available another 900,000
records of the NAACP. I think that deserves a hand. [Applause] That was quite a
bit of processing. And we also maintain original
records of other organizations that led the fight for
civil liberties, such as the NAACP Legal Defense
and Educational Fund, the National Urban League, the Brotherhood of
Sleeping Car Porters, and the Leadership Conference
on Civil Rights. And these organizational records
are enhanced by the personal papers of numerous African American
leaders and activists throughout history,
including Frederick Douglass, Booker T. Washington,
Carter G. Woodson who is a relative of
Adrienne Cannon. [Applause] Mary Church Terrell,
Nannie Helen Burroughs, Roy Wilkins, Thurgood Marshall,
Arthur Spingarn, Robert L. Carter,
A. Philip Randolph, Bayard Rustin, James Forman,
and Rosa Parks. And over the years, the Library
of Congress has showcased in many ways the rich African
American collections through publications such as the African
American Mosaic Resource Guide and popular exhibits like
The African American Odyssey and others on Rosa Parks and
the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Now these programs and the
acquisitions they promoted would not have been possible without
the generosity of the Congress of the United States. That's been called the
greatest patron of a library in the history of the world. For they have enabled us to
build and sustain the world's most comprehensive collection
of knowledge and history, of which our African American
material is a vital and we're very proud to say, a growing
part as the newly processed NAACP records illustrate. So it's an honor to
have you here to celebrate. And we thank you for being here. And, Adrienne, I'm
turning it back to you. [Applause] >> Adrienne Cannon: Chairman of
the National Board of Directors, Mr. Leon W. Russell. Leon W. Russell was elected
chairman of the National Board of Directors of the NAACP at
its annual Board of Directors meeting in New York on
February the 18th, 2017. Mr. Russell has served as a
member of the NAACP National Board of
Directors since 1990. Mr. Russell retired in January
2012 after serving as the Director of the
Office of Human Rights for Pinellas County Government, Clearwater, Florida,
since January 1977. In this position, Mr.
Russell was responsible for implementing the county's affirmative action and human
rights ordinances, which provide for the development of a
racially and sexually diverse workforce, reflecting the
general makeup of the local civilian labor force and the
implementation of the county's Equal Employment
Opportunity programs. Programs involved in the
implementation of this ordinance cover employees in all of the
departments under the county administrator and the
five constitutional officer. The Pinellas County Human
Rights Code Ordinance provides protection for illegal
discrimination in housing, employment, public
accommodations for the county's
923,000 residents. This ordinance has been
deemed substantially equivalent to title 8 of the 19 68 Federal Fair Housing Act
and title seven of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Over 500 formal complaints of
discrimination are filed under this ordinance annually. In September 2007, Mr. Russell
was elected President of the International Association of Official Human Rights
Agencies, IAOHRA, during its annual meeting
in Atlanta, Georgia. The IAOHRA membership is agency
based and consists of statutory, human and civil rights agencies
throughout the United States and Canada, as well as
representation from other nations. These agencies enforce
state and local civil rights laws, and are actively engaged
in reducing and resolving intergroup tension and
promoting intergroup relations. Mr. Russell concluded his
second term as IAOHRA president at the conclusion
of the organization's annual conference in Austin, Texas
in September 2011. Additionally, Mr. Russell
served as the President of the Florida State Conference
of Branches of the NAACP from January 1996
until January 2000, after serving for 15 years
as the first Vice President. He has served as Assistant
Secretary Chair of the Convention Planning Committee, and Vice Chairman of the NAACP
National Board of Directors. Mr. Russell has served as a
member of such organizations as the International City
Management Association, National Forum of Black Public
Administrators, Board of Directors of the
Children's Campaign of Florida, Blueprint Commission
on Juvenile Justice, with responsibility
for recommending reforms to improve the juvenile
justice system in the state of Florida. Past board member of the
Pinellas Opportunity Council and past president and board member
of the National Association of Human Rights Workers. Currently, he serves
as the Chairman of the American
Children's Campaign, formerly the Children's
Campaign of Florida. Mr. Russell also served
as the Chairman of The Floridians Representing
Equity and Equality, FREE. FREE was established as a
statewide coalition to oppose the Florida Civil Rights
Initiative and Anti-affirmative action proposal, authored
by the Ward Connerly. Ultimately, the initiative failed
to get on the Florida ballot because of the strong legal
challenge spearheaded by FREE. Mr. Russell has received numerous
civic awards and citations. He was born and grew up in
Pulaski, Virginia, where he attended segregated
Chaffee Elementary School, Christiansburg Institute,
and graduated from Pulaski High School in 1968. He is a graduate of Eastern
Tennessee State University in Johnson City, Tennessee with a
B.S. degree in political science. Please join me in welcoming Chairman of the board of
the NAACP, Leon W. Russell. [Applause] >> Leon W. Russell:
Thank you, Adrienne, for that overly
long introduction. [Laughter] Good evening, and thank you
all for coming to this program this evening. This is
extremely important. Because, first of all,
what you will hear from our brilliant Gloria
Browne-Marshall, when she talks about the voting rights war and
what that really meant for us. But for me, as Chairman of
the National Board of Directors of the NAACP, this is an
opportunity to thank the Library of Congress
for its partnership since 1964. And obviously we are a
115 year old organization. So it doesn't surprise me that
we have the largest collection at the Library of Congress. What does often surprise me
is the fact that I hear so many people talking about the fact
that they've come to the Manuscript Division to do
research, and that they have used the papers of the
association so many times. And that, to me, is part of the
most important thing that can happen for the association, because we're very bad at
telling our own story. Very bad at telling our own
story, that 115 year history that really is the civil rights
history of this country. I'm somewhat-- I tend to
challenge historians who want to say that there is
a modern civil rights movement. I don't know what that means when it's obvious to me that
since we got off the first boat that we've been
fighting for freedom. And so the civil rights movement
has been a 400 year movement, and certainly a 246 year movement
when we think about the history of the nation. And so I'm very pleased that the Library of Congress feels that it can honor us,
quite frankly, by doing the display, by making sure that
people have access to the over 4 million documents that
make up the NAACP collection. And so I'm very
pleased about that. Before I go any further,
I want to raise two names. First, I want to introduce
India Artists, who is the current archivist of the NAACP. She works very closely with the
staff of the Library of Congress and making sure that all of the
boxes that are recent get here. She's the person, the
conduit between a lot of people who want to know things, and
the Library of Congress, where she tells them, if you
want to know, go there. But I also want to
raise another name. And that's the name of
Mildred Bond Roxborough. Mildred basically
has been the mother of our association with
the Library of Congress. She for-- And let me just give
you a little history. Mildred Bond Roxborough came to work for
the NAACP in 1954. We ain't let her go yet. She is 97 years old. And she's still an employee
of the NAACP. Now, she has retired five times. But we won't let her go. But, Mildred, in any number of positions
that she's held with the association, including in the
branch and field department, which is where the majority of
the documents, I think, probably come from, with respect to the things
that are here at the library, Mildred was part of
that organization. She was our convention planner. She was our development
director, but mostly she was the archives. She remains the
archive of the association when India needs to know something. She has a hotline to Mildred
and they will get it done. So I wanted to raise
those two names. Somebody walked in the room
that I'm going to introduce also Derek Lewis. Stand up, Derek. If you look at the display,
which I guess is where you're calling it now,
section ten or-- >> part 10.
>> Leon W. Russell: part 10. Talks about really that
period of what I considered the heat of the 60s,
the 50s, the 70s. And one of the things that we
were talking about when we were looking at that display was the
fact that it was young people. Young people who were
the heart of the movement. It was the young people who
faced the dogs, who faced the water hoses, who
really stood out. Derrick Lewis is the ascending,
and I'm making an announcement I'm not supposed to make,
but I'm going to make it, is the ascending director of the
Youth and College Division of the National Association for the
Advancement of Colored People. [Applause] And so we're really thrilled that we continue to be on the
forefront with our young people, that they continue to churn
and make things happen. And so we're we're
really thrilled about that. The collection that is used
here really is the basis for a lot of what people
write about black folks. A lot of the truth that folks write about
black folks in this country. The ability to come to the
Library of Congress, go through the manuscripts that are stored
here, that are collected and cataloged here give people a snapshot of what life in the United States
for black folks really is about. And so we at the Association
are really very, very proud of our association with
the Library of Congress. We look forward to
adding more boxes. Part 10, part 11, part 12,
part 13 of the collection. We look forward to being able
to share the work that goes on throughout this country, in
communities that really make up the NAACP, and because they
make up the NAACP, they are the story of
black folks in America. In closing, just a personal vignette. Somebody just asked me a moment
ago if I had family connections that cause me to be engaged
and involved with the NAACP. And up until about three
and a half years ago, I did not know all of
my own family history. We're about a week away
from May 17th, and everybody knows Brown v. the
Board of education. But I don't think people think
about what led to Brown. And what led to Brown was a legal attack in a lot
of areas, quite frankly. One of the most important of
those being equalization of teacher pay and
the fight to make, remember Plessy versus Ferguson,
separate but equal. To make separate equal. That was a legal fight. The lawyers who would
eventually argue the Brown case began arguing for equalization. Suing for equalization. And I had no clue. I had no clue. That my maternal grandfather
had been a plaintiff. In 1947, in an equalization lawsuit
in Pulaski County, Virginia. Lawyers were Oliver Hill
and Spottswood Robinson. I didn't have a clue. That that was the case. Until three years ago, when I was asked to join some
of my friends in working to reinvigorate our long closed,
segregated black elementary school, Calfee
Elementary in Pulaski, to make it a community center
and a community cultural center. And all of that history
came tumbling out. And we like to think that if some folks
down in Farmville hadn't raised the little cane, that Pulaski would have been
the Virginia case in Brown, but it wasn't. We missed out. It's a history. We never know
what we don't know. And so being able to come to
the Library of Congress, being able to go
through the records, being able to have
people do research and do projects and learn
about what our history is, can teach us a lot about
who we are and why we are. And so I want to thank the library,
Doctor Hayden, Adrienne, all of the staff here at the
library for what you do in raising up and allowing people
to see our 115 year history from the National Association. I look forward to hearing some
of that great research from Doctor Browne-Marshall. So thank you. [Applause] >> Adrienne Cannon:
Gloria J. Browne-Marshall is a professor of
constitutional law and africana studies at
the John Jay College, City University, New York. Her books include "The Voting
Rights War: The NAACP and the Ongoing
Struggle for Justice", "She Took Justice: The
Black Woman, Law, and Power," and "Race, Law, and
American Society: 1607-Present" Prior to becoming a tenured full
professor of constitutional law at John Jay College, she taught
in the Africana Studies program at Vassar College,
litigated cases for the Southern Poverty
Law Center, Community Legal Services, the NAACP
Legal Defense Fund Incorporated, and was a law clerk in the
Eastern District of Pennsylvania and the Court of Common
Pleas in Philadelphia. Gloria Browne-Marshall is an
interdisciplinary writer with essays in the Milwaukee Courier,
Time.com, CNN.com, NBC.com, and in several journals.
As a playwright and producer, Professor Browne-Marshall
has brought stories of resilience and resistance
to the forefront through the production of seven plays,
including Shot Cortisol, published by TRW. My Juilliard, Killing Me Softly, Waverly Place and
Dreams of Emmett Till which takes the murder of Emmett
Till into the 21st century. She attended the Sarah
Lawrence MFA program. Her work in progress is a
play entitled class that asks who owns American history? She recently completed a
documentary film titled "Before 1619," based on the
travels to Angola and forthcoming nonfiction book entitled "A Protest History
of the United States." Professor Browne-Marshall
received an Emmy Award as a writer and host of
Your Democracy, an animated video
series that explores the pillars of the
United States Constitution. She is a recipient of a Harvard
Kennedy School Institute of Politics fellowship,
a Pulitzer Center grant. Wiley College Women of
Excellence Award, NAACP Service Award,
emerging Screenwriter award, American Film Award, among
many film festival awards and a Frederick Lewis
Allen Fellowship. She is founder, director
of the Law and Policy Group incorporated, a non-profit
organization that produces the biennial report on the Status
of Black Women and Girls, the only ongoing national report on the state of
black females in America. She has provided legal
commentary for CNN, MSNBC, CNN International, France 24,
BBC and dozens of media outlets around the United States. Professor Browne-Marshall is a
member of the National Press Club, National Association
of Black Journalists. NAACP Organization of American
Historians Pen international, the Authors Guild
Center for Fiction, Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority,
National Association of Black Attorneys,
Mystery Writers of America, and the American
Bar Association. Gloria Browne-Marshall
was invited by entities such as the
International Monetary Fund, U.S. Coast Guard, Howard
University Law School, the National Archives, as well
as colleges, bar associations, theaters, and civic organizations
nationally and internationally to speak on issues
of legal history, constitutional law, gender
equality, literature and law, and racial justice. And now it is my pleasure to
introduce our speaker. Our principal speaker
for this evening, Professor Gloria
J. Browne-Marshall. [Applause] >> Gloria J. Browne-Marshall:
This is such an high honor. I'm going to take a moment to
just get my nerves together, because I do not want to
disappoint my ancestors. And one of the things that I
find is so fascinating about this organization, this entity
or our government is that the possibility is there
for so much. I thank you the honorable Carl Hayden,
I thank you. Please. Mr. Russell, for your remarks, for
being here, for taking your time. But I also want to thank the
dignitaries of elected officials, as well as those people
who are the activists in the community. Because
they too are giving so much to make this country great. I want to thank everyone
who was working to make our democracy strong and that
takes everyone's effort. Thank you, Adrienne Cannon,
for inviting me. There are so many writers out
there who would love to be in my place right now, and that's
too bad because I'm here. [Laughter] When you think
about how many boxes of information of letters the NAACP
is bestowing upon the world, you think about all the different
researchers who have come to the NAACP to better
understand this country. It's just an amazing
sense of pride. And the NAACP gives me in
my research, a deeper sense of cultural pride. I am a very proud
African American. And once you begin to research
the history of our country and you begin to research the
history of the road we've traveled, you two would better
understand if you don't already, why one would be a
proud African American. It's just the sense of having
to fight the fight of two steps forward and one long
step back over 400 years. And the power that the African
American experience, as evidenced through the documents
of the NAACP, provide for us to understand why people will
continue to push us backwards, because we do have political
power, and we've had this power for well over 400 years. And this power and cultural pride
coming together is a force that has allowed us
to be in this room today. Our political progress is
recorded in those documents. And if I had a real social
life, I would be able... [Laughing] to tell you so much more about
how the world thinks about the NAACP documents. But I am one of those people
who actually believe the thrill of life for me is
going to the archives. It's going to the library. To going through those
documents, going through those documents
for me to put my hands or lay my hands on the letters of those
who wrote to the NAACP in the midst of rural communities
asking for the help of this organization, those who became
members knowing that their membership could mean that
their farms would be burned or they would lose all employment,
and yet they became members anyway. That's the source of
power and pride I see when I go through those documents, and
it's been two steps forward and one step in many times,
one very long step back. But that did not stop us. And that's where the pride
comes in as well, knowing the obstacles that are there and
continuing to fight anyway. That is what the NAACP
represents to me. When I was in high school, and middle school, I
was bused across town. I was one of those people. And so when I see the
exhibit and it looks at the busing of students,
I remember being bused. I remember standing on those
street corners when it was before the sunrise, waiting
for the school bus to come. I remember wanting to do more
extracurricular activities after school, but not being able to
because I had to get back on the bus to go across town. I remember what
happened to students in other parts of the country. I remember being the only one. And this assumption of deficit,
the assumption of not being smart enough or not
being good enough. But I also remember
being a class officer. I remember lettering in track. I remember the trophies I won
in speech and debate, and what it did was
show me when I competed that I won most of the time. And it made me realize with the
confidence to stand before you now that Brown v. Board of
Education and these other cases that were brought, and the jury
is still out for whether or not what was gained was enough for
what little children like myself at that time lost. We don't know. But in the end, we had to break
the cycle of segregation. When I was writing the
book I'm working on now, "A History of Protest," I found out
that my relative was a civil rights
attorney in Kansas who brought one of the
initial cases, but he didn't live
long enough to see the Brown v.
Board of Education case. And that's what
we've all been doing. I ran track. When you place the baton in the
hand of the person who's running after you, those young people,
then take off and run as fast as they can in their time. When I read these documents,
I see the people who ran their race and handed the baton
over to the next generation. Generation after generation
after generation. When I write as an activist,
as a civil rights attorney, when I'm a playwright, my
philosophy is that of Sankofa. We must understand our past
to better understand our present, to build a better future. So let me take a moment, if you
don't mind, to not start our history in the past of this
country's oppression. But as African Americans
to start it in Africa. And the reason why I think it's
important is started in Africa. This one individual person. If you can take this person
home with you, I'd appreciate it. And that's Queen Nzinga
and Queen Nzinga of what was then in Ndongo and Matamba was
a warrior queen born in 1583. She died in 1663. She negotiated a peace treaty
with the Portuguese, who had invaded her country in 1622,
when we had our 400th commemoration. It was
those 20 and odd Africans who had arrived in
1619 into Virginia. From whence did they come? Angola. Angola. So when we've had these debates
around political power and the African-American experience,
it's with this sense that we don't understand
how government works. But she was queen. Therefore there
was a government. Europe did not have to give
Africa the sense of government. Her father was king. He was someone she watched
as he had to oversee and make decisions as any king would
a king in Europe would. We need to understand that
we did not have to have the destruction of Africa
to give us civilization. We had government, we had
religion, we had a culture. We had what was needed
for us to grow from there. So some people still believe
that the best thing happened was that slave ship. I'm not one of those people,
and I'd like to discuss it with the folks who think that
that was a good thing. Maybe we can have a
conversation because we need to understand that government,
what we see as our role in government, is something that we
have known for thousands of years. Maybe it wasn't based on
the way government was set up in many European places, but we
had our sense of government. I say this and I spend the time
on it, because this idea that we had to be taught what
government meant and we weren't ready for it yet, we weren't
ready to have the vote. We needed to learn more,
our political responsibility. And yes, all of us make
mistakes politically. All of us make decisions about
how we want to use our vote. But the idea that we had no
sense of government was untrue historically, and I just want to
set that record straight first. When those 20 odd Africans
arrived into the colony, we know of Mary and Anthony
Johnson, who had land of their own. That colony was formed in 1607. Only those with land could vote. When we talk about the NAACP
and the obstacles it faced, it's now at that time
when it was formed. Facing obstacles that went
back hundreds of years. Prejudices. Laws that were in
place to undermine the political process of people
of African descent. This whole wall of
circumstances were put in play. So let me tell you
a little bit more. Mary and Anthony Johnson
had land of their own. They had servants, European and
African servants of their own in the 1600s. And then the laws were changed
and forced them out of the colony. We need to understand
that law has played this role. Law and violence have played
the role to undermine our political progress. When we're in a situation in
which we have the position of political power, it's
undermined in the backlash. It's based solely
on our progress. When we look at our progress,
wait for the backlash. It is happened historically. And so when we go through and
we look at our perseverance, we say the rules have been set
out, we're playing by those rules. And as soon as we get successfully
there, the rules change. The backlash comes
of law and violence. That has been the two steps
forward and the long one step back, the NAACP records show us. What is it that we had to do? Well, Wentworth Cheswell was
elected constable in Newmarket, New Hampshire. We would say he's the
first black elected official. When was this? 1789. Chattel slavery was already in
place across the country. Yet, we persevered. We at that time still
sought out political power. European immigrants could not
vote if they did not have land. But in order to maintain white
political power, those laws were changed to allow those European
immigrants, landless immigrants to then vote. But Africans in America
could not vote. The laws were made different
even during the 17 and 1800s, laying the foundation for those
differing laws going into the future. But Sankofa tells us,
continue to study that past, not from the standpoint of
all the obstacles we had. But here's where I see our
agency. We had those obstacles,
and then we said, We're going to
go forward anyway. That's why you have
a Sojourner Truth. That's why you have
a Harriet Tubman. That's why you have
a Frederick Douglass, who said, the ballot
or the bullet? Yes. He said that before
Malcolm X, the ballot or the bullet was from Frederick Douglass. Why? Because over 100,000
black people fought to make this country free in the Civil War. If you have a chance, please go to the African American
Civil War Museum. Frank Smith is right
here in the audience. It is a wonderful exhibit, and
it will show you that without those black soldiers fighting,
the North would have lost. We weren't giving our freedom. We earned our freedom. We earned it, and
we earned with it. The ballot. And with that ballot
came the backlash. The backlash of the Ku Klux Klan,
the John Birch Society and other entities that did not
want to see the black power and the black position in politics. The 13th amendment abolished
slavery except as punishment for a crime. The 14th Amendment
gave citizenship at birth. Due process, equal protection,
privileges and immunities. The 15th amendment gave the
black man the right to vote and vote, he did. No women could vote at that
time, but the black man and the white man had a right to vote. The women had met, remember in
Seneca Falls in 1848, demanding their right to vote as well,
and they pushed for it. But those same white women did
not want black women included in the suffragist movement. Did that stop us? We're black women.
Of course it did not. [Laughter] We started our own organizations
and continued to fight. And as Sojourner Truth
said, ain't I a woman? In 1851, at their convention in
Akron, Ohio, took the stage and said, ain't I a woman? We have continued in our
foundational ways to change this country, whether
or not it liked it but needed it. That 15th amendment
gave us Hiram Revels, the first black U.S. Senator. The first black U.S. senator
was not Barack Obama. It was Hiram Revels in 1870. And from there we had thousands
of black men in state, local and federal offices. And then, of course,
what happens? The Colfax massacre in 1873,
in Louisiana, black men coming together, trying to
figure out just how to use their political power.
White men surround it. They surround the building
and begin to shoot in it. We don't even know how
many lives were lost. There were mass graves,
they said, of hands and legs sticking out of the shallow
graves that had been thrown together for these bodies
to cover up the crime. The U.S. Supreme
Court then says, No. And the Cruickshank case
versus United States. We're not going to
find a crime here. There were federal civil rights
laws to protect the black vote. However, the U.S.
Supreme Court said, they weren't voting at the time. So therefore it wasn't a
violation of the federal laws. These are the types of obstacles
that met us at every turn. And yet we persevered.
We pushed forward. We knew we had political power. And that's why you had
the Mississippi plan. Senator James Kimble Vardaman,
who decided and if you don't mind my reading and I will not
read the offensive parts to his statement. In my book,
"The Voting Rights War," James Kimble Vardaman, later
governor of the state and a U.S. senator, removed all doubt
about why the state had voted to add a literacy test
and poll tax. "There is no use to equivocate
or lie about the matter. Mississippi's constitutional
convention was held for no other purpose than to
eliminate the N-word from politics. Not the ignorant,
but the N-word." Vardaman believed the cold
blooded murder of blacks to prevent them from
progressing beyond menial labor was acceptable, he said,
"If it is necessary, every Negro in the
state will be lynched. It will be done to maintain
white supremacy." Let's not get it twisted
in the old Latin phrase that's from the very old Latin. I want us to understand
what we were up against once black men gained
the right to vote in 1870 with the 15th amendment. And so we began to see the
Mississippi Plan of 1890 leading into Plessy versus Ferguson. That said that we'd be separate,
but equal and separate was never equal,
was never equal. The end of reconstruction
came in 1877 and left us without any federal protection. My people in 1879 are known
as part of the Exodusters. We left Kentucky
and went to Kansas. That was a brave, bold
thing for us to do. I know we've heard of the
Great Migration of the 1900s, but there was a migration
before that in the 1870s. That was my family. And we tried as best we could
to try to carve out a living there. The Midwest seemed
to have hope for us. There were others who came up
to the Midwest, but we hadn't had the real
Great Migration yet. And then what happens? We have the Springfield Riots. In the birthplace, home
they say, that's known for Abraham Lincoln. And as these rioters are
lynching and burning down black homes and businesses
and they're screaming out, Lincoln freed you, but we're
going to show you your place. This is what we were
experiencing. And it's in that bloodshed that
we have the rise of the NAACP, because there was a call that
was made from white northerners, Mary Ovington leading that charge,
and many others who said, wait a minute, where
are the abolitionists? Remember, it hasn't been this
long since slavery ended. Where are the abolitionists? Why are we not protecting
the African Americans? And so with that call, there
was a meeting that was held, and that meeting
was one to address the Springfield riots
of August 14th, 1908. But on the other side, people
of African descent weren't waiting for white
people to save us. I mean, no offense,
none whatsoever. But the spirit of Queen Nzinga
has been in us all of this time. So therefore, W.E.B. Dubois had already started the
Niagara movement. And as part of the Niagara
movement of 1905, we have the meeting of people who
are one generation and some, not even one generation
out of slavery, who are meeting to
decide their own futures, their own determination. And with that, an invitation
goes out from the call of Mary Ovington based on
the Springfield Riots, and the call is
made to W.E.B. Dubois because it's already shown
his ability to lead and come together with a program
that was essential to the self-determination of
people of African descent. The Niagara movement. And I quote,"The world spurns
the coward who fears to try." Listen to that. Listen to that. Besides, there is no
telling what can be done by thoughtful,
intelligent cooperation. At least in such
an organization, we can make the country know and realize that as men
we will not, without protestation or an effort to
obtain our own, allow others to take what rightfully
belongs to us. Sick and hell. And there's a
young part to this. They add to it, and I quote,
"We want our college students to take a stand." This is in 1905. "We want our college students to
take a stand for the principles set down in the objects
of the Niagara movement. We want you to do so because
it will make you fearless men, useful to the race." This is what was going on in the
early part of the 20th century. Develop and make
yourselves strong for the leadership which
will come to you. I want us to understand that
when the NAACP was formed, most people say it was a
majority white organization. Yes, it was. W.E.B. Dubois and Ida B. Wells
Barnett were the two African Americans who were
part of that founding group. But when that invitation,
the call went out to meet on Lincoln's birthday, that call went out
to a thousand people. The activists of that time period,
the leaders of that time period. Less than 150 answered the call. So we need to understand
it was difficult. It was also difficult for the
Niagara movement because those African Americans who met in
Niagara side of the Canadian side of Niagara Falls, because
that's where they could meet in an integrated fashion and have some form of
self-determination and agency. That's why it was called the
Niagara movement, because they met on the Canadian
side of Niagara Falls. They felt that an organization
that was led by whites alone, for the most part, would not
represent their interests in the same way. That's still
a debate we have today. Well, we should be having. I want us to better understand
as well that ACT-SO, which is part of the NAACP and part of the
display we have here, the academic, the creative,
the technological, the scientific Olympics for young people,
that's the young group that is part of the NAACP. That was something, as I said
before, the Niagara movement was looking at to generationally,
when we hand off the baton, are we preparing our
young people to take it? Or are we thinking, oh, you
don't know your history well enough yet? There are some among us who say
we don't tell our history to the young people enough, or how are
they supposed to know their history well enough to take
on that baton to make us feel comfortable? Doctor Henry
Moskowitz, Mary White Ovington, Moorfield Storey, who became
President of the NAACP and brought some of
the original cases. I started working on this book
during the time period of Barack Obama's, President Barack
Obama's second term, because I had a feeling,
that sense of joy. And I was here in Washington,
D.C., I was among the crowds, and it was cold outside. If those of you who remember that,
that was a very cold, cold day, and yet it was warm
because we were together in this, and I said, oh my goodness,
people are going to expect this for every election. And if they don't get it,
they're not going to want to vote. That's what made me feel I needed
to write something to remind us. And the NAACP documents a
celebration of these documents because it reminds me
of those who came before. And that's why I said this
journey, in particular, the journey of the NAACP
is America's journey, is our social justice journey,
is our political journey. And so therefore, those
documents would be the best way for me to highlight where
we've been, where we are and where we're going. That's why
I wrote this book, because I had a feeling people were going to
want that hallelujah moment for the next election.
And when they don't get it, they're going to stay home. But I want us to also know,
during these time periods in early American history, I don't
think that the people, black men and then in 1920, black
women were voting for people who actually cared about them. I don't think they had
the issues on the ballot. That would have been in the
best interests of the African American at
the time, but they said, I need to have my right
to vote anyway. It may not be the
politician I want, it may not be the issue I want. Maybe I want to vote
just to vote against it. But I want my right. We're not going to always
have a sense of celebration with every election. They wanted that right, because
it came with citizenship. And they wanted to
be full citizens. And have full
political participation. When we went through the
documents, I went, me, myself and I, when we went
through the documents, it was with this sense of awe. How were they able
to be in rural Texas and have the sheriff
threaten them with lynching? And still remain a
member of the NAACP. How were they able
to have the courage? Sometimes I look at this
and I don't want to think that I'm without courage. But these are special people. Dear sir, the colored people in
this part attempted to vote in the Democratic primary
election, which was held on or about July 27th last. We were prohibited from having
any part of this election, but not because we were not willing
to take the Democratic oath, but on the grounds
that we were Negro. We desire to test this matter
to the limits of the courts and win what we go after. This was in 1918. I want us to understand when we
tell people who say they are not sure they want to vote, why?
I'm not going to get what I want anyway. What
difference does it make? Just as they probably in 1918,
didn't have the politician on the ballot that was best
representing their issue. They said we showed up to vote and they put their lives
on the line to do so. Their lives on the line. Because in 1920, after black
women gained the right to vote, the backlash was not just
against black men, it was also against black women because black
women were being lynched too. Sir, while stopping in
your beautiful little city this week, I was informed that
you were of the habit of going out among the Negroes of Orlando
and delivering lectures, explaining to them just how
to become citizens and how to assert their rights. If you are familiar with days
of reconstruction that followed in the wake of the Civil War,
you will recall that the scalawags of the North and
the Republicans of the South proceeded very much the same
as you are proceeding to instil into the Negro the
idea of social equality. You will also remember that
these things forced the loyal citizens of the South to organize
clans of determined men who pledged themselves to
maintain white supremacy and to safeguard our women
and children. And now, if you are a scholar,
you know that history repeats itself, and that he who resorts
to your kind of game is handling edged tools. We shall always enjoy white
supremacy IN THIS COUNTRY. And he who interferes
must face the consequences. Signed the Grand
Master of Florida. Cluck, cluck. So even our white allies
were at risk of death. It must be understood
that the political power of the African American was such
that there were the laws, the literacy tests,
the poll taxes. And of course, if that didn't
work, out and out violence. I want to give you two more
quick points, and then I know we're going to open up for Q and A. Annie Harper in Virginia,
Evelyn butts, they brought their own
challenges against the poll tax. The literacy test was
challenged as well. And the literacy
test was challenged in a way by Louise Lassiter, who, if you can imagine
to pay your poll tax, you had to go to
the sheriff's office. What level of intimidation can
you believe to have to pay the poll tax, which is
then alerting the sheriff? I intend to vote and that's
why I'm paying this poll tax. So now the sheriff can
then alert the Ku Kluxers, as this letter shows, to attack
that person at night. There is no prosecutor who's
prosecuting, no politician who's protecting, and
no sheriff who's there. It's just those people who are
members of the NAACP sending their letters in, asking to
be part of legal cases, challenging poll taxes, challenging
literacy tests. The poll tax was finally
eliminated in 1964. It took an amendment
to the U.S. Constitution. An amendment to
the U.S. Constitution. I want us to think about the
tent cities, and in my book I have a picture of one of
the tent cities, the tent cities, people living in tents. Why? Because they
registered to vote. And they were driven out of
town, driven from their homes and having to live in a tent
in the elements. I want us to think about those
who were imprisoned in 1972. Who decided they would start
an NAACP branch in prison. I want us to think
about those things. Harry and Harriet more
blown up in their homes. NAACP activists,
school teachers. Improbably, the sheriff
did it. Allegedly. The sheriff who was known
in that part of Florida. Two have killed others. Allegedly. A bomb placed on
Christmas Day under their home of Harry and Harriet Moore. And he died on the
way to the hospital. She died a few days later. Just because they were
registering people to vote. NAACP martyrs, NAACP
martyrs. What I call them. And the NAACP martyr
of Vernon Dahmer who knew that his
life was in jeopardy. He knew that the
time was getting near as an NAACP person who decided
that he was helping people to register to vote, and that
during that time period he had been threatened so many times. But he knew it was coming close. But he didn't know that they
would go to the point of throwing firebombs
into his home. But he said with his dying
breath, if you don't vote, you don't count. A voting rights martyr. In present day, we're dealing
with Shelby County versus Holder, the case that gutted
the Voting Rights Act that President Lyndon Johnson
knew was important to have preclearance to avoid
legislation that could be put in place to undermine
the right to vote. That proposed legislation had
to be pre-cleared in certain jurisdictions. That was gutted from the
Voting Rights Act of 1965, the one that so many lives
were lost in order to pass. The three college
students who were killed in Philadelphia,
Mississippi, Medgar Evers, and on and on,
church bombings, everything. And of course, the march across
the Edmund Pettus Bridge. All of that went into creating the foundation for
the Voting Rights Act. And to this day it
languishes this bill to pass to put those
provisions back into the act. Languishing in Congress.
We need help. We need people to actually do
the work to make sure it's passed. We're in the present. Today we have voter suppression,
district packing cases, disappearing polling sites,
chaos and attacks on the Capitol. Book banning,
racialized mass shootings. We have any number
of oppressive tactics. And yet, we stand. We have cultural pride. We have political power. We have a past that goes well
beyond even Queen Nzinga of Perseverance. Our future is bold. Why? Because we have
black astronauts. We have black prima ballerinas. We have black Olympians. We have black ambassadors. We have black head coaches. We have all of these black people
who are in positions of power in corporations and
governments and everything. And of course, we have
a black vice president. So what should we expect? The backlash. Prepare for it. Because historically it will
come and we will survive it. We need to understand. But by the year 2045, this country is going to be
majority people of color. Other people know this,
and that's why you're seeing political apartheid
strategies taking place. We need to ensure our young people
are prepared to lead in 2045. We need to be prepared to
understand that the role of a democracy can be a
messy part of our lives, but it's a necessary
part of our lives. As a matter of fact,
Reverend C.T. Vivian, the late Reverend C.T. Vivian, who I see as a mentor who wrote
the foreword for this book, said, "Our democracy
is not the best. But it's the best we have." Therefore, when you go out
and think about the NAACP, think about the road
we've traveled. Stony, the road. And yet we stand tall. Cultural pride. Power and faith. Lift every vote. Thank you. [Applause]
