Civil Rights
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Ole Miss Riot
On Oct. 1, 1962 Mississippi University admitted James Meredith; their first black student. This Federally ordered act of integration resulted in a violent mob riot on the campus. Two people were killed and hundreds injured. Mississippi had segregationist laws that Governor Ross Barnett tried to uphold despite President Kennedy’s order to obey the federal law against segregation. The fight to preserve James Meredith’s civil right to attend the University of Mississippi is sometimes referred to as “the last battle of the Civil War”. Learn more about the facts and people involved.
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Remembering Rosa Parks
It was 58 years ago today Dec. 1, 1955 on a city bus in Montgomery, Alabama that Rosa Parks, an NAACP member, bravely refused to move to the back of the bus. She refused to allow a white man to have her seat on the bus. We often imagine that one individual citizen of the United States, cannot make a difference. We give up before even trying believing that without large sums of money and powerful political backing it is an impossibility for our simple effort to succeed. Thankfully we have the remarkable example of Rosa Parks. She reminds us of the power one person has to make a stand against social injustice. Her single act of…
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I Have a Dream
Martin Luther King’s Speech: ‘I Have a Dream’ – The Full Text By The Rev. MARTIN LUTHER KING Jr. Aug. 28, 1963— abcnews.go.com The Full Text of the Famous Speech by America’s Greatest Civil Rights Icon I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation. Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a…
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The Eve of a Public Holiday Honoring Martin Luther King Jr.
Patti Smith, in her award winning book Just Kids, wrote on page 66 “That spring, only days before Palm Sunday, Martin Luther King was gunned down at the Lorraine Hotel in Memphis.” I read that sentence, just now, and remembered that tomorrow will be Martin Luther King Day. The coincidence struck me as sufficient enough, that I should stop reading and instead write about why we honor this man so many years after his execution on April 4, 1968 ; he was only 39 years old when he died. There are many reasons why we honor this heroic African American. I will choose one instance as an example of his heroism and influence.…
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Historical Revolutions
Revolutions throughout history have been fought by those seeking freedom from the crushing hand of their despotic rulers. More recently there are the extraordinary pro-democracy rebellions in the Middle East, referred to as Arab Spring, where revolts against years of oppression are breaking out. One of the first and most drastic outcries of Arab Spring against the oppression in the Middle East was in 2010, when a Tunisia man chose to burn himself to death in protest of his ill treatment by the police. Historical Revolutions The American Revolution (1775-1783) The Haitian Revolution (1794-1804) The French Revolution (1789-1799) The Russian Revolution (1917) The 1956 Hungarian Revolution The Cuban Revolution (1956-1959) The…