DOCSLIB.ORG

Chronicling a Half Century of Shared Struggle

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Chronicling a Half Century of Shared Struggle William Minter, Gail Hovey, Charles Cobb Jr., eds.. No Easy Victories: African Liberation and American Activists over a Half Century, 1950-2000. Trenton: Africa World Press, 2008. xvii + 248 pp. $29.95, paper, ISBN 978-1-59221-575-1. Reviewed by David Hostetter Published on H-SAfrica (April, 2008) The late Samora Machel, the frst president of The book's title comes from African indepen‐ independent Mozambique, asserted that "Interna‐ dence leader Amilcar Cabral, who said "Tell no tional solidarity is not an act of charity. It is an act lies; claim no easy victories." To that end, the book of unity between allies fghting on different ter‐ is organized into decade-specific chapters that rains for the same objective" (p. 200). The engage‐ cover American solidarity efforts from the ffties ment of Americans with African struggles against through the nineties. Co-editor William Minter colonialism and apartheid is the story of activists provides a valuable overview of American con‐ attempting to live up to Machel's maxim. The edit‐ nections with Africa in his introductory essay ti‐ ed volume No Easy Victories: African Liberation tled "An Unfinished Journey." Minter recounts his and American Activists, 1950-2000 endeavors to personal engagement with the continent while provide a "panoramic view" of a half century of analyzing the solidarity efforts of civil rights, reli‐ solidarity efforts for African independence and gious, labor, student, and left-wing activists. The against apartheid in South Africa. The editors, ac‐ underreported, underappreciated organizing of tivist-scholars William Minter, Gail Hovey, and the ffties, sixties, and seventies came to fruition Charles Cobb Jr., have crafted an account of U.S. in what Minter calls "the antiapartheid conver‐ activism that celebrates the strengths and ana‐ gence" of the eighties, which marked the zenith of lyzes the weaknesses of solidarity with Africa. The American-African solidarity and remains a re‐ book, much like the movement it recounts, is an markable accomplishment (p. 39). Minter's intro‐ ambitious coalition effort. The 8.5 by 11-inch pa‐ duction provides the context for the more special‐ perback combines a foreword by Nelson Mandela ized selections that round out the book. with analytical essays, interviews, personal state‐ The essays on each decade are written by a ments, documents from the movement, maps, and variety of authors, providing a rich variety of per‐ a rich array of photographs. spectives on the trials and triumphs of Africa-fo‐ cused activism. Each essay is accompanied by in‐ H-Net Reviews terviews with and profiles of activists from the to destroy the left-liberal alliance that had previ‐ decade described, providing important personal ously characterized the CAA. insights on the context and character of those During the forties Randolph and his allies suc‐ years. Historian Lisa Brock's contribution covers cessfully pressured President Franklin Roosevelt the ffties, when solidarity with the anti-apartheid to end discrimination by armament manufactur‐ movement began to gain notice. She deals with ers fulfilling defense contracts and compelled the divide between the Council on African Affairs President Harry Truman to end segregation in the (CAA) and the American Committee on Africa military. This record of achievement, along with (ACOA) that frst appeared in 1952. Brock states: the experience of Houser, Rustin, and Bill Suther‐ "ACOA did not give credit to or claim any continu‐ land in the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), is ity with the CAA. Silences in history speak as elo‐ reflected in the strategy and tactics later devel‐ quently as words, and this omission, given the oped by ACOA. ACOA's founders acted not out of times, may suggest if not outright anticommunism fear but from principled political disagreement on the part of ACOA, then at least fear of being as‐ and long-standing practical experience when they sociated with Communists" (p. 63). Brock follows rejected the invitation of Alphaeus Hunton, once her historical evaluation with profiles of George Max Yergan's ally in the National Negro Congress, Houser and Bill Sutherland, both founders of the to join with the CAA in demonstrating support for ACOA, and Charlene Mitchell of the Communist the Defiance Campaign. When it began to champi‐ Party USA, all of whom maintained their Africa- on sanctions and divestment ACOA built upon centered activism from the ffties through the Randolph's exemplary pursuit of concrete nineties. achievements against segregation in the United Brock's essay is interesting and well argued, States to support the anti-apartheid struggle. The but contains a silence of its own in regard to the militant resistance of the CAA and incremental re‐ reasons for the rift among the then small network form advocated by the ACOA would later be of activists concerned about Africa. ACOA's blended to produce a successful new movement founders were understandably leery of the Coun‐ not riven the by the divisions of the old left. cil on African Affairs' connections to the Commu‐ While No Easy Victories details the evolution nist Party (CP). Those who formed ACOA's an‐ of activist strategies, a more explicit analysis of tecedent, the Americans for South African Resis‐ the role of nonviolence is missing. This is unfortu‐ tance (AFSAR), in 1952 in order to support the De‐ nate because ACOA's support for the Defiance fiance Campaign in South Africa included A. Campaign arose in large part from the excitement Philip Randolph along with his protégés Bayard elicited among its founders by the application of Rustin and George Houser. Randolph had re‐ Gandhian methods to the fght against apartheid. signed the presidency of the National Negro Con‐ George Houser's 1953 pamphlet "Nonviolent Revo‐ gress in 1940 after the NCC had affiliated with La‐ lution in South Africa" expressed hope that the bor's Non-Partisan League, effectively aligning it nonviolent precedent set by the Defiance Cam‐ with the Communist Party during the period paign would spread throughout Africa and be‐ when the CP defended the Hitler-Stalin pact. Ran‐ yond. The grand plans of nonviolent activists in dolph's Communist-backed replacement was Max the ffties to build a pacifist international rooted Yergan, co-founder of the International Commit‐ in Africa were tempered by the 1960 massacre at tee on African Affairs, which in 1942 became the Sharpeville as well as the move away from nonvi‐ Council on African Affairs. Yergan's 1947 political olence by the frst wave of independent African about-face, when he turned to the right and be‐ leaders once they gained state power. Support for came an advocate of U.S. Cold War policy, helped 2 H-Net Reviews economic sanctions, advocated by the South ted by the mainstream media. In addition, Robert African liberation movement and adopted by in‐ Van Lierop recounts the production and distribu‐ ternational solidarity campaigners, took hold af‐ tion of his 1972 flm on Mozambique, A Luta Con‐ ter Sharpeville when the African National Con‐ tinua. These examples of grassroots media help‐ gress and its counterparts determined that nonvi‐ ing to build political movements offer inspira‐ olent resistance was no longer sufficient. tional models for activists to emulate in a time The ACOA, the Washington Office on Africa, when the technological options are more bounti‐ and TransAfrica as well as allied organizations ac‐ ful. tive on the local level are all examined. Another Of the many documents and commentaries group that fnally gets rightful recognition is the from movement participants, including Alphaeus American Friends Service Committee (AFSC). Hunton, Julian Bond, and Walter Rodney, the es‐ AFSC, arguably the most indispensable progres‐ say "How I Learned African History from Reggae" sive change organization in twentieth-century by Angela Marie Walters, a student of co-editor America, had a hand in many of the activist ef‐ Lisa Brock, stands out. Walters recounts growing forts dealing with Africa. The Service Committee up in New Mexico, isolated from Africa and made its frst connections in Southern Africa in African Americans yet connected to diasporic con‐ 1932. During that visit AFSC's delegates were host‐ cerns through the recorded works of musicians ed for a time by Max Yergan, then a Young Men's from Jamaica. Although brief mentions of the Christian Association (YMCA) official based in 1986 Sun City album and a section on Miriam South Africa. Despite many years of internal Makeba by Gail Hovey are included, popular cul‐ struggle over the efficacy of sanctions and divest‐ ture as a crucial venue for spreading and ment, as well as the challenge to pacifism posed strengthening support for Africa is not analyzed. by solidarity with liberation movements engaged It is important to remember that at the height in armed struggle, AFSC helped to foster the coop‐ of the anti-apartheid convergence, activists un‐ eration needed for a decentralized, locally led derstood that in order for Americans to be moved movement to be successful. Heretofore most his‐ to action an issue must gain media coverage and torians of anti-apartheid activism have under‐ then amplification through popular culture. The played the centrality of AFSC's contributions to 1984 Thanksgiving eve arrests and subsequent the anti-apartheid struggle. No Easy Victories year-long picketing of the South African embassy, helps to remedy this oversight by establishing that through which TransAfrica launched the Free the Service Committee, through its talented staff, South Africa Movement, stands as the textbook international network, and local U.S. offices, example of how to time and execute a demonstra‐ spread the message of the movement to many tion to maximize media coverage. Books, music, places that would otherwise not have been as con‐ and movies about apartheid proved elemental in nected to Africa's struggles.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Acoa 0 0 0 0
    AMERICAN COMMITrEE ON AFRICA - 198 Broadway * New York, N.Y. 10038 * (212) 962-1210 AMERICAN COMMITrEE ON AFRICA - 198 Broadway * New York, N.Y. 10038 * (212) 962-1210 A QUARTER CENTURY OF STRUGGLE By William Booth President, ACOA On July 1st, George M. Houser will retire from the American Committee on Africa, having served as executive director since 1955. Leadership will be handed on to his colleague of many years, research director Jennifer Davis. It gives me great pleasure to take this opportunity to recall George's achievements and to welcome Jennifer as the new director. George Houser arrived in Luanda this April the very day that the leaders of the Front Line States were meeting thereto discuss Namibia's future. He spent two hours with Angolan Foreign Minister Paulo Jorge the night before the Foreign Minister met with Chester Crocker, Assistant Secretary of Statedesignate for African Affairs. Being in the right place at the right time is something George Houser has been doing for more than twenty five years. He was in Addis Ababa in 1963 when the Organization of African Unity was founded, and in Ghana in 1954 and Zimbabwe in 1980 when important elections were held in those two countries. He attended the All African People's Conference in 1958, 1960, and 1961, meeting Patrice Lumumba, Tom Mboya, Kwame Nkrumah and many others. George met Nkrumah on his first trip to Africa in 1954, and ACOA helped sponsor a dinner in his honor in 1958 which was attended by 1100 people. Kenneth Kaunda and Julius Nyerere were among numerous other leaders who ACOA invited to the US to speak or assisted as they came to the UN to petition.
    [Show full text]
  • Poor Bedfellows: How Blacks and the Communism
    Poor Bedfellows: How Blacks and the Communist Party Grew Apart in the Post-War Era Jill Ferris November 30, 2007 Culture and Society in Cold War America Prof. Wall Ferris 2 The decade following the end of World War II is characterized by the building of the Cold War consensus. Virulently anti-Communist in nature, this consensus poised the nation in a moral battle against the Soviet Union. With the 1948 arrest and prosecution of eleven Communist leaders under the Smith Act, as well as well-publicized investigations conducted by the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) and later Senator Joseph McCarthy’s Government Operations Subcommittee on Investigations, the government fostered the development of the second “Red Scare” in the twentieth century. This decade also represents a complicated and challenging time within the historical context of the civil rights struggle. Many black veterans returned home from the war, only to find themselves shut out of veteran’s organizations like the American Legion and, in general, the post-war American dream. 1 Until 1954 when the landmark Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka case was decided by the U.S. Supreme Court, the civil rights movement was marked by small battles, successes and losses. Individuals and organizations struggled to define the movement within the new era and formulate a successful strategy to bring about significant change in the treatment of blacks in America. The combination of these two environments – strong anti-communist sentiment and a factional civil rights movement – created a challenging situation for the Communist Party’s relationship to the black community.
    [Show full text]
  • Radical Pacifism, Civil Rights, and the Journey of Reconciliation
    09-Mollin 12/2/03 3:26 PM Page 113 The Limits of Egalitarianism: Radical Pacifism, Civil Rights, and the Journey of Reconciliation Marian Mollin In April 1947, a group of young men posed for a photograph outside of civil rights attorney Spottswood Robinson’s office in Richmond, Virginia. Dressed in suits and ties, their arms held overcoats and overnight bags while their faces carried an air of eager anticipation. They seemed, from the camera’s perspective, ready to embark on an exciting adventure. Certainly, in a nation still divided by race, this visibly interracial group of black and white men would have caused people to stop and take notice. But it was the less visible motivations behind this trip that most notably set these men apart. All of the group’s key organizers and most of its members came from the emerging radical pacifist movement. Opposed to violence in all forms, many had spent much of World War II behind prison walls as conscientious objectors and resisters to war. Committed to social justice, they saw the struggle for peace and the fight for racial equality as inextricably linked. Ardent egalitarians, they tried to live according to what they called the brotherhood principle of equality and mutual respect. As pacifists and as militant activists, they believed that nonviolent action offered the best hope for achieving fundamental social change. Now, in the wake of the Second World War, these men were prepared to embark on a new political jour- ney and to become, as they inscribed in the scrapbook that chronicled their traveling adventures, “courageous” makers of history.1 Radical History Review Issue 88 (winter 2004): 113–38 Copyright 2004 by MARHO: The Radical Historians’ Organization, Inc.
    [Show full text]
  • 1 Cold War Contested Truth
    Cold War Contested Truth: Informants, Surveillance, and the Disciplining of Black Radicalism, 1947-1957 Charisse Burden-Stelly, PhD Africana Studies and Political Science Carleton College [email protected] (510) 717-9000 Introduction During the height of the era of McCarthyism, roughly 1947-1957, Black radicalism was surveilled, disciplined, discredited, and criminalized through a multitude of anticommunist technologies. These included “parallelism,” red-baiting, infiltration, and guilt by association. McCarthyism was constituted by a range of legislation meant to fortify the U.S. security state against the Communist threat, starting with the Foreign Agents Registration Act of 1938, and including the Alien Registration Act of 1940 (commonly known as the Smith Act); the Labor Management Relations Act of 1947 (often referred to as the Taft-Hartley Act); Executive Order 9835 of 1947 (the “Loyalty Order”) and its supersession by Executive Order 10450 in 1953; the Attorney General’s List of Subversive Organizations; and the Internal Security Act of 1950 (also known as the McCarran Act). It was under this legal architecture that scores of activists and scholars who defied Cold War statist pedagogy were indicted, deported, incarcerated, surveilled, and forced underground. This paper uses the examples of the the Peace Information Center (PIC) the Sojourners for Truth and Justice (STJ), and the Council on African Affairs (CAA) to elucidate that career confidential informants, “stool pigeons,” and “turncoats” were instrumental to the Cold War state apparatus’s transmogrification of Black radicals committed to anti-imperialism, anticolonialism, antiracism, peace, and the eradication of economic exploitation into criminals and subversives. Black 1 radicalism can be understood as African descendants’ multivalent and persistent praxis aimed at dismantling structures of domination that sustain racialized dispossession, exploitation, and class-based domination.
    [Show full text]
  • Jan Smuts, Howard University, and African American Leandership, 1930 Robert Edgar
    Ouachita Baptist University Scholarly Commons @ Ouachita Articles Faculty Publications 12-15-2016 "The oM st Patient of Animals, Next to the Ass:" Jan Smuts, Howard University, and African American Leandership, 1930 Robert Edgar Myra Ann Howser Ouachita Baptist University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarlycommons.obu.edu/articles Part of the African History Commons, Race, Ethnicity and Post-Colonial Studies Commons, and the United States History Commons Recommended Citation Edgar, Robert and Howser, Myra Ann, ""The osM t Patient of Animals, Next to the Ass:" Jan Smuts, Howard University, and African American Leandership, 1930" (2016). Articles. 87. https://scholarlycommons.obu.edu/articles/87 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Faculty Publications at Scholarly Commons @ Ouachita. It has been accepted for inclusion in Articles by an authorized administrator of Scholarly Commons @ Ouachita. For more information, please contact [email protected]. “The Most Patient of Animals, Next to the Ass:” Jan Smuts, Howard University, and African American Leadership, 1930 Abstract: Former South African Prime Minister Jan Smuts’ 1930 European and North American tour included a series of interactions with diasporic African and African American activists and intelligentsia. Among Smuts’s many remarks stands a particular speech he delivered in New York City, when he called Africans “the most patient of all animals, next to the ass.” Naturally, this and other comments touched off a firestorm of controversy surrounding Smuts, his visit, and segregationist South Africa’s laws. Utilizing news coverage, correspondence, and recollections of the trip, this article uses his visit as a lens into both African American relations with Africa and white American foundation work towards the continent and, especially, South Africa.
    [Show full text]
  • George Houser “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX
    THE REVEREND GEORGE MILLS HOUSER “NARRATIVE HISTORY” AMOUNTS TO FABULATION, THE REAL STUFF BEING MERE CHRONOLOGY Reverend George Houser “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX REVEREND GEORGE HOUSER GEORGE MILLS HOUSER 1916 June 2, Friday: George Mills Houser was born in Cleveland, Ohio to a Methodist missionary couple, the Reverend Otto Henry Houser and Ethel Mills Houser. He would be with his parents at Manila in the Philippine Islands and turn eight while the family was in London on its way back to the United States. Influenced by Henry David Thoreau and his theories on how to use nonviolent resistance to achieve social change, he would join the War Resisters League and in November 1940 while studying at Union Theological Seminary in New York become a war protestor, and join with other ministerial students in conscientious objection to draft registration. After release from the federal prison in Danbury, Connecticut with a felony record, he would find himself unwelcome at the Union Theological Seminary because he had in that principled stand somehow discredited this Christian institution, and would need to complete his ministerial training instead at the Theological Seminary in Chicago. NOBODY COULD GUESS WHAT WOULD HAPPEN NEXT Reverend George Houser “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX GEORGE MILLS HOUSER REVEREND GEORGE HOUSER 1924 George Mills Houser turned 8 while the family was in London, on its way back to the United States from an extended missionary tour at Manila in the Philippine Islands. LIFE IS LIVED FORWARD BUT UNDERSTOOD BACKWARD? — NO, THAT’S GIVING TOO MUCH TO THE HISTORIAN’S STORIES.
    [Show full text]
  • Herbert Shore Collection in Honor of Eduardo C
    HERBERT SHORE COLLECTION IN HONOR OF EDUARDO C. MONDLANE INVENTORY Subgroup I. Historical Files relating to Herbert Shore’s interests in the Arts and Culture Series 1. Council on the Arts, Culture, and Technology (TACT), 1962-63, 1971-84, 1991, n.d. (1 architectural drawing) Box 1 TACT General Information Aboriginal Culture, Aboriginal Art from Papunya, Central Australia, Dec. 12, 1977 Ad-hoc panel in view of the preparation of the Second World Conference on Cultural Policies, Dec. 15–19, 1980 Annual Report to U.S. NATCOM, Sept. 30, 1980 Art and Education, Mar. 5, 1971 Art and the Future, 1978-80 Art in a Technological Society, Report by Herbert Shore, 1980 Art in a Technological Society, Workshops, Jan 24-25, 1980 (4f) The Arts and the Technological Challenge, 1982 Desmond E. Berghofer, The Development of Educational Policy in the Context of Lifelong Learning: A Discussion Paper, Mar. 2, 1983 The Black Art Revolution in the United States and Its Possible Relevance to Africa, Report to the Ford Foundation by Ulli Beier, n.d. The Communications Explosion, (1972?) Correspondence, 1978-80 Cultural Development and Policies, 1975-82, n.d. Cultural Policy and Unesco, 1979-1981, n.d., (3f) Cultural Transformations and the Human Scale of Time and Space, Ludwik Bielawski, n.d. Cultural Values, n.d. Culture & Technology, 1978, 1982, n.d. (4f) Development of a New Instrument of Percussion –The Two-Manual Vibraphone, Ronald M. George, n.d. Economic Order, Moving Towards Change, 1976 Education, Department of, 1976-1983 (5f) Educational Film Center, Storytellers, 1977-1979 Educational Research. Mozambique, 1980, n.d.
    [Show full text]
  • Interview with George Houser
    Interview with George Houser "It was George Houser who introduced me to people who supported the African anti-colonial struggle. ... All of us who came to the United Nations or the United States during our campaigning for independence received help and encouragement from the ACOA." — Mwalimu Julius K. Nyerere, in the foreword to George M. Houser, No One Can Stop the Rain[1] "We always conceived our work as part and parcel of the civil rights struggle. ... The struggle in Africa was to us, as Americans, an extension of the battle on the home front." — George M. Houser, " The Struggle Never Ends," October 2003[2] Introduction For three decades, from the early 1950s through the 1970s, George Houser was the American name most familiar to leaders of African liberation movements seeking sympathetic contacts in the unfamiliar and generally unsympathetic context of Cold War America. This was not because the American Committee on Africa (ACOA, pronounced A-C-O- A), the organization he headed for those years, was large, powerful, or well known, or because it had access to the corridors of power. Nor was Houser himself a public figure attracting media attention. It was simply because they could count on Houser being there, and doing what he could. Born in 1916 in Ohio, Houser grew up first in the Philippines, where his parents were Methodist missionaries, and then in New York state, California, and Colorado, where his father was a Methodist pastor. As a student active in the National Council of Methodist Youth in the 1930s, he absorbed the activist message of the Social Gospel, with its strands of pacifism, socialism, support for organized labor, and, above all, opposition to racial discrimination.
    [Show full text]
  • Mary White Ovington Papers
    Mary White Ovington Collection Papers, 1854-1948 6.25 linear feet Accession # 323 OCLC# The papers of Mary White Ovington were placed in the Archives of Labor and Urban Affairs by Mrs. Carrie Burton Overton, Miss Ovington's secretary, in 1969, 1971 and 1973 and were opened for research in 1973. Mary White Ovington was born in Brooklyn in 1865.In 1895, after education in private schools and at Radcliffe College, she began a career as asocial worker. From 1904 on, she devoted herself to the particular problems of Negro populations in New York and other cities. In 1909 she participated in the founding of the NAACP. She remained an officer and prominent figure in the organization until her retirement in 1947. Miss Ovington was the author of several books and numerous articles. Her history of the NAACP, The Walls Came Tumbling Down, is in both the Archives Library and the Wayne State Purdy Library collections. Miss Ovington died in New York in 1951. Important subjects covered in the collection are: Unpublished autobiographical material by Miss Ovington Living conditions of the poor in New York City in the early 1900s Negroes in the American South in the early 1900s Foundation and growth of the NAACP The Civil Rights Movement, in general, up to 1947 Ovington family history, 1800-1948 Among the important correspondents are: (an index to the location of these letters will be found on the last page of the guide) Jane Addams Herbert Lehman Arna Bontemps Claude McKay Benjamin Cardozo Elmer Rice John White Chadwick Robert H. Schauffler LorenzaCole A.
    [Show full text]
  • Ictnrnln Untvpraitg College and Theological Seminary
    ICtnrnln Untvpraitg College and Theological Seminary Founded in DS5J THE OLDEST INSTITT'TION FOI! THE IIKJHEI! EDUCATION OF THE NE^KO. J* THE KIUST INSTITUTION NAMED FOR AlHiAIIAM LINCOLN Catalogue l!H<>-MH7 _ „ «*»»» * I'm- •' ""*•" 7 . LINCOLN UNIVERSITY IN 1014 CATALOGUE OF IGttwiltt lltmtrrBttg (JHjrHter (£mmtg, fpnna. SIXTY-SECOND YEAR 1916-1917 I'RKSS OF FERRIS & L E A C 1-1 JANUARY 1, 1917 <Eflttfrttt0 Calendar 5 PART I. The University 7 Board of Trustees of the University 7 Standing Committees of the Trustees 8 Faculty and Instructors of the University 9 Location of the University r t Needs of Lincoln University 14 The Alumni 21 PART II. The College 24 Faculty of the College 24 Courses and Degrees 24 Admission Requirements 25 Classification 3S Descriptio'n of the Courses of Instruction 46 PART III. The Theological Seminary 55 Faculty of the Theological Seminary 55 General Information 55 Admission Requirements 55 Schedule of Studies for the Seminary Year 1016-1017.. 6[ Names and Description of Courses 62 PART IV. Degrees, Honors, Catalogue of Students 60 Theological Degrees Conferred. 10,16 (>•, Theological Honors and Prizes for the Year 10,15-1916. • 6\> Academic Degrees Conferred, 1016 70 College Honors and Prizes for the Year 1915-1916 71 Honor Men 73 Students in the Theological Seminary 75 Students in the College 78 .^•N|/» . ^•^t/- . 1 ?g^ | 1017 \±qIPE Z 1017 ^r 1^1 i® ** feff1 t r JANUARY T JULY artT " JANUARY ' s n T w T F s s n T w T F s s n T W T F S • .
    [Show full text]
  • CC Spaulding & RR Wright
    W&M ScholarWorks Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects Theses, Dissertations, & Master Projects 2011 C.C Spaulding & R.R Wright---Companions on the Road Less Traveled?: A Reconsideration of African American International Relations in the Early Twentieth Century Brandon R. Byrd College of William & Mary - Arts & Sciences Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.wm.edu/etd Part of the African American Studies Commons, African History Commons, and the United States History Commons Recommended Citation Byrd, Brandon R., "C.C Spaulding & R.R Wright---Companions on the Road Less Traveled?: A Reconsideration of African American International Relations in the Early Twentieth Century" (2011). Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects. Paper 1539626667. https://dx.doi.org/doi:10.21220/s2-pqyd-mg78 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Theses, Dissertations, & Master Projects at W&M ScholarWorks. It has been accepted for inclusion in Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects by an authorized administrator of W&M ScholarWorks. For more information, please contact [email protected]. C.C. Spaulding & R.R. Wright - Companions on the Road Less Traveled? A Reconsideration of African American International Relations in the Early Twentieth Century Brandon R. Byrd Raleigh, North Carolina Bachelor of Arts, Davidson College, 2009 A Thesis presented to the Graduate Faculty of the College of William and Mary in Candidacy for the Degree of Master of Arts Department of History The College of William and Mary January, 2011 APPROVAL PAGE This Thesis is submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts Brandon Ron Approved by the Committee, October, 2010 « w ~ Frances L.
    [Show full text]
  • The Wesleyan Witness in the U.S. Civil Rights Movement: the Allen Legacy Against 20Th Century American Apartheid
    THE WESLEYAN WITNESS IN THE U.S. CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT: THE ALLEN LEGACY AGAINST 20TH CENTURY AMERICAN APARTHEID Dennis C. Dickerson James M. Lawson, Jr. Professor of History Vanderbilt University & Historiographer, African Methodist Episcopal Church In an address to the 1960 World Methodist Council in Oslo, Norway Archibald J. Carey, Jr., a pastor in the African Methodist Episcopal Church and a practicing attorney in Chicago, Illinois, focused on activists in the burgeoning civil rights movement whose religious witness drew from Wesleyan theology and praxis.1 Those whom he specifically mentioned from his denomination understood their role as derivative from Richard Allen, who challenged Methodism and America in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, to establish justice and equality in both church and society. Carey, a confidante to the young Martin Luther King, Jr. and a federal appointee fighting employment discrimination, believed that he and others were emulating Allen through their participation in contemporary civil rights struggles. I propose to tackle in this paper two interrelated issues. How did Carey and other Wesleyan clergy and lay understand the relationship between Methodism and societal change as pursued in this growing national crusade? How did they envisage Wesleyan theology and praxis and its application to the civil rights movement? Though the Allen legacy greatly informed and shaped the activism of such stalwarts as Carey, A. Philip Randolph, the militant labor leader, Oliver L. Brown of Brown decision fame, Rosa Parks, the Montgomery bus boycott heroine, and others, their praxis seemed tangential to the institutional behavior of the A.M.E. Church, the religious body to which they belonged.
    [Show full text]