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free men, women, and children in Richmond, Va., 1865

Calling on white Americans: Reparations for slavery are due

By Editors' Choice, Reparations

The legacy of slavery is far from resolved. It persists every day and everywhere. By David Gardinier and Karen Hilfman, The Boston Globe — Since the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis by a white police officer, and the resounding anti-racist uprisings around the world, the concept of reparations has picked up momentum in national conversations and has sparked new public curiosity and interest. Among Black people and their ancestors,…

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Kamala Harris

The Hoopla Over the Kamala Harris VP Selection Obscures the Many Young People of Color Who Are Winning Offices Nationally

By Commentaries/Opinions

By Sonali Kolhatkar, Independent Media Institute — Joe Biden’s pick of Senator Kamala Harris (D-CA) as his running mate for the 2020 Democratic presidential ticket has generated strong responses. While many Democrats are elated at the idea of seeing a brown-skinned woman of Indian and Jamaican heritage in such a position, progressives are debating one another about Harris’ mixed record on bread-and-butter issues such as criminal justice reform, foreign policy,…

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Robert Vane

Racism scarred Jim Crow-era Black Americans. Here’s why they deserve reparations

By Editors' Choice, Reparations

African Americans born during the 20th-century Jim Crow era were promised all the freedoms and rights of the white Americans, but instead languished in the torture chamber of racism and state-sponsored bigotry. By Robert Vane — One of the most meaningful and impactful initiatives in our country is the Honor Flight program. It flies veterans to Washington, D.C., to visit the memorials and brings tears to all who witness it.

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The Red, Black and Green Universal African Flag

The Red, Black & Green: Fly the Flag and Fight for the Exoneration of Marcus Garvey

By Vantage Point Articles

Vantage Point Articles & Essays By Dr. Ron Daniels (Originally Published July 2015) — August 17 will mark the 128th birthday of the Honorable Marcus Mosiah Garvey, the visionary Jamaican-born leader who built the Universal Negro Improvement Association and African Communities League (UNIA-ACL) into the largest mass movement for liberation in the history of Africans in America and perhaps the world!…

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A civil rights marcher suffering from exposure to tear gas holds an unconscious Amelia Boynton Robinson after mounted police officers attacked marchers in Selma, Ala., as they were beginning a 50-mile march to Montgomery to protest race discrimination in voter registration.

The Voting Rights Act was signed 55 years ago. Black women led the movement behind it.

By Commentaries/Opinions

By N’dea Yancey-Bragg, USA Today — In March of 1965, Amelia Boynton Robinson walked with hundreds of other protesters across the Edmund Pettus Bridge. Boynton Robinson, who planned the march from Selma to the Alabama capital of Montgomery along with Rev. C.T. Vivian and others, was struck with a baton by Alabama state troopers that day. “They came from the right, the left, the front and started beating people,” she told The Crisis, the official magazine of the NAACP, in…

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Glover, right, and author Ta-Nehisi Coates

History of affirmative action policies show how white people have benefitted

By Editors' Choice

By Christiana Best-Giacomini, Hartford Courant — When most Americans hear “affirmative action,” they often think the phrase is referring to a policy that protects African Americans. What many Americans don’t know is that affirmative actions are policies that were made by white people, to benefit white people, exclusively. Moreover, due to the insidious nature of how these policies and practices are integrated into American institutions and culture, white people continue…

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Amandla Baraka: We Keep Us Safe, June 2020

‘We Must Act Out Our Freedom’

By Editors' Choice

By Darryl Pinckney, NYREV — I will look for you in the stories of new kings. Juneteenth isn’t mentioned in the writings of W.E.B. Du Bois or Carter Woodson, the founder of The Journal of Negro History. I haven’t yet come across a description of the first Juneteenth celebrations equivalent to Colonel Thomas Wentworth Higginson’s report of the ceremonies for the Emancipation Proclamation as it was read aloud on Port Royal…

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