Are Fredom Riders Seeds Bearing Fruit? By Julianne Malveaux Fifty years ago this month, the Freedom Rides began. While the Supreme Court ruled that segregation in interstate commerce, including bus terminals, was illegal, the laws were not being enforced. Because the law failed to act, people of conscience, courage and determination acted instead. Resistance to […]
We Have to Raise the Debt Ceiling By Julianne Malveaux A recent Gallup poll found that 47 percent of all Americans oppose raising the debt ceiling. Only 19 percent support raising the ceiling past its current $12.1 trillion dollar limit. The remainder of us say we don’t know enough about the debt ceiling to have an opinion. […]
History Hostages By Julianne Malveaux History belongs to she who holds the pen. When the lion is writing, he ate. When the prey is writing (but she didn’t survive) she was eaten but also offered a valiant fight. We celebrate our holidays and milestones through the lens of those who won the war, not through […]
DEBILITATING POVERTY IS CORROSIVE BY JULIANNE MALVEAUX The fall of the Roman Empire is best captured in the phrase that “Nero fiddled while Rome burned”. Set on pursuing his own pleasures and indulgences, Nero could not see the walls crumbling around him. Similarly, our leaders seem oblivious to the walls crashing in on us, bickering about the way […]
Republicans have adopted hate as a potent and politically divisive tactic.
When I first became active in the Civil Rights Movement as a teenager in Youngstown, Ohio, January 1st was always a very important day in the Black community — not because it was the first day of a new year, but it was Emancipation Day. Every year the Interdenominational Ministerial Alliance and the local Chapter of the NAACP would host a major program commemorating the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation by President Abraham Lincoln on January 1, 1863. This was celebrated as a momentous occasion because with a stroke of a pen, President Lincoln freed enslaved Africans from bondage. Certainly a just cause for celebration! What was never noted in the Emancipation Day Programs was that the Proclamation did not “free” all of the 4 million enslaved Africans.
Most Americans have been enjoying the holiday haze since House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) folded and allowed the two-month extension of unemployment insurance and the Social Security tax cut, and other key matters. Indeed, if the French take the month of August off by law, we almost do the same in the period between Christmas and New Year. Except for retail establishments that support the great American pastime – shopping…
One of the greatest triumphs of the Black Power, Black Nationalist and Black Consciousness movements of the 60’s and 70’s was the widespread embrace of the Nguzo Saba, The Seven Principles of the Black Value System, and Kwanzaa, the African American holiday created by Dr. Maulana Karenga. As an authentic genius and master teacher, a fundamental tenet of Dr. Karenga’s thought is that “the key crisis in Black life is…
Most parents of college students look forward to December, when their students come home for the holidays. Some are so excited to see their offspring home that they actually come to their colleges to pick them up. Others prepare special treats and goodies as an antidote to the oft complained about cafeteria food. Robert and Pam Champion won’t have that opportunity. Their son, Robert, died on November 19. His death…
Our rhetoric does not match the reality of our children in harm’s way
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