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Will Americans Lose Their Right to Vote in the Pandemic?

By Editors' Choice

The safest way to cast a ballot will very likely be by mail. But with opposition from the president, limited funding and time running out, will that option be available? By Emily Bazelon, NYT — In March, as a wave of states began delaying their spring primaries because of the coronavirus, Wisconsin’s election, scheduled for April 7, loomed. The ballot for that day included the presidential primary, thousands of local…

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Rev. Joseph Lowery with Rosa Parks

Undaunted Resistance: Joseph Lowery and the Spirit of SCLC

By Editors' Choice

By R. Drew Smith, AAIHS — Against all odds, a movement for racial justice took hold in mid-20th-century America, emerging from within the racially-heated South, and drawing sustenance from a rich-array of Black religious sources. A cadre of activist Black clergypersons were among the central figures in this historic social movement, with organizations such as the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) epitomizing the promise of a socially-mobilized Black clergy sector. Although SCLC…

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BP oil spill

After wrecking the Gulf, Big Oil is worsening the COVID-19 crisis

By Editors' Choice

By Sue Sturgis, Facing South — This week marked a decade since the Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling rig exploded in the Gulf of Mexico 40 miles off the Louisiana coast, killing 11 workers and injuring 17 others and triggering the worst oil spill in U.S. history. From the initial blast on April 20, 2010, until the well was sealed four months later, 200 million gallons of crude oil poured into Gulf waters…

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Thomas Massie of Kentucky and Georgia House Speaker David Ralston

The GOP fight against voting by mail

By COVID-19 (Coronavirus), Editors' Choice

By Benjamin Barber, Facing South — Earlier this month, after Wisconsin’s Republican-led legislature refused to allow an expansion of mail-in voting, GOP officials and judges forced the state’s voters to choose between casting their ballot and risking their health during the coronavirus lockdown. Milwaukee health officials have already identified seven people who have contracted the coronavirus because of in-person voting during the April 7 state primary. Voters were also forced to endure difficult…

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John Marshall High School, in Milwaukee, on election day.

Selma 1965, Wisconsin 2020: Multiracial Democracy vs. A White Republic

By Editors' Choice

By Max Elbaum, Organizing Upgrade — I have never been prouder of the people of my home state than over the last twelve days. I went to John Marshall High School in Milwaukee, class of 1964. It was after coming home from school one day that I watched on television as non-violent Civil Rights protesters were attacked with dogs and fire hoses in Birmingham, Alabama. A few weeks after I…

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Meharry's students and staff have worked together to conduct drive-thru testing and screening for the coronavirus. Meharry Medical College

Black scientists hope to begin testing antiviral drug for coronavirus in two weeks

By COVID-19 (Coronavirus), Editors' Choice

Meharry Medical College President James Hildreth has been advocating for advanced or pre-emptive screening in black neighborhoods for weeks. By Curtis Bunn, NBC News — Meharry Medical College was founded in 1876 in Nashville, Tennessee, to teach medicine to former enslaved Africans and to serve the underserved. Now, in one of its laboratories, a scientist says he is two weeks away from testing an anti-virus to prevent COVID-19, the disease…

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This image is found on the M4BL COVID-19 demands webpage.

The Antidote to COVID-19 is the Movement for Black Lives Policy Platform of Demands

By COVID-19 (Coronavirus), Editors' Choice

By White People 4 Black Lives (WP4BL) — Amidst the upheaval of the COVID-19 pandemic, the national Movement for Black Lives (M4BL) has put forth a set of urgent policy demands. White People 4 Black Lives wholeheartedly endorses M4BL’s policy demands, and we pledge to fight for them — and against, in the words of M4BL’s platform preamble,the “the tragic and unnecessary theft and loss of Black life.” As white people, we…

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