Departments

;

Alabama

  • SOURCE: New York Times
    9/19/2021

    Alabama Begins to Remove Racist Language from State Constitution

    The 1901 Alabama constitution explicitly declared its intention to preserve the power of "the Anglo-Saxon race." A committee is now preparing a version stripped of racist language which will go before the voters next year for ratification. 

  • SOURCE: Financial Times
    3/29/2021

    The Ultimate David and Goliath Fight in Alabama

    The effort to organize Amazon Workers in Bessemer, Alabama may succeed if it connects the cause of labor to broader civil rights issues that resonate with the local Black community and echo the involvement of Martin Luther King in struggles for workers and economic justice, say historians Keri Leigh Merritt and Michael Innis-Jiménez. 

  • SOURCE: Smithsonian
    3/23/2021

    Who Were the Scottsboro Nine?

    Paul Guardullo of the National Museum of African American History and Culture discusses the power dynamics in the 1931 south that made nine Black men vulnerable to a false rape accusation, and the way that the supporters of the Scottsboro Nine challenged unequal justice. 

  • SOURCE: Daily Beast
    3/22/2021

    How a Detective Who Was Blamed for One Lynching Solved Another

    Wilbur Williams was suspended for a 1976 incident of police brutality that evidence shows he wasn't involved in, and butted heads with the Mobile, Alabama political establishment. In 1981, he led a contentious investigation that led to the conviction of KKK members for a lynching that nearly tore the city apart. 

  • SOURCE: New York Times
    2/26/2021

    The Deep South Has a Rich History of Resistance, as Amazon Is Learning

    Columnist Jamelle Bouie draws on the work of historians Michael W. Fitzgerald, Paul Horton, Robin D.G. Kelley, and Robert Widell, Jr. which shows that Alabamians, and Black Alabamians in particular, have organized to fight both racial oppression and labor exploitation.

  • SOURCE: The Atlantic
    2/26/2021

    America’s Political Roots Are in Eutaw, Alabama

    "The terror campaign of 1870 ended the promise of Alabama’s brief Reconstruction era, allowing the so-called Redeemers to pry Alabama from the hands of reform. This was the critical juncture that led to the way things are."

  • SOURCE: New York Times
    2/26/2021

    Shelia Washington Dies at 61; Helped Exonerate Scottsboro Boys

    Shelia Washington read the story of the Scottsboro Boys as a teen, dedicated her life to preserving knowledge of their case, and finally spearheaded an effort that led the state of Alabama to exonerate the wrongly convicted men. 

  • SOURCE: The New Republic
    2/8/2021

    The Alabama Town That Could Defeat Jeff Bezos

    The industrial suburb of Bessemer has a long history as a rare center of union activity in the South and now is the focal point of an effort to organize Amazon's warehouse workers. Historian Robin D.G. Kelley, who has written about interracial labor militancy in Alabama, gives context. 

  • SOURCE: New York Times
    1/17/2021

    Tom Lankford, 85, Dies; Southern Journalist With Divided Loyalties

    Tom Lankford took many iconic photographs in Birmingham that publicized the cause of Civil Rights protestors. But he worked behind the scenes to cultivate relationships with the city's notorious Bull Connor to buttress the reputation of the police force while working with his publisher to squelch local demands for change that threatened the business community.