theblackbottom

By STEVEN GREENHOUSE
Published: October 25, 2012
DETROIT — Tired of battling legislative efforts to roll back union rights in state after state, organized labor is trying a new strategy: going on the offense. The first target is Michigan, the cradle of the United Auto Workers and a bastion of union power.
Michigan’s unions are asking voters to [...]

The whole world opened to me when I learned to read~Mary McCleod Bethune
Once you learn how to read, you will be forever free!~Frederick Douglass
REVIEW
Fredrick C. Harris is Professor of Political Science and the Director of the Institute for Research in African-American Studies at Columbia University. He is the triple award [...]

Source: Colorlines.com
Wisconsin was considered the state with the strictest photo voter ID law, until yesterday when Judge David Flanagan ordered a temporary injunction on the law until an upcoming trial determines if the law should be scrapped permanently. The lawsuit, brought by the NAACP and immigration rights group Voces de la Frontera, was [...]

If You Learn How To Read, You Will Be Forever Free!~Frederick Douglass
REVIEW Laurent DuBois is the Marcello Lotti Professor of Romance Studies and History at Duke University and the Director of the Center for French and Francophone Studies, and Co-Director of the Haiti Lab at the Franklin Humanities Institute. He is a specialist on the [...]

In a fiery summons to an important voting block, President Barack Obama told blacks on Saturday to quit crying and complaining and “put on your marching shoes” to follow him into battle for jobs and opportunity.
And though he didn’t say it directly, for a second term, too.
Obama’s speech to the annual awards dinner of the [...]

The state of Mississippi has the most black elected officials in the country. Mississippi’s Black population is roughly 30-35% of the total population. Yet, Mississippi has not elected any of these individuals to statewide office. The politics of Mississippi has been contentious and brutal regarding race. Whatever happens in the general election this November Mr. [...]

Broadly speaking there has been two social movements in the United States since the end of World War II, the Civil Rights Movement (CRM) and the Conservative Political Movement (CPM). And for the last sixty plus years these two movements have struggled against one another politically to define the culture and politics of the United [...]

Kilpatrick taking deposits on upcoming book of prison memoirs
Source: Mike Wilkinson/ The Detroit News
It cost just 50 cents to get the first glimpse into the scandal that brought down Kwame Kilpatrick.
Now Kilpatrick wants his turn — and he’s looking for $26.95 to “pre-order” a copy of his life story, “Surrendered: The Rise and Fall and [...]

Once You Learn How to Read, You Will Be Forever Free!~Frederick Douglass
REVIEW T.J. English is a noted journalist, screenwriter, and author of the New York Times bestsellers Havana Nocturne and Paddy Whacked, as well as The Westies, a national bestseller, and Born to Kill, which was nominated for an Edgar Award. He has written [...]

PATSY MINK: AHEAD OF THE MAJORITY explores the remarkable political story of Patsy Takemoto Mink, an Asian American woman from Hawai‘i who, battling racism and sexism, redefined American politics.
Small in stature but a giant in vision, she began her life on a Maui sugar plantation and rose to become the first Asian American woman and [...]