The History Book Club discussion
CIVIL RIGHTS
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CIVIL RIGHTS - INTRODUCTION
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Civil liberties are typically associated with those freedoms listed in the U.S. Bill of Rights. Some scholars refer to them as "negative freedoms," that is, freedom construed as "freedom from government." The Bill of Rights was added to the U.S. Constitution as a practical political compromise between Federalists and Anti-federalists. For the most part, the Bill of Rights only protected individuals in their relationship to the U.S. government, not state governments. The Bill of Rights was not intended to apply to states, but the U.S. Supreme Court overturned this interpretation in Gitlow v. United States (1925). Gitlow did not "incorporate" all of the freedoms, but rather began a process in which the Court "selectively incorporated" those freedoms into the 14th amendment guarantee of "due process," that is, applying to states. Furthermore, unlike civil rights (below), civil liberties do not typically restrict the actions of private persons, only government.Civil rights, on the other hand, are typically viewed as based on the "Civil War amendments," that is the 13th (abolition), 14th (citizenship) and 15th (voting) amendments. Whereas the Bill of Rights stated that "Congress shall make no law..." the Civil War amendments gave Congress "the power to implement" these amendments through appropriate legislation. Put differently, the Bill of Rights restricted the power of Congress and the Civil War amendments expanded the power of Congress.
Unlike civil liberties, which some refer to as "negative freedoms," civil rights are often referred to as "positive freedoms." That is, civil rights legislation authorizes the government to create those conditions whereby people can be free. Furthermore, and in distinction to civil liberties, which restricted the power of Congress, the Civil War amendments restrict the power of state governments and private property owners to deny persons due process and equal protection of the laws. Those civil rights that restrict discrimination by private persons are few and narrowly construed, namely, employment, education, housing, public accommodations, voting, and banking.
Finally, those classifications that are "protected" by the U.S. Constitution are few in number: race, religion, and national origin. Gender is "semi-protected" by the Constitution and has less protection than race or religion. All other means and manner of classifying persons are not protected by the Constitution, but may be unlawful if they are "unreasonable" or unrelated to a "legitimate public purpose."
I am curious how you classify gender as "semi-protected" by the Constitution. What about the 19th Amendment?
I don't classify gender as "semi-protected," the U.S. Supreme Court classifies it as such.I am a strong supporter of affording "gender" and "sexual orientation" Constitutional protection. Unfortunately, I do not sit on the U.S. Supreme Court. (I'm still expecting a call from Mr. Obama, but I think he has misplaced my telephone number!)
The 19th amendment only concerns voting rights. I was among those who championed the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), which failed to obtain the necessary number of state ratifications.
I am also terribly embarrassed to be a resident of California, whose voters approved Proposition 209. Among other things, Prop. 209 denied "semi-protection" to gender, relegating the classification to "unprotected" status.
Women and lesbians/gays/bisexuals/transsexuals (LGBT) deserve Constitutional protection, in my personal opinion. As I say, I'm waiting for my telephone call from Mr. Obama.
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Too often the role of women in the civil rights movement is either overlooked or, ironically, segregated and categorized as strictly being part of the women's movement. Here is a book that addresses the role of women in the civil rights movement.
by Davis W. HouckHistorians have long agreed that women--black and white--were instrumental in shaping the civil rights movement. Until recently, though, such claims have not been supported by easily accessed texts of speeches and addresses. With this first-of-its-kind anthology, Davis W. Houck and David E. Dixon present thirty-nine full-text addresses by women who spoke out while the struggle was at its most intense.
Beginning with the Brown decision in 1954 and extending through the Voting Rights Act of 1965, the editors chronicle the unique and important rhetorical contributions made by such well-known activists as Ella Baker, Fannie Lou Hamer, Daisy Bates, Lillian Smith, Mamie Till-Mobley, Lorraine Hansberry, Dorothy Height, and Rosa Parks. They also include speeches from lesser-known but influential leaders such as Della Sullins, Marie Foster, Johnnie Carr, Jane Schutt, and Barbara Posey.
Nearly every speech was discovered in local, regional, or national archives, and many are published or transcribed from audiotape here for the first time. Houck and Dixon introduce each speaker and occasion with a headnote highlighting key biographical and background details. The editors also provide a general introduction that places these public addresses in context. Women and the Civil Rights Movement, 1954-1965 gives voice to stalwarts whose passionate orations were vital to every phase of a movement that changed America.
This looks interesting:Political Process and the Development of Black Insurgency, 1930-1970
by Doug McAdamSynopsis
In this classic work of sociology, Doug McAdam presents a political-process model that explains the rise and decline of the black protest movement in the United States. Moving from theoretical concerns to empirical analysis, he focuses on the crucial role of three institutions that foster protest: black churches, black colleges, and Southern chapters of the NAACP. He concludes that political opportunities, a heightened sense of political efficacy, and the development of these three institutions played a central role in shaping the civil rights movement. In his new introduction, McAdam revisits the civil rights struggle in light of recent scholarship on social movement origins and collective action.
"[A] first-rate analytical demonstration that the civil rights movement was the culmination of a long process of building institutions in the black community."—Raymond Wolters, Journal of American History
"A fresh, rich, and dynamic model to explain the rise and decline of the black insurgency movement in the United States."—James W. Lamare, Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science
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Disposable People: New Slavery in the Global Economy, Revised Edition, With a New Preface
by
Kevin BalesSynopsis;
Slavery is illegal throughout the world, yet more than twenty-seven million people are still trapped in one of history's oldest social institutions. Kevin Bales's disturbing story of contemporary slavery reaches from Pakistan's brick kilns and Thailand's brothels to various multinational corporations. His investigations reveal how the tragic emergence of a "new slavery" is inextricably linked to the global economy. This completely revised edition includes a new preface.
All of the author's royalties from this book go to fund antislavery projects around the world.
Justice: Faces of the Human Rights Revolution
by Mariana Cook (no photo)Synopsis:
New York-based photographer Mariana Cook is known for her character studies of persons both in and out of the public eye. Among her previous bestselling photobooks are "Mathematicians," "Faces of Science," "Mothers and Sons" and "Fathers and Daughters." Her latest collection introduces us to some of the women and men who are the faces of the human rights revolution, among them former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, the 39th American President Jimmy Carter, Archbishop Desmond Tutu and the Burmese democracy activist Aung San Suu Kyi. Cook traveled the world to photograph and interview her subjects, and the accompanying texts--some written by the subjects themselves, others edited from interviews with them--share their insights into the nature and importance of human rights, and their reasons for devoting themselves to that cause. Through them we are reminded of the power of a single individual--one face, one voice--to transform the world. These human rights pioneers seek no personal gain: any rewards are the benefits that we all enjoy when the rule of democratic law protects us. The pictures and the words in this book show the strength of human character that has made human rights such a powerful movement across the world in our lifetime.
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Obama at Selma: What It Was Like to Be There
by Will Bevis (no photo)Synopsis:
This Story is for all those who have ever wanted to see President Obama in person but couldn't.
It tells what it was actually like to be there among the 50,000 or so other people
That day, March 7th, 2015,
when the first Black President of the United States of America
came to speak at the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama.
I was there, and I tell you what we had to go through
to try to be as close as we could...
to the current most powerful man in the world...
I was lucky enough to be able to make the trip...
As a writer...
I wan't to share the experience with those who wanted to be there...
But couldn't be.
I hope you enjoy it.
Will Bevis
Gadsden, Alabama
March 12th, 2015
Freedom Riders: 1961 and the Struggle for Racial Justice
by Raymond Arsenault (no photo)Synopsis:
The saga of the Freedom Rides is an improbable, almost unbelievable story. In the course of six months in 1961, four hundred and fifty Freedom Riders expanded the realm of the possible in American politics, redefining the limits of dissent and setting the stage for the civil rights movement. In this new version of his encyclopedic Freedom Riders, Raymond Arsenault offers a significantly condensed and tautly written account. With characters and plot lines rivaling those of the most imaginative fiction, this is a tale of heroic sacrifice and unexpected triumph. Arsenault recounts how a group of volunteers--blacks and whites--came together to travel from Washington DC through the Deep South, defying Jim Crow laws in buses and terminals and putting their lives on the line for racial justice. News photographers captured the violence in Montgomery, shocking the nation and sparking a crisis in the Kennedy administration. Here are the key players--their fears and courage, their determination and second thoughts, and the agonizing choices they faced as they took on Jim Crow--and triumphed.
Rights Gone Wrong: How Law Corrupts the Struggle for Equality
by
Richard Thompson FordSynopsis:
A New York Times Notable Book for 2011 Since the 1960s, ideas developed during the civil rights movement have been astonishingly successful in fighting overt discrimination and prejudice. But how successful are they at combating the whole spectrum of social injustice—including conditions that aren’t directly caused by bigotry? How do they stand up to segregation, for instance—a legacy of racism, but not the direct result of ongoing discrimination? It’s tempting to believe that civil rights litigation can combat these social ills as efficiently as it has fought blatant discrimination.
In Rights Gone Wrong, Richard Thompson Ford, author of the New York Times Notable Book The Race Card, argues that this is seldom the case. Civil rights do too much and not enough: opportunists use them to get a competitive edge in schools and job markets, while special-interest groups use them to demand special privileges. Extremists on both the left and the right have hijacked civil rights for personal advantage. Worst of all, their theatrics have drawn attention away from more serious social injustices.
Ford, a professor of law at Stanford University, shows us the many ways in which civil rights can go terribly wrong. He examines newsworthy lawsuits with shrewdness and humor, proving that the distinction between civil rights and personal entitlements is often anything but clear. Finally, he reveals how many of today’s social injustices actually can’t be remedied by civil rights law, and demands more creative and nuanced solutions. In order to live up to the legacy of the civil rights movement, we must renew our commitment to civil rights, and move beyond them.
The Black Calhouns: From Civil War to Civil Rights with One African American Family
by
Gail Lumet BuckleySynopsis:
In The Black Calhouns, Gail Lumet Buckley—daughter of actress Lena Horne—delves deep into her family history, detailing the experiences of an extraordinary African-American family from Civil War to Civil Rights.
Beginning with her great-great grandfather Moses Calhoun, a house slave who used the rare advantage of his education to become a successful businessman in post-war Atlanta, Buckley follows her family’s two branches: one that stayed in the South, and the other that settled in Brooklyn.
Through the lens of her relatives’ momentous lives, Buckley examines major events throughout American history. From Atlanta during Reconstruction and the rise of Jim Crow, to New York City during the Harlem Renaissance, and then from World War II to the Civil Rights Movement, this ambitious, brilliant family witnessed and participated in the most crucial events of the 19th and 20th centuries.
Combining personal and national history, The Black Calhouns is a unique and vibrant portrait of six generations during dynamic times of struggle and triumph.
Little Rock Girl 1957: How a Photograph Changed the Fight for Integration
by
Shelley TougasSynopsis:
Nine African American students made history when they defied a governor and integrated an Arkansas high school in 1957. It was the photo of one of the nine trying to enter the school a young girl being taunted, harassed and threatened by an angry mob that grabbed the worlds attention and kept its disapproving gaze on Little Rock, Arkansas. In defiance of a federal court order, Governor Orval Faubus called in the National Guard to prevent the students from entering all white Central High School. The plan had been for the students to meet and go to school as a group on September 4, 1957. But one student, Elizabeth didn't, didnt hear of the plan and tried to enter the school alone. A chilling photo by newspaper photographer Will Counts captured the sneering expression of a girl in the mob and made history. Years later Counts snapped another photo, this one of the same two girls, now grownup, reconciling in front of Central High School.
Building a Latino Civil Rights Movement: Puerto Ricans, African Americans, and the Pursuit of Racial Justice in New York City
by Sonia Song Lee (no photo)Synopsis:
In the first book-length history of Puerto Rican civil rights in New York City, Sonia Lee traces the rise and fall of an uneasy coalition between Puerto Rican and African American activists from the 1950s through the 1970s. Previous work has tended to see blacks and Latinos as either naturally unified as "people of color" or irreconcilably at odds as two competing minorities. Lee demonstrates instead that Puerto Ricans and African Americans in New York City shaped the complex and shifting meanings of "Puerto Rican-ness" and "blackness" through political activism. African American and Puerto Rican New Yorkers came to see themselves as minorities joined in the civil rights struggle, the War on Poverty, and the Black Power movement--until white backlash and internal class divisions helped break the coalition, remaking "Hispanicity" as an ethnic identity that was mutually exclusive from "blackness." Drawing on extensive archival research and oral history interviews, Lee vividly portrays this crucial chapter in postwar New York, revealing the permeability of boundaries between African American and Puerto Rican communities.
Don't let that intimidating title stop you. This is actually a very readable book that details efforts by women in the early 20th century to reform the nation's approach to care for women and children in the areas of labor laws, public health, education and politics. And other than occasional necessary dips into detailed statistics, it flows nicely and is as entertaining as it is informative.It starts with Jane Addams' Hull House in Chicago and the national network of women that grew from that to run the Children's Bureau and other organizations for twenty years. It examines the successes of these reformers as well as legitimate criticism of their methods in certain areas.
It isn't quite about civil rights for women, but it does cover efforts by women to gain some say in the nation, especially in the era before they gained the vote.
by Robyn Muncy (no photo)
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KAREN GRIGSBY GATES August 25, 2013
One of the must-read books about the civil rights movement is The Story of Ruby Bridges, about one of the first black children to integrate a New Orleans school in 1960. AP
If you've been browsing bookstores this summer, you'll probably notice there are, in some places, whole tables devoted to books about the civil rights movement. The 50th anniversary of the March on Washington has focused national attention on movement history and most everything related to it.
Here at NPR, we've been doing our bit with a series called The Summer of '63, which looks at a number of pivotal moments in the evolution of the movement. In addition to broadcast stories and a lot of interesting work on the Web (blogs, commentary, even photographs), there's a wonderful selection of movement-related music.
And then there are the books. This is a partial compilation of my personal list, and I'm re-reading some of them over the summer, for obvious reasons. Here is some of what I've pulled from my library:
Parting the Waters: America in the King Years 1954-1963.Over the years, historian Taylor Branch has given us a splendid three-part biography of Martin Luther King Jr. in the civil rights movement. Parting the Waters is the first of the trilogy and my favorite of the three. It traces King as a young, somewhat uncertain minister through the growing momentum of the movement, and culminates in King's triumphant speech at the March on Washington. (The next two books — Pillar of Fire, which covers 1963-1965, and At Canaan's Edge, 1965-1968 — trace the challenges King faces as the movement morphs from the initial challenges of desegregation to tackle issues of endemic poverty and the war in Vietnam.)
Henry Hampton, the visionary behind the Eyes on the Prize series, wrote Voices of Freedom with Eyes writer Steve Fayer. This tells the movement's story in the words of its participants, from the famous to the obscure.
Lynne Olson was a journalist for years and says she became interested in the women of the civil rights movement "because you didn't often hear much about them beyond, say, Rosa Parks." Freedom's Daughters traces women's involvement in equal rights from the antebellum period through the beginnings of the Black Power movement. Reading it, you start to see why Olson believes "the civil rights movement would not have gotten off the ground without its women. They were the movement's engine."
The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, or SNCC, was peopled by young folk — kids in college and just beyond, mostly, but also some high-schoolers. Decisions were arrived at by consensus, and work was done jointly. So it makes sense that Hands on the Freedom Plow: Personal Accounts By Women in SNCC is co-edited by six SNCC women. It's a compilation of stories from 52 women who worked in SNCC to register black voters. The tales are heroic and harrowing and sometimes funny. Especially moving are the remembrances of work of brave women who worked alongside SNCC students, guiding them around the pitfalls of social activism in the segregated south.
Coming of Age in Mississippi has been required reading in many a high school or college history class, and with good reason: Anne Moody faithfully chronicles daily life in the Mississippi Delta in the '40s and '50s, and gives readers an unvarnished look at the feudal system that allowed agriculture to flourish in so much of the rural South, and makes us understand why so many Delta families took the extraordinary risk of participating in the struggle for equal rights. As a local Delta organizer said once: "We didn't worry about losing nothing because we didn't have nothing to lose." Told without drama, hysteria or embellishment, Coming of Age never fails to get its readers to close the book with one word: wow.
The Watsons Go To Birmingham — 1963, by Christopher Paul Curtis. When the furnace gives out, it's the last straw for the Watsons of Flint, Mich. As they sit, freezing, in their icebox of a living room, with layers of sweaters and piled with blankets, the family, prodded by their Alabama-born mother, makes the decision to take a trip south, toward grandma and warmth. They stay longer than originally anticipated and it gives author Christopher Paul Curtis the chance to mix a fair amount of history into this wonderful novel, which remains a young reader's favorite. (Michele Norris chose it as one of her first Back Seat Book Club selections) and which received the coveted awards, including the Newberry Honor Award and the Coretta Scott King Award.
The Story of Ruby Bridges, by Robert Coles, illustrated by George Ford. Psychiatrist Robert Coles, who spent much of his career studying the lives of children and how they are affected by various issues, such as race and poverty, has written a moving account of school desegregation from a child's point of view. Six-year-old Ruby Bridges was one of the first black children to integrate a New Orleans school in 1960 — an ordeal that has traumatized many people far older than she. Her equanimity and bravery shine through. The anniversary edition has an afterword by the Ruby herself, who is now a grandmother.
Other:
by
Taylor Branch
by Henry Hampton (no photo)
by
Lynne Olson
by Faith S. Holsaert (no photo)
by
Anne Moody
by
Christopher Paul Curtis
by
Robert ColesSource: National Public Radio
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By Minnesota Public Radio
Link: https://www.npr.org/podcasts/52875225...
Genre: News & Politics
Why You Should Listen: The documentary podcast aired last summer during the trial of Jeronimo Yanez, the police officer who shot and killed Philando Castile in 2016. Riham Feshir and Jon Collins, two reporters at Minnesota’s MPR News, chronicle the life of the victim, then the officer, before delving into a second-by-second account of what took place the night of the shooting. This is local journalism at its best. The first four episodes in particular add depth to understanding an important case.
Episode to Get Hooked on: “1: The Driver”
Source: Time and Apple
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Alex HaleySynopsis:
History of the slave trade and pre-integration America
When he was a boy in Henning, Tennessee, Alex Haley's grandmother used to tell him stories about their family—stories that went back to her grandparents, and their grandparents, down through the generations all the way to a man she called "the African." She said he had lived across the ocean near what he called the "Kamby Bolongo" and had been out in the forest one day chopping wood to make a drum when he was set upon by four men, beaten, chained and dragged aboard a slave ship bound for Colonial America.
Still vividly remembering the stories after he grew up and became a writer, Haley began to search for documentation that might authenticate the narrative. It took ten years and a half a million miles of travel across three continents to find it, but finally, in an astonishing feat of genealogical detective work, he discovered not only the name of "the African"--Kunta Kinte—but the precise location of Juffure, the very village in The Gambia, West Africa, from which he was abducted in 1767 at the age of sixteen and taken on the Lord Ligonier to Maryland and sold to a Virginia planter.
Haley has talked in Juffure with his own African sixth cousins. On September 29, 1967, he stood on the dock in Annapolis where his great-great-great-great-grandfather was taken ashore on September 29, 1767. Now he has written the monumental two-century drama of Kunta Kinte and the six generations who came after him—slaves and freedmen, farmers and blacksmiths, lumber mill workers and Pullman porters, lawyers and architects—and one author.
But Haley has done more than recapture the history of his own family. As the first black American writer to trace his origins back to their roots, he has told the story of 25,000,000 Americans of African descent. He has rediscovered for an entire people a rich cultural heritage that slavery took away from them, along with their names and their identities. But Roots speaks, finally, not just to blacks, or to whites, but to all people and all races everywhere, for the story it tells is one of the most eloquent testimonials ever written to the indomitability of the human spirit.
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by Frances Fox Piven (no photo)Piven and Cloward have updated their classic work on the history and function of welfare to cover the American welfare state's massive erosion during the Reagan, Bush, and Clinton years.
The authors present a boldly comprehensive, brilliant new theory to explain the comparative underdevelopment of the U.S. welfare state among advanced industrial nations.
Their conceptual framework promises to shape the debate within current and future administrations as they attempt to rethink the welfare system and its role in American society.
Reviews and Interviews:
"Uncompromising and provocative. . . . By mixing history, political interpretation and sociological analysis, Piven and Cloward provide the best explanation to date of our present situation . . . no future discussion of welfare can afford to ignore them."
—Peter Steinfels, The New York Times Book Review
"Regulating the Poor is a classic. Piven and Cloward bring a lot of historical evidence to bear in this book, in making a straightforward argument. Their main contention is that welfare systems play a political function.
These systems don’t just exist because we’re good people who want to help those in need, although that’s part of it. They also serve a social control function.
Piven and Cloward lay out a cyclical description of how the generosity of social welfare policies have waxed and waned. When there is discord on the horizon, when it looks like folks in poverty are going to be reacting to their economic insecurity in socially disorderly ways—as was the case in the 1960s—policy benefits get more generous. That helps regulate the poor, it keeps them from reacting in a way that might necessitate more fundamental political change. But when the political front is quiet, we cycle back to a less generous system in order to position people to be useful in the labor market.
This is a descriptive account, but the broader point that Piven and Cloward assert is that social welfare policy is not only about goodwill and general principles, it is also about continual attempts by the state to control lower income populations. This is a controversial contention. But Piven and Cloward provoked political scientists to grapple with it. That is why this book is important.
What does the comparative underdevelopment of the American welfare system tell us about the contentions made by Piven and Cloward?
The primary reason for regulating the poor, as far as Piven and Cloward are concerned, is to support the market economy and maintain social order. When we need more labourers in the market, we pull back welfare benefits and we get people who are willing to take any job. While I think there is much truth to their contentions, there are other reasons for regulating poor people. One of those reasons is that, in the US, poor people are disproportionately black and Latino; they’re racial ‘others.’
Historically, this points to reasons beyond the economic for motivating the public and political elites in the US to want to ensure that they can control and take punitive measures against not just poor people in general, but against poor people of colour in particular. To the extent that the UK and other western welfare states are more generous, one of the main differentiating factors is race.
But that is only part of the story. There is a substantial literature around comparative welfare states that traces why the United States welfare state is underdeveloped." -- Interview with Jamila Michener, assistant professor of government at Cornell University at FiveBooks
More: https://fivebooks.com/best-books/jami...
Source: FiveBooks
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Suzanne Mettler“Keep your government hands off my Medicare!” Such comments spotlight a central question animating Suzanne Mettler’s provocative and timely book: why are many Americans unaware of government social benefits and so hostile to them in principle, even though they receive them?
The Obama administration has been roundly criticized for its inability to convey how much it has accomplished for ordinary citizens.
Mettler argues that this difficulty is not merely a failure of communication; rather it is endemic to the formidable presence of the “submerged state.”
In recent decades, federal policymakers have increasingly shunned the outright disbursing of benefits to individuals and families and favored instead less visible and more indirect incentives and subsidies, from tax breaks to payments for services to private companies.
These submerged policies, Mettler shows, obscure the role of government and exaggerate that of the market.
As a result, citizens are unaware not only of the benefits they receive, but of the massive advantages given to powerful interests, such as insurance companies and the financial industry.
Neither do they realize that the policies of the submerged state shower their largest benefits on the most affluent Americans, exacerbating inequality.
Mettler analyzes three Obama reforms—student aid, tax relief, and health care—to reveal the submerged state and its consequences, demonstrating how structurally difficult it is to enact policy reforms and even to obtain public recognition for achieving them.
She concludes with recommendations for reform to help make hidden policies more visible and governance more comprehensible to all Americans.
The sad truth is that many American citizens do not know how major social programs work—or even whether they benefit from them.
Suzanne Mettler’s important new book will bring government policies back to the surface and encourage citizens to reclaim their voice in the political process.
Reviews:
“The Submerged State is a vitally important analysis for anyone who has bemoaned the inertia and inequities of modern US politics.”-- (Times Higher Education)
“[I]nformative [and] engaging. . . . This is an important, well-reasoned, welcome volume. Highly recommended.”-- (D. R. Imig Choice)
“Mettler demonstrates convincingly that the submerged state perpetuates economic inequality as well as confusion, ignorance, and apathy. The average citizen would benefit greatly if, as far as possible, Mettler’s prescriptions for the reduction of the submerged state were to be effected.” -- (Ursula Hackett Oxonian Review)
“Important and provocative.” -- (Jeffery A. Jenkins, University of Virginia Congress & the Presidency)
“Why do Americans find government so baffling and irritating—even though many of us depend on public programs for a secure retirement, an affordable mortgage, or a college loan?
In this timely and important book, political scientist Suzanne Mettler explains how the United States has come to rely on hidden, indirect policies that privilege special interests but puzzle regular citizens. American democracy can do better, and she shows how. Politicians and the public alike have much to learn from her brilliant and engaging analysis.” -- (Theda Skocpol, Harvard University)
“Americans want government policies to be transparent, straightforward, and fair, but many social programs are confusing and opaque and shower benefits disproportionately on the well-to-do. In this timely, penetrating, and highly readable book, Suzanne Mettler illuminates the hidden government benefits and subsidies that comprise our ‘submerged state’ and demonstrates how its murky operation impairs democratic practice and weakens civic engagement.”--(Eric M. Patashnik, University of Virginia)
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by Frances Fox Piven (no photo)Synopsis:
Have the poor fared best by participating in conventional electoral politics or by engaging in mass defiance and disruption? The authors of the classic Regulating The Poor assess the successes and failures of these two strategies as they examine, in this provocative study, four protest movements of lower-class groups in 20th century America:
-- The mobilization of the unemployed during the Great Depression that gave rise to the Workers' Alliance of America
-- The industrial strikes that resulted in the formation of the CIO
-- The Southern Civil Rights Movement
-- The movement of welfare recipients led by the National Welfare Rights Organization
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by Frances Fox Piven (no photo)Synopsis:
Piven and Cloward have updated their classic work on the history and function of welfare to cover the American welfare state's massive erosion during the Reagan, Bush, and Clinton years. The authors present a boldly comprehensive, brilliant new theory to explain the comparative underdevelopment of the U.S. welfare state among advanced industrial nations. Their conceptual framework promises to shape the debate within current and future administrations as they attempt to rethink the welfare system and its role in American society.
"Uncompromising and provocative. . . . By mixing history, political interpretation and sociological analysis, Piven and Cloward provide the best explanation to date of our present situation . . . no future discussion of welfare can afford to ignore them."
--Peter Steinfels, The New York Times Book Review
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by St. Clair Drake (no photo)Synopsis:
Ground-breaking when first published in 1945, Black Metropolis remains a landmark study of race and urban life. Based on a mass of research conducted by Works Progress Administration field workers in the late 1930s, it is a historical and sociological account of the people of Chicago's South Side, the classic urban ghetto. Drake and Cayton's findings not only offer a generalized analysis of black migration, settlement, community structure, and black-white race relations in the early part of the twentieth century, but also tell us what has changed in the last hundred years and what has not. This edition includes the original Introduction by Richard Wright and a new Foreword by William Julius Wilson.
"Black Metropolis is a rare combination of research and synthesis, a book to be deeply pondered. . . . No one who reads it intelligently can ever believe again that our racial dilemma can be solved by pushing buttons, or by gradual processes which may reach four or five hundred years into the future."—Bucklin Moon, The Nation
"This volume makes a great contribution to the building of the future American and the free world."—Louis Wirth, New York Times
"By virtue of its range, its labor and its insight, the book seems certain to become a landmark not only in race studies but in the broader field of social anthropology."—Thomas Sancton, New Republic
Award:
Anisfield-Wolf Book Award for Nonfiction (1946)
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William Julius WilsonSynopsis:
"The Truly Disadvantaged should spur critical thinking in many quarters about the causes and possible remedies for inner city poverty. As policy makers grapple with the problems of an enlarged underclass they—as well as community leaders and all concerned Americans of all races—would be advised to examine Mr. Wilson's incisive analysis."—Robert Greenstein, New York Times Book Review
"'Must reading' for civil-rights leaders, leaders of advocacy organizations for the poor, and for elected officials in our major urban centers."—Bernard C. Watson, Journal of Negro Education
"Required reading for anyone, presidential candidate or private citizen, who really wants to address the growing plight of the black urban underclass."—David J. Garrow, Washington Post Book World
Selected by the editors of the New York Times Book Review as one of the sixteen best books of 1987.
Award:
Winner of the 1988 C. Wright Mills Award of the Society for the Study of Social Problems.
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by Jason DeParle (no photo)Synopsis:
Bill Clinton's drive to "end welfare" sent 9 million women and children streaming from the rolls.
In this masterful work, New York Times reporter and two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist Jason DeParle cuts between the mean streets of Milwaukee and the corridors of Washington to produce the definitive account.
As improbable as fiction, and equally fast-paced, this classic of literary journalism has captured the acclaim of the Left and Right.
At the heart of the story are three cousins, inseparable at the start but launched on differing arcs.
Leaving welfare, Angie puts her heart in her work. Jewell bets on an imprisoned man. Opal guards a tragic secret that threatens her kids and her life. DeParle traces back their family history six generations to slavery, and weaves poor people, politicians, reformers, and rogues into a spellbinding epic.
At times, the very idea of America seemed on trial: we live in a country where anyone can make it, yet generation after generation some families don't.
Washington Post: "Riveting... like a searing novel of urban realism -
Theodore Dreiser comes to Milwaukee." Chicago Tribune:
"Sweeping scope and dramatic detail worthy of Charles Dickens."
Award:
Helen Bernstein Book Award for Excellence in Journalism (2005)
Mod
by
Michelle AlexanderSynopsis:
"Jarvious Cotton's great-great-grandfather could not vote as a slave. His great-grandfather was beaten to death by the Klu Klux Klan for attempting to vote.
His grandfather was prevented from voting by Klan intimidation; his father was barred by poll taxes and literacy tests.
Today, Cotton cannot vote because he, like many black men in the United States, has been labeled a felon and is currently on parole."
As the United States celebrates the nation's "triumph over race" with the election of Barack Obama, the majority of young black men in major American cities are locked behind bars or have been labeled felons for life.
Although Jim Crow laws have been wiped off the books, an astounding percentage of the African American community remains trapped in a subordinate status--much like their grandparents before them.
In this incisive critique, former litigator-turned-legal-scholar Michelle Alexander provocatively argues that we have not ended racial caste in America: we have simply redesigned it. Alexander shows that, by targeting black men and decimating communities of color, the U.S. criminal justice system functions as a contemporary system of racial control, even as it formally adheres to the principle of color blindness.
The New Jim Crow challenges the civil rights community--and all of us--to place mass incarceration at the forefront of a new movement for racial justice in America.
The History Book Club
Books mentioned in this topic
Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America (other topics)White Fragility: Why It's So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism (other topics)
The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness (other topics)
American Dream: Three Women, Ten Kids, and a Nation's Drive to End Welfare (other topics)
The Truly Disadvantaged: The Inner City, the Underclass, and Public Policy (other topics)
More...
Authors mentioned in this topic
Ibram X. Kendi (other topics)Robin DiAngelo (other topics)
Michelle Alexander (other topics)
Jason DeParle (other topics)
William Julius Wilson (other topics)
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What are Civil Rights
"Civil rights" are the rights of individuals to receive equal treatment (and to be free from unfair treatment or "discrimination") in a number of settings -- including education, employment, housing, and more -- and based on certain legally-protected characteristics.
Historically, the "Civil Rights Movement" referred to efforts toward achieving true equality for African-Americans in all facets of society, but today the term "civil rights" is also used to describe the advancement of equality for all people regardless of race, sex, age, disability, national origin, religion, or certain other characteristics.
Where Do Civil Rights Come From?
Most laws guaranteeing and regulating civil rights originate at the federal level, either through federal legislation, or through federal court decisions (such as those handed down by the U.S. Supreme Court). States also pass their own civil rights laws (usually very similar to those at the federal level), and even municipalities like cities and counties can enact ordinances and laws related to civil rights.
Civil Rights" vs. "Civil Liberties"
"Civil rights" are different from "civil liberties." Traditionally, the concept of "civil rights" has revolved around the basic right to be free from unequal treatment based on certain protected characteristics (race, gender, disability, etc.), while "civil liberties" are more broad-based rights and freedoms that are guaranteed at the federal level by the Constitution and other federal law.
What is Discrimination?
In plain English, to "discriminate" means to distinguish, single out, or make a distinction. In everyday life, when faced with more than one option, we discriminate in arriving at almost every decision we make. But in the context of civil rights law, unlawful discrimination refers to unfair or unequal treatment of an individual (or group) based on certain characteristics, including:
Age
Disability
Ethnicity
Gender
Marital status
National origin
Race,
Religion, and
Sexual orientation.
Lawful vs. Unlawful Discrimination
Not all types of discrimination will violate federal and/or state laws that prohibit discrimination. Some types of unequal treatment are perfectly legal, and cannot form the basis for a civil rights case alleging discrimination. The examples below illustrate the difference between lawful and unlawful discrimination.
Example 1: Applicant 1, an owner of two dogs, fills out an application to lease an apartment from Landlord. Upon learning that Applicant 1 is a dog owner, Landlord refuses to lease the apartment to her, because he does not want dogs in his building. Here, Landlord has not committed a civil rights violation by discriminating against Applicant 1 based solely on her status as a pet owner. Landlord is free to reject apartment applicants who own pets.
Example 2: Applicant 2, an African-American man, fills out an application to lease an apartment from Landlord. Upon learning that Applicant 2 is an African-American, Landlord refuses to lease the apartment to him, because he prefers to have Caucasian tenants in his building. Here, Landlord has committed a civil rights violation by discriminating against Applicant 2 based solely on his race. Under federal and state fair housing and anti-discrimination laws, Landlord may not reject apartment applicants because of their race.
Where Can Discrimination Occur?
Federal and state laws prohibit discrimination against members of protected groups (identified above) in a number of settings, including:
Education
Employment
Housing
Government benefits and services
Health care services
Land use / zoning
Lending and credit
Public accommodations (Access to buildings and businesses)
Transportation
Voting
Anti-Discrimination Laws
Most laws prohibiting discrimination, and many legal definitions of "discriminatory" acts, originated at the federal level through either:
Federal legislation, like the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1992. Other federal acts (supplemented by court decisions) prohibit discrimination in voting rights, housing, extension of credit, public education, and access to public facilities.
OR
Federal court decisions, like the U.S. Supreme Court case Brown v. Board of Education, which was the impetus for nationwide racial desegregation of public schools. Other Supreme Court cases have shaped the definition of discriminatory acts like sexual harassment, and the legality of anti-discrimination remedies such as affirmative action programs.
Today, most states have anti-discrimination laws of their own which mirror those at the federal level. For example, in the state of Texas, Title 2 Chapter 21 of the Labor Code prohibits employment discrimination. Many of the mandates in this Texas law are based on Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the federal law making employment discrimination unlawful.
Municipalities within states (such as cities, counties, and towns) can create their own anti-discrimination laws or ordinances, which may or may not resemble the laws of the state itself. For example, a city may pass legislation requiring domestic partner benefits for city employees and their same-sex partners, even though no such law exists at the state level.
Source: FindLaw
http://public.findlaw.com/civil-right...