The Communist Party was the only political movement on the left in the late 1920s and 1930s to place racial justice and equality at the top of its agenda and to seek, and ultimately win, sympathy among African Americans. This historic effort to fuse red and black offers a rich vein of experience and constitutes the theme of The Cry Was Unity. Utilizing for the first time materials related to African Americans from the Moscow archives of the Communist Inter-national (Comintern), The Cry Was Unity traces the trajectory of the black-red relationship from the end of World War I to the tumultuous 1930s. From the just-recovered transcript of the pivotal debate on African Americans at the 6th Comintern Congress in 1928, the book assesses the impact of the Congress’s declaration that blacks in the rural South constituted a nation within a nation, entitled to the right of self-determination. Despite the theory’s serious flaws, it fused the black struggle for freedom and revolutionary content and demanded that white labor recognize blacks as indispensable allies. As the Great Depression unfolded, the Communists launched intensive campaigns against lynching, evictions, and discrimination in jobs and relief and opened within their own ranks a searing assault on racism. While the Party was never able to win a majority of white workers to the struggle for Negro rights, or to achieve the unqualified support of the black majority, it helped to lay the foundations for the freedom struggle of the 1950s and 1960s. The Cry Was Unity underscores the successes and failures of the Communist-led left and the ways in which it fought against racism and inequality. This struggle comprises an important missing page that needs to be returned to the nation’s history. Mark Solomon, an emeritus professor at Simmons College, is the author of Red and Black: Communism and Afro-Americans, 1929-1935, Death Waltz to Armageddon: E. P. Thompson and the Peace Movement, and Stopping World War II (with Michael Myerson).

Editor: Melanie E. L. Bush - Foreword: Robin D. G. Kelley Co-editors: Rose M. Brewer, Daniel Douglas, Loretta Chin, Robert Newby Series Editor: Mohammad H. Tamdgidi Roderick Douglas Bush (1945–2013) was a scholar, educator, mentor, activist and a loving human being. In reflecting on his life well-lived, the contributors in Rod Bush: Lessons from a Radical Black Scholar on Liberation, Love, and Justice share insightful lessons from his life and works on how to effect liberation and radical social transformation in the everyday practices of scholarship, teaching, activism, and personal interaction through a loving spirit dedicated to social justice. Rod Bush was deeply convinced that “Pan-European racism is the Achilles’ heel of the modern world-system, and the demographic situation of the United States, with its large, strategically located populations of color, is a key locus of struggle for a more just, democratic, and egalitarian world order.” This book shows by the example of Rod Bush how one can “be the change”—through a commitment to everyday practices and personal transformations that embody, enable, embrace, and engage global social change. This anthology provides deep reflections on the question of how one can live radical principles in contemporary times. What does it mean to be human? How does one embed love and justice in one’s worldview and daily practice? Rod Bush, partner, colleague, teacher, mentor, comrade, and friend, was well known as an activist scholar who incorporated his values into his teaching, mentorship and everyday interactions. Therefore, his theoretical interests and practical involvements in movements are intimately linked and simultaneous. In his foreword, Robin D. G. Kelley shares his intimate views of Rod Bush’s life and works. In his view, Rod’s “commitment to study and struggle in the service of human liberation knew no boundaries. His vision was planetary. He wrote critically and brilliantly about Black radical movements—here and abroad—and about the destructive power of racism, colonialism, capitalism (the modern world-system), all with the goal of transforming a society based on exploitation, subjugation, and war into a society rooted in mutual benefit, life, and love.” At a historical moment when the political landscape is fraught with volatility, and the Movement for Black Lives and other struggles for dignity and justice gain increasing momentum, Rod’s life serves as an example, providing many lessons that we can draw from and practice ourselves. Rod consistently asserted that it is critical to recognize the historical leadership of those involved in struggles for Black Liberation and justice writ large. For, a vision for Black Lives is indeed a vision that benefits all humanity. The anthology is edited by Melanie E. L. Bush and co-edited by Rose M. Brewer, Daniel Douglas, Loretta Chin, and Robert Newby. Contributors include: Robin D. G. Kelley (Foreword), Angelo Taiwo Bush, Chriss Sneed, Daniel Douglas, Godfrey Vincent, Matthew Birkhold, Loretta Chin, Latoya A. Lee, Tatiana Chichester, A. Kia Sinclair, Mojúbàolú Olufúnké Okome, Natalie P. Byfield, Komozi Woodard, Bob Barber, Rodney D. Coates, Charles “Cappy” Pinderhughes, Jr., James V. Fenelon, Walda Katz-Fishman, Jerome Scott, Rose M. Brewer, Robert Newby, Roderick D. Bush, and Melanie E. L. Bush. The anthology is a volume (XII, 2019) in the Edited Collection Series of Human Architecture: Journal of the Sociology of Self-Knowledge, edited by Mohammad H. Tamdgidi. Endorsements “One look at the list of contributors to this compendium with its diverse assembly of scholars, and I knew that Rod Bush’s lessons would be fully absorbed and explicated. I only wish I could have spent more time with him and been a beneficiary of his immense insights on love, liberation and justice. Rod would be proud of the commentaries and the thoughtful devotion of the editors.” — Herb Boyd, writer, activist, and academic, most recently author of Black Detroit — A People’s History of Self-Determination and the forthcoming Black Panther Film: Paradigm Shift or Not? An Anthology co-edited with Haki Madhubuti “Though–sadly–not a household name, when the history of his era is written, undoubtedly the immense intellectual and political contributions of Rod Bush will not only be acknowledged but also celebrated. The volume at hand gives an indication of why this is so.” — Gerald Horne, author, The Apocalypse of Settler Colonialism: The Roots of Slavery, White Supremacy and Capitalism in 17th Century North America and the Caribbean “This is a brilliant collection of essays by notable engaged scholars celebrating the life and work of Rod Bush, as a whole forming a textual critique of Bush’s essential research, theory, and writing. It elucidates the most important decolonial movements of our time, including race, class and gender, Black internationalism, Black nationalism and Native American struggles, social justice, and more. Other essays reveal the beauty and ethical stance of the man himself. The book is a treasure that social science and humanities instructors will find invaluable as a teaching text.” — Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, professor-emerita, author of An Indigenous Peoples History of the United States, and Loaded: A Disarming History of the Second Amendment “Rod Bush was a most remarkable person. He started out as my student, and became my friend and collaborator. Rod mixed first-class scholarship with first-class activism. He became a model for all of us. We shall miss him dearly. The way to honor him is to emulate him. We can all learn from him.” — Immanuel Wallerstein, Senior Research Scholar, Yale University, author of The Modern World-System I-IV, and The World-System and Africa “This volume is not only a welcome tribute to a deep thinker, talented organizer, outstanding teacher, and a caring, compassionate human being. It is also a rich tapestry of insights, stories and images that inspires us to keep pushing until everyone — everyone — lives in a world of peace, justice and freedom.” — Max Elbaum, author of Revolution in the Air: Sixties Radicals Turn to Lenin, Mao and Che

A major new history of the literary traditions, oral and print, of African-descended peoples in the United States.

Economic inequalities have been perhaps the most enduring problem facing African Americans since the civil rights movement, despite the attention they have received from activists. Although the civil rights movement dealt successfully with injustices like disenfranchisement and segregated public accommodations, economic disparities between blacks and whites remain sharp, and the wealth gap between the two groups has widened in the twenty-first century. The Economic Civil Rights Movement is a collection of thirteen original essays that analyze the significance of economic power to the black freedom struggle by exploring how African Americans fought for increased economic autonomy in an attempt to improve the quality of their lives. It covers a wide range of campaigns ranging from the World War II era through the civil rights and black power movements and beyond. The unfinished business of the civil rights movement primarily is economic. This book turns backward toward history to examine the ways African Americans have engaged this continuing challenge.

In Framing a Radical African Atlantic Holger Weiss presents a critical outline and analysis of the International Trade Union Committee of Negro Workers (ITUCNW) and the attempts by the Communist International (Comintern) to establish an anticolonial political platform in the Caribbean and Sub-Saharan Africa during the interwar period. It is the first presentation about the organization and its activities, investigating the background and objectives, the establishment and expansion of a radical African (black) Atlantic network between 1930 and 1933, the crisis in 1933 when the organization was relocated from Hamburg to Paris, the attempt to reactivate the network in 1934 and 1935 and its final dissolution and liquidation in 1937-38.

This book presents a re-evaluation of the objectives and actions of the 'Tar Heel Reds' from the 1920s to the 1960s. The author argues that, contrary to widely held belief, they were not a threat to national security, nor were they beholden to the Soviet Union and that their aims are now accepted parts of the national consensus.

Jim Crow refers to a set of laws in many states, predominantly in the South, after the end of Reconstruction in 1877 that severely restricted the rights and privileges of African Americans. As a caste system of enormous social and economic magnitude, the institutionalization of Jim Crow was the most significant element in African American life until the 1960s Civil Rights Movement led to its dismantling. Racial segregation, as well as responses to it and resistance against it, dominated the African American consciousness and continued to oppress African Americans and other minorities, while engendering some of the most important African American contributions to society. This major encyclopedia is the first devoted to the Jim Crow era. The era is encapsulated through more than 275 essay entries on such areas as law, media, business, politics, employment, religion, education, people, events, culture, the arts, protest, the military, class, housing, sports, and violence as well as through accompanying key primary documents excerpted as side bars. This set will serve as an invaluable, definitive resource for student research and general knowledge. The authoritative entries are written by a host of historians with expertise in the Jim Crow era. The quality content comes in an easy-to-access format. Readers can quickly find topics of interest, with alphabetical and topical lists of entries in the frontmatter, along with cross-references to related entries per entry. Further reading is provided per entry. Dynamic sidebars throughout give added insight into the topics. A chronology, selected bibliography, and photos round out the coverage. Sample entries include Advertising, Affirmative Action, Armed Forces, Black Cabinet, Blues, Brooklyn Dodgers, Bolling v. Sharpe, Confederate Flag, Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), Detroit Race Riot 1943, Ralph Ellison, Eyes on the Prize, G.I. Bill, Healthcare, Homosexuality, Intelligence Testing, Japanese Internment, Liberia, Minstrelsy, Nadir of the Negro, Poll Taxes, Rhythm and Blues, Rural Segregation, Sharecropping, Sundown Towns, Booker T. Washington, Works Project Administration, World War II.

Realities of the street-level American Communist experience during the worst years of the Depression "Red Chicago" is a social history of American Communism set within the context of Chicago's neighborhoods, industries, and radical traditions. Using local party records, oral histories, union records, party newspapers, and government documents, Randi Storch fills the gap between Leninist principles and the day-to-day activities of Chicago's rank-and-file Communists. Uncovering rich new evidence from Moscow's former party archive, Storch argues that although the American Communist Party was an international organization strongly influenced by the Soviet Union, at the city level it was a more vibrant and flexible organization responsible to local needs and concerns. Thus, while working for a better welfare system, fairer unions, and racial equality, Chicago's Communists created a movement that at times departed from international party leaders' intentions. By focusing on the experience of Chicago's Communists, who included a large working-class, African American, and ethnic population, this study reexamines party members' actions as an integral part of the communities in which they lived and the industries where they worked. "A volume in the series The Working Class in American History, edited by David Brody, Alice Kessler-Harris, David Montgomery, and Sean Wilentz"

If you were an independent, adventurous, liberated American woman in the 1920s or 1930s where might you have sought escape from the constraints and compromises of bourgeois living? Paris and the Left Bank quickly come to mind. But would you have ever thought of Russia and the wilds of Siberia? This choice was not as unusual as it seems now. As Julia L. Mickenberg uncovers in American Girls in Red Russia, there is a forgotten counterpoint to the story of the Lost Generation: beginning in the late nineteenth century, Russian revolutionary ideology attracted many women, including suffragists, reformers, educators, journalists, and artists, as well as curious travelers. Some were famous, like Isadora Duncan or Lillian Hellman; some were committed radicals, though more were just intrigued by the “Soviet experiment.” But all came to Russia in search of social arrangements that would be more equitable, just, and satisfying. And most in the end were disillusioned, some by the mundane realities, others by horrifying truths. Mickenberg reveals the complex motives that drew American women to Russia as they sought models for a revolutionary new era in which women would be not merely independent of men, but also equal builders of a new society. Soviet women, after all, earned the right to vote in 1917, and they also had abortion rights, property rights, the right to divorce, maternity benefits, and state-supported childcare. Even women from Soviet national minorities—many recently unveiled—became public figures, as African American and Jewish women noted. Yet as Mickenberg’s collective biography shows, Russia turned out to be as much a grim commune as a utopia of freedom, replete with economic, social, and sexual inequities. American Girls in Red Russia recounts the experiences of women who saved starving children from the Russian famine, worked on rural communes in Siberia, wrote for Moscow or New York newspapers, or performed on Soviet stages. Mickenberg finally tells these forgotten stories, full of hope and grave disappointments.

In 1969, nineteen-year-old Robert Hunt was found dead in the Cairo, Illinois, police station. The white authorities ruled the death a suicide, but many members of the African American community believed that Hunt had been murdered—a sentiment that sparked rebellions and protests across the city. Cairo suddenly emerged as an important battleground for black survival in America and became a focus for many civil rights groups, including the NAACP. The United Front, a black power organization founded and led by Reverend Charles Koen, also mobilized—thanks in large part to the support of local Christian congregations. In this vital reassessment of the impact of religion on the black power movement, Kerry Pimblott presents a nuanced discussion of the ways in which black churches supported and shaped the United Front. She deftly challenges conventional narratives of the de-Christianization of the movement, revealing that Cairoites embraced both old-time religion and revolutionary thought. Not only did the faithful fund the mass direct-action strategies of the United Front, but activists also engaged the literature on black theology, invited theologians to speak at their rallies, and sent potential leaders to train at seminaries. Pimblott also investigates the impact of female leaders on the organization and their influence on young activists, offering new perspectives on the hypermasculine image of black power. Based on extensive primary research, this groundbreaking book contributes to and complicates the history of the black freedom struggle in America. It not only adds a new element to the study of African American religion but also illuminates the relationship between black churches and black politics during this tumultuous era.