On December 10, 1963, while still the leading spokesman for the Nation of Islam, Malcolm X gave a speech at a rally in Detroit, Michigan. That speech outlined his basic black nationalist philosophy and established him as a major critic of the civil rights movement. … Read More(1963) Malcolm X, “Message to the Grassroots”
By March 1964, Malcolm X had broken with the Nation of Islam. In the speech below, given on April 3, 1964 in Cleveland, Ohio he explains his departure and his reason for establishing a separation between his religion and his politics. He also makes clear … Read More(1964) Malcolm X, “The Ballot or the Bullet”
On February 13, 1965, Malcolm X’s home in New York City was bombed. He and his family were not hurt and he decided to keep a longstanding speaking commitment at Detroit, Michigan, arriving the next day to give the presentation below. This proved to be … Read More(1965) Malcolm X, “Speech at Ford Auditorium”
In 1993 South African political activist Nelson Mandela shared the annual Nobel Peace Prize with South African President F.W. de Klerk. Mandela’s Nobel Peace Prize address on December 10, 1993 in Oslo, Norway appears below. Your Majesty the King, Your Royal Highness, Honourable Prime Minister, … Read More(1993) Nelson Mandela, “Nobel Peace Prize Address”
In September 1957 Arkansas Democratic Governor Orval E. Faubus became the national symbol of racial segregation when he used Arkansas National Guardsmen to block the enrollment of nine black students who had been ordered by a federal judge to desegregate Little Rock’s Central High School. … Read More(1958) Orval E. Faubus, “Speech on School Integration”
Soon after he was named chairman of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), Stokely Carmichael began to tout the slogan and philosophy of Black Power. In the speech below he explains Black Power to an audience at the University of California, Berkeley. It’s a privilege … Read More(1966) Stokely Carmichael, “Black Power”
In 1957 Roy Wilkins, Executive Secretary of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), was next to Rev. Martin Luther King, the most recognized civil rights leader in the nation. In October of that year he addressed the Commonwealth Club of California … Read More(1957) Roy Wilkins, “The Clock Will Not Be Turned Back”
In 1966 Robert C. Weaver became the first African American to hold a cabinet post when President Lyndon B. Johnson appointed him Secretary of the new created Department of Housing and Urban Development. Weaver, however had held a series of federal government and academic positions … Read More(1963) Robert C. Weaver, “The Negro as an American”
In January 1962, Nelson Mandela, the emerging leader of the South African campaign against apartheid, spoke at a convention of Pan African advocates meeting in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. In that speech he outlined the history of the freedom struggle that he would one day personify. … Read More(1962) Nelson Mandela, “Address at the Conference of the Pan-African Freedom Movement of East and Central Africa”
On April 4, 1968, during an Indianapolis, Indiana rally for his presidential campaign, attended by a large number of African Americans, Robert F. Kennedy, despite suggestions he shouldn’t appear at all, decided to proceed and announce the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., to a … Read More(1968) Robert F. Kennedy, “On the Death of Martin Luther King, Jr.”
