UPDATED AND REVISED EDITION THE LITTLE-KNOWN STORY OF POOR AND WORKING-CLASS WHITES, URBAN ETHNIC GROUPS AND BLACK PANTHERS ORGANIZING SIDE BY SIDE FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE IN THE 1960S AND '70S Some of the most important and little-known activists of the 1960s were poor and working-class radicals. Inspired by the Civil Rights movement, the Black Panthers, and progressive populism, they started to organize significant political struggles against racism and inequality during the 1960s and into the 1970s. Historians of the period have traditionally emphasized the work of white college activists who courageously took to the streets to protest the war in Vietnam and continuing racial inequality. Poor and working-class whites have often been painted as spectators, reactionaries, and, even, racists. But authors James Tracy and Amy Sonnie disprove that narrative. Through over ten years of research, interviewing activists along with unprecedented access to their personal archives, Tracy and Sonnie tell a crucial, untold story of the New Left. Their deeply sourced narrative history shows how poor and working-class individuals from diverse ethnic, rural and urban backgrounds cooperated and drew strength from one another. The groups they founded redefined community organizing, and transformed the lives and communities they touched. Hillbilly Nationalists, Urban Race Rebels and Black Power is an important contribution to our understanding of a pivotal moment in U.S. history. Among the groups in the book: + JOIN Community Union brought together southern migrants, student radicals, and welfare recipients in Chicago to fight for housing, health, and welfare . . . + The Young Patriots Organization and Rising Up Angry organized self-identified hillbillies, Chicago greasers, Vietnam vets, and young feminists into a legendary “Rainbow Coalition” with Black and Puerto Rican activists . . . + In Philadelphia, the October 4th Organization united residents of industrial Kensington against big business, war, and a repressive police force . . . + In the Bronx, White Lightning occupied hospitals and built coalitions with doctors to fight for the rights of drug addicts and the poor.
The historians of the late 1960s have emphasised the work of a small group of white college activists and the Black Panthers, activists who courageously took to the streets to protest the war in Vietnam and continuing racial inequality. Poor and working-class whites have tended to be painted as spectators, reactionaries and even racists. Tracy and Amy Sonnie have been interviewing activists from the 1960s for nearly 10 years and here reject this narrative, showing how working-class whites, inspired by the Civil Rights Movement, fought inequality in the 1960s.
Revolutionary Hillbilly is a history book, an organizer's notebook, and an autobiography. These are stories of unity against poverty and racism. Hy Thurman is a hillbilly and a revolutionary organizer. As a co-founder of the Young Patriots Organization, Thurman helped organize poor white communities in alliance with the Illinois Black Panther Party and Young Lords Organization during the Sixties. He is an educator who got his schooling in the fields of Tennessee, his PhD on the streets of Chicago, and his hunger for justice in the back of a patrol car. Revolutionary Hillbilly is unique because it is a first person chronicle of the unfolding of landmark events of the 1960's. Hy Thurman's book provides an insiders view of how coalitions can form and the group dynamics that can keep these movements vibrant. It is an invaluable resource for historians and activists alike.
Daily, 66 million poor white people pay the price for failing whiteness. In Trash, activist and chaplain Cedar Monroe introduces us to the poor residents of a small town in Washington, who grapple with a collapsing economy and their own racism. Trash asks us to see the peril in which poor white people live and the choices we all must make.
THE STORY OF SOME OF THE MOST IMPORTANT AND LITTLE-KNOWN ACTIVISTS OF THE 1960s, IN A DEEPLY SOURCED NARRATIVE HISTORY The historians of the late 1960s have emphasized the work of a group of white college activists who courageously took to the streets to protest the war in Vietnam and continuing racial inequality. Poor and working-class whites have tended to be painted as spectators, reactionaries, and, even, racists. Most Americans, the story goes, just watched the political movements of the sixties go by. James Tracy and Amy Sonnie, who have been interviewing activists from the era for nearly ten years, reject this old narrative. They show that poor and working-class radicals, inspired by the Civil Rights movement, the Black Panthers, and progressive populism, started to organize significant political struggles against racism and inequality during the 1960s and 1970s. Among these groups: + JOIN Community Union brought together southern migrants, student radicals, and welfare recipients in Chicago to fight for housing, health, and welfare . . . + The Young Patriots Organization and Rising Up Angry organized self-identified hillbillies, Chicago greasers, Vietnam vets, and young feminists into a legendary “Rainbow Coalition” with Black and Puerto Rican activists . . . + In Philadelphia, the October 4th Organization united residents of industrial Kensington against big business, war, and a repressive police force . . . + In the Bronx, White Lightning occupied hospitals and built coalitions with doctors to fight for the rights of drug addicts and the poor. Exploring an untold history of the New Left, the book shows how these groups helped to redefine community organizing—and transforms the way we think about a pivotal moment in U.S. history.
enchanted In the wake of growing WTO and war protests around the world, social protest is fast becoming a viable and necessary form of political action. Now, from Henry David Thoreau's classic 1849 essay 'On the Duty of Civil Disobedience' (reprinted within in its entirety) to contemporary direct action tactics used by non-violent groups around the world, this handbook outlines a history of social protest and includes handy information and resources for people interested in continuing the tradition.
The story of how a national grassroots network fought a resurgence of the KKK and other fascist groups during the Reagan years, laying the groundwork for today’s anti-fascist/anti-racist movements. "Smash fascism! Read this book!"—Tom Morello, songwriter and guitarist with Rage Against the Machine "Studying the John Brown Anti-Klan Committee will give readers an understanding of the complexity of deconstructing the weapon of white supremacy from the inside out. Thank you Hilary and James for the precision of this analysis, and the true north of this star."—adrienne maree brown, author of Pleasure Activism and Emergent Strategy In June 1977, a group of white anti-racist activists received an alarming letter from an inmate at a New York state prison calling for help to fight the Ku Klux Klan's efforts to recruit prison staff and influence the people incarcerated. Their response was to form the first chapter of what would eventually become a powerful, nationwide grassroots network, the John Brown Anti-Klan Committee, dedicated to countering the rise of the KKK and other far-right white nationalist groups. No Fascist USA! tells the story of that network, whose efforts throughout the 1980s—which included exposing white supremacists in public office, confronting neo-Nazis in street protests, supporting movements for self-determination, and engagement with the underground punk scene—laid the groundwork for many anti-racist efforts to emerge since. Featuring original research, interviews with former members, and a trove of graphic materials, their story offers battle-tested lessons for those on the frontlines of social justice work today. Praise for No Fascist USA!: "Hilary Moore and James Tracy have written a magnificent book that not only corrects the record but helps explain the mercurial rise of white supremacist organizations in the 1970s, how the Klan was (temporarily) defeated, and why this period has been largely ignored. No Fascist USA! radically shifts our perspective, challenging the prevailing wisdom that racist terrorism rises in response to economic downturns, white downward mobility, or in a vacuum created by progressive alternatives. I love this book."—Robin D.G. Kelley, from the foreword "No Fascist USA! is not only timely, but also essential in the present period of accelerated white supremacist activity and anti-racist organizing to combat it. In telling the story of the John Brown Anti-Klan Committee, the authors, without romanticizing or condemning, draw important lessons from the fifteen-year history of the group."—Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, author of Loaded: A Disarming History of the Second Amendment “With its savvy blend of youth culture and street confrontation, the John Brown Anti-Klan Committee tried to stop Trumpism before Trump. They confronted the rise of white nationalism in prisons, workplaces, and music scenes when precious few paid attention to it . . . Hilary Moore and James Tracy have gifted us with an urgent read.”—Dan Berger, author of Captive Nation: Black Prison Organizing in the Civil Rights Era “James Tracy and Hilary Moore deliver a searing, bold new work that examines another painful and complicated chapter in American race relations. In an eye-opening account, They are able to connect the dots of the John Brown Anti-Klan Committee, a band of contemporary predominantly white activists, and its efforts to expose white supremacist organizations. With a fresh eye and new research, their book uncovers with stunning precision how these groups remain active and exposes some of their unlikely alliances.”—Laurens Grant, filmmaker, The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution and Freedom Riders “We learned from history. You can too!”—Terry Bisson, author of Fire on the Mountain and former member of the John Brown Anti-Klan Committee "This book is a must-read for anyone wanting to understand the roots of what happened in Charlottesville, and the burgeoning white nationalist membership lists in the U.S. today. We cannot possibly take on the challenges we face without learning from the past. This book is a necessary and long overdue contribution to inform the way forward."—Carla F. Wallace, co-founder, Showing Up for Racial Justice "I've waited thirty years for this book! Our emergency hearts have always driven uprisings to stop white terrorism, but it always takes more than black-bloc tactics in the streets to stop fascists. No Fascist USA! firmly connects today's militant anti-fascist street-fighting movements with important living radical histories to disrupt the cycles that keep the spectre of fascism alive in the modern era. The struggles faced by the John Brown Anti-Klan Committee continue today in our difficult arc towards collective liberation."—scott crow, author of Setting Sights: Histories and Reflections on Community Armed Self-Defense
This new South End Press edition makes available the full text of this out-of-print classic--along with a new foreword by Manning Marable, interviews with participants in DRUM, and reflections on political developments over the past threee decades by Georgakas and Surkin.
