Black Political Activity Research Articles

“I Africanize São Paulo”: Vision, Race, and Afro-Paulistano Visual Culture

Although the city of Sao Paulo has the largest number of Black people in Brazil, it is not commonly associated with Blackness or Black aesthetics. Yet, the city has historically and currently been the home of Black collective action, culturalproduction, and Black life. This article focuses on the “I Africanize Sao Paulo”T-shirt, its designer, and photo campaign. Rather than consider Sao Paulo antithetical to Black aesthetic and cultural production, I find that the “I Africanize Sao Paulo” T-shirt demonstrates a form of Afro-aesthetics that emerges from Sao Paulo’s tradition of Black politics and culture. I focus on the history of Black political and cultural activity that preceded the T-shirt production as well as the factors that contribute to the obfuscation of Black culture in the city.

Race Over Party: Black Politics and Partisanship in Late Nineteenth-Century Boston by Millington W. Bergeson-Lockwood

Reviewed by: Race Over Party: Black Politics and Partisanship in Late Nineteenth-Century Boston by Millington W. Bergeson-Lockwood Joshua D. Farrington (bio) Race Over Party: Black Politics and Partisanship in Late Nineteenth-Century Boston. By Millington W. Bergeson-Lockwood. (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2018. Pp. 262. $90.00 cloth; $29.95 paper; $22.99 ebook) Millington Bergeson-Lockwood offers a much-needed challenge to the dominant historical narrative of Black partisanship in the late-nineteenth century that tends to reduce Black politics to an unwavering support of "the Party of Lincoln." Bergeson-Lockwood's case study of Boston, however, reveals a far more nuanced and fluid partisanship in a city that produced some of the nation's staunchest, most racially progressive "Radical Republicans." By the 1870s, a sizeable segment of Black Bostonians, led by Edwin Garrison Walker (one of the first Black men elected to Massachusetts's state legislature), became vocally critical of the growing apathy of the local and national Republicans towards protecting Black rights. Over the next two decades, these criticisms would morph into a new brand of independent politics that "rejected the idea that they owed any party loyalty or unanimity based on past deeds" (p. 5). Instead, they sought to push the Republican Party back in the direction of civil rights by supporting responsive Democratic candidates, or by creating their own slate of Black independents. While this strategy of political independence held moments of promise for Black Bostonians in the 1880s and 1890s, it ultimately failed to push either party in the direction of Black civil rights and instead pushed the city's Black activists to turn toward new approaches, such as the Niagara Movement, outside of the sphere of partisan politics in their fight for racial justice and equality. One particularly fascinating chapter in Bergeson-Lockwood's narrative is the brief moment of interracial cooperation between Boston's Irish and Black independents. Both Irish immigrants and African Americans had for too long been ignored by the city's political establishment, and rallied behind the Democratic Party in the 1880s to elect the city's first Irish-born mayor. This interracial partisan cooperation led to the erection of a statue in Boston Common honoring Black [End Page 367] patriot Crispus Attucks, which appealed to strong anti-British sentiment among Irish immigrants and rightfully acknowledged the role of African Americans in Boston's history. Many Black independents also rallied behind the cause of Irish nationalism as part of their broader support for transnational civil rights. This moment of interracial promise, too, would end in failure, as Irish allies to African Americans lost to more conservative Protestants in the elections of the 1890s. By focusing on Boston, Race Over Party offers a geographic counterbalance to the recent plethora of books focused on the failures of Reconstruction in the Deep South. It also adds a needed perspective to urban histories of the Gilded Age, which tend to prioritize white ethnic mobilization over Black political activity. While Boston provides an interesting case study, the author should have done more to connect the Northeastern city to a larger, national context of Black independence. The reader is left wondering if this partisan independence was unique to Boston or reflective of trends in other urban areas. Even a cursory example of Louisville, Kentucky, for instance, which was mentioned twice in passing by Bergeson-Lockwood, would have revealed an equally independent brand of Black partisanship that eschews simplistic narratives of Black Republican partisanship. Apart from needing more national context, the book also lacks in placing Boston's Black independent politics in larger chronological context as well. While the final chapter attempts to assess the "legacy of independent politics," it fails to extend its analysis beyond the early twentieth century, thereby minimizing its lasting importance (p. 182). Ironically, it would be Black Republicans of the 1960s and 1970s in Boston who would take up the banner of "independent politics" and elect the north's first African American to the U.S. Senate, Edward Brooke. This legacy of Black partisan independence, and other examples after 1910, are left out of the book's analysis. [End Page 368] Joshua D. Farrington JOSHUA...

Obamacares: Candidate Traits, Descriptive Representation, and Black Political Participation

AbstractWhile a number of studies demonstrate that black candidates have the ability to increase black political participation, a growing literature is investigatingwhydescriptive representation matters. This paper contributes to this discussion by exploring whether perceptions of candidate traits play a mediating role between the presence of an African American candidate on the ballot and increases in black political activity. I test this trait hypothesis using data from the 1992–2012 American National Election Study, a survey experiment, and statistical mediation analysis. The results indicate that perceptions of black candidates as being better leaders, more empathetic, knowledgeable, intelligent, honest, and moral explain a substantial amount of why descriptive representation increases black political participation across a range of different political activities. In the conclusion, I discuss the importance of the psychological link between blacks and their co-racial representatives in inspiring higher levels of political participation.

Shrill Hurrrahs: Women, Gender, and Racial Violence in South Carolina, 1865–1900 by Kate Côté Gillin (review)

Reviewed by: Shrill Hurrrahs: Women, Gender, and Racial Violence in South Carolina, 1865–1900 by Kate Côté Gillin Hannah Rosen (bio) Shrill Hurrrahs: Women, Gender, and Racial Violence in South Carolina, 1865–1900. By Kate Côté Gillin. (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2013. Pp. 184. Cloth, $39.95.) White women in South Carolina made their loyalties known during the election campaign of 1876, the political contest that marked the end of Reconstruction-era Republican control of southern state governments [End Page 134] and the return to power of conservative white elites. In one instance, a newspaper report describing a Democratic Party procession noted the actions of women who leaned out of windows along the march’s path to cheer on male leaders: “From eager lips came shrill hurrahs. . . . Snowy handkerchiefs were waived by hands that never seemed to tire” (94). It is from this quotation—celebrating white women’s endorsement of political leaders associated with the widespread voter intimidation and violence employed to win this election—that Kate Côté Gillin draws the title of her book. Shrill Hurrahs, which explores the history of racial violence in South Carolina from the end of the Civil War to the turn of the century, joins a growing number of works that place women and gender at the center of the history of this period. In this increasingly crowded field, Gillin’s well-researched book stands out most for its exploration of the key role played by elite white women as supporters, instigators, and at times direct participants in racist political terror. Gillin presents white-on-black violence over the latter half of the nineteenth century as increasing in organization, brutality, and efficacy. And at each stage of its development, she argues, the violence represented angry white reactions to the Civil War’s disruptions not only of a prior labor regime and racial hierarchy, but also of an antebellum gender order. For example, in chapter 3 Gillin tells the fascinating story of the Ku Klux Klan in South Carolina, the successor to early vigilante efforts. The Klan attained an exceptional level of organization in this state, where it also came under exceptional federal scrutiny. The latter led to widespread indictments, arrests, and some prosecutions under the Enforcement Acts. And this affected gender dynamics within white families, when white male defendants were taken from home just as they had been during the Civil War. White women were left responsible for supporting their families in ways that problematized patriarchal images of female dependence. Similarly, chapter 4 contends that, although the Klan was essentially defeated by federal action, its example of using well-controlled paramilitary organizations to swing elections through voter intimidation was embraced by others and taken to a still higher level of efficacy. Indeed, through such methods, Democrats managed to wrest political control from Republicans in 1876. Nonetheless, Gillin argues, this achievement could not block black men and women’s now occupying what were considered honorable gender roles, nor stop white women from exercising new levels of independence. The most striking contribution of each of her chapters is Gillin’s exploration of the important role of elite white women as “co-conspirators” in racial violence (100). Gillin describes white women acting at times as assailants but more often as instigators. They exhorted their husbands and [End Page 135] sons to follow up on threats that white women made against black workers, and they—often falsely—identified black assailants, leading to violent retribution. Gillin also traces how elite white women depicted Klan tactics in their diaries and memoirs as a legitimate response to black political activity. Finally, South Carolina’s history of extensive Klan prosecutions provides Gillin with evidence of white women organizing to petition for pardons, raise funds for bail, collect supplies for prisoners, and nurse sick inmates. They were the “confessors, advocates, and pillars of strength” that facilitated white male violence (52). Gillin argues throughout that white women’s roles in violence further “stretched the limits of southern womanhood beyond its old constraints” (77). In this way, she claims, white efforts to restore an antebellum social order resulted instead, ironically, in disrupting gender norms even further and “forever alter[ing...

Black Britain and the Politics of Race in the 20th Century

AbstractThis essay examines a growing literature on postcolonial Black Britain that seeks to suture the ties between prewar and postwar histories of Black political activity in Britain. By examining how people of African descent articulated the political conditions of being Black in metropolitan Britain during the 20th century, recent studies have shown how non‐state actors shaped ideas about the relationship between race and citizenship. In unearthing the myriad of ways that people of African descent navigated the politics of being both Black and British, this body of work has begun to offer critical perspectives on postcolonial Black Britain's place within the political history of the African Diaspora. Moreover, this essay argues that new work on Black Britain and the politics of race yields fruitful ground for dismantling some of the artificial historiographical partitions that have oftentimes separated metropolitan race politics in the postwar era from the broader history of empire, decolonization, and transnational anti‐racist movements organized around the pursuit of Black freedom.

Radical Reform: Interracial Politics in Post-emancipation North Carolina

Postemancipation politics in the South was a mess of inchoate collective actors, shifting aims and allegiances, and unstable coalitions, and nowhere was this more evident than in North Carolina. The state had remarkably competitive elections and high voter turnout (including for black men) through 1896, a stunning cross-class and biracial coalition that won power temporarily from the white-dominated Democratic party, and a just-as-stunning elite-dominated virulent white supremacy campaign in 1898 that violently shut down black political activity in the name of “progress.” In Radical Reform Deborah Beckel tries to make sense of this mess by analyzing many disparate political elements as having a common impulse to reform politics. This reform impulse can best be understood, she argues, not by starting the story with Reconstruction. Rather, one must reach back to the antebellum period to appreciate the antecedents of the impulse and therefore its trajectory: “by focusing on antebellum reform movements, Civil War dissidence, and the postwar interracial Republican Party, I explore the interplay of racial, class, and geographical divisions” (pp. 6–7).

“Freakin’ Out”: Remaking Masculinity through Punk Rock in Detroit

Detroit, as a birthplace for some of the earliest forms of punk rock, had a unique set of political and social conditions that made it ripe for the negotiation of race, sexuality, and gender within punk. One band of four Black brothers named “Death” navigated the space between their parent community and the world of what was perceived as “white” music. By performing a refusal to enact any one sense of “self,” Death performed a transgression, which was key to their own straightforward aesthetic. This transgression ostracized them from white and Black communities alike. Death forces us to reexamine the white-dominated narrative of punk music, which was thoroughly influenced by Black cultural modes from the outset. Early white punk bands MC5 and the Stooges had ready access to Black music and political activity; they performed new masculine identities based on an admiration for Black culture, as well as Black stereotypes. Paradoxically, as young Black men playing an early form of punk music, Death was unable to break into the world of white rock and was generally misunderstood in their local Black music community. Rather than concern themselves with an aesthetic style, Death pushed boundaries through their imaginative musical and political visions.

Conceptualizing racialized black political activity within European spaces: a political opportunities approach

African presence in Europe can be traced back to Roman times, yet African peoples within European spaces are continually perceived and often treated as new migrants with no sense of an historical attachment to European soil. This paper seeks to understand and challenge this conception of black migrants to Europe by focusing on the community and political activities of black subjects in European spaces. Using Britain as a primary reference point, the paper argues that the unfolding nature of black political activity in European spaces emerges as a result of dynamic interactions between black protagonists and the state. The nature of these interactions it is argued are racialized in character and that black community organizations and individuals play a crucial role in determining the forms and nature of political activity and outcomes that operate under the guise of minority ethnic mobilization. This paper argues a point that is often overlooked in the literature that focuses on African and other immigrants to Europe as recent migrants with problems. The paper uses a refined political opportunities approach and focuses on state practices and black community organizational practices between the First and Second World Wars to outline the varied nature of black community and political activity in an era of state antagonism towards black populations at home and abroad. The paper argues that context, state power and action, and the activities and ideas of black community organizations interact in dynamic ways to account for the changing nature of black political activity in European spaces.

American Pogrom: The East St. Louis Race Riot and Black Politics (review)

Reviewed by: American Pogrom: The East St. Louis Race Riot and Black Politics Dominic J. Capeci Jr. American Pogrom: The East St. Louis Race Riot and Black Politics. By Charles L. Lumpkins. Athens: Ohio University Press. 2009. In his thought-provoking revision of the East St. Louis upheaval of 1917, Charles L. Lumpkins contends that violence was sparked, not by social strain over interracial industrial employment—as interpreted by Elliott M. Rudwick (1964) and Malcolm McLaughlin (2005)—but by white politicians and realtors seeking to suppress black political independence. Hence he embraces Roberta Senechal's thesis for the 1908 Springfield riot (1990) and evaluates the East St. Louis outbreak within the era of industrialization, migration, and war, from 1898 to 1921, when urban blacks sought equality. He defines the rioting as "a pogrom: an assault, condoned by officials, to destroy a community defined by ethnicity, race, or some other identity"; that is, "another example of ethnic cleansing" (xi) as described by James Loewen (2005) and Elliot Jaspin (2007). Indeed, the bloodletting in largely downtown East St. Louis officially claimed thirty-nine black lives (500 rumored), destroyed hundreds of black homes, and chased over 7,000 blacks from the city; in comparison, nine whites lay dead (forty rumored), clearly indicating a one-sided assault. In expanding on the sources of Rudwick and McLaughlin, Lumpkin instead emphasizes black political activity and community-building that—given the voting potential of oncoming black migrants—threatened white powerbrokers, who promoted racial fear and violence. In its aftermath, black leaders continued their political activism, albeit appearing more accommodating of white society. They understood the lesson of racial compliance, yet never accepted it completely or unconditionally. Thereafter, black efforts paid off, assisted by the Great Depression and World War II. In the wake of the Civil Rights Movement that ended segregation and discrimination, however, the black majority in East St. Louis found itself, like counterparts elsewhere, in control of a municipality weakened by the exodus of whites, economic de-industrialization, and self-serving political bosses of both races. Tragically, this postwar urban crisis upturned fifty years of struggle for racial equality by black residents. Like other recent studies of racial violence, Lumpkins stresses black political initiative as the reason for white violence and interprets it as a pogrom "or ethnic cleansing" (8). Pogrom is viable, though fuller comparison is needed to support the contention that the East St. Louis Race Riot is the "American equivalent" (77) of pogroms against 19th Century Russia Jews and 20th Century Armenians. However, applying the term ethnic cleansing—which historically connotes widespread extermination—is more problematic, in part because East St. Louis whites avoided invading "predominantly or all-black districts" (125)—where most blacks lived—for fear of being harmed themselves. This suggests more a white desire to keep blacks in their place rather than annihilate them; and why, after the riot, black politicians appeared to tow the color line. This terminology question notwithstanding, American Pogrom falls within William M. Tuttle, Jr.'s 2004 Mid-America Conference on History call for the reconsideration of all U.S. riots of this era within the context of black insurgency and comparative racism. Lumpkins's book is an important addition for understanding the historical significance of the East St. Louis violence and the evolution of rioting historiography. [End Page 166] Dominic J. Capeci Jr. Missouri State University Copyright © 2011 Mid-America American Studies Association

We Are Fighting the World: A History of the Marashea Gangs in South Africa, 1947-1999 (review)

Reviewed by: We Are Fighting the World: A History of the Marashea Gangs in South Africa, 1947–1999 Guy Thompson (bio) Gary Kynoch. We Are Fighting the World: A History of the Marashea Gangs in South Africa, 1947–1999 Ohio University Press/University of KwaZulu-Natal Press. xv, 200. US $44.95 We Are Fighting the World is a rich and provocative look at gang activity and crime in South Africa, which remains one of the world's most violent societies despite the dramatic changes that followed the end of apartheid. Drawing on extensive interviews with former and current gangsters, Gary Kynoch provides a nuanced history of this criminal world, arguing that that history is vital to understand contemporary South Africa. Kynoch explores the origins and development of criminal gangs created by labour migrants from neighbouring Lesotho who were living in South Africa. The gangsters called themselves 'Marashea' – 'the Russians' in the Sotho language – adopting the name to invoke the Soviet Union's Second World War military prowess. Migrants from Lesotho generally had little formal education, so they had limited options in South Africa, where white wealth rested on the exploitation of cheap black labour. Criminal opportunities abounded in the overcrowded and poorly serviced townships that Africans were restricted to under apartheid; some migrants resorted to illegal beer-brewing, theft, prostitution, or selling marijuana, and the men who profited from these activities organized themselves to defend their markets and offer 'protection' to residents. Kynoch captures this chaotic world well, emphasizing several key themes throughout the book: gangster culture and values within this violent masculinist context; gender [End Page 550] dynamics, particularly male gang members' control over women members and their sexuality; the economic opportunism of criminals; and the central role of ethnic identity and allegiances among Africans. He provides a rich portrait of the men and women involved in the Marashea; while the book concentrates on the activities of these gang members from Lesotho, its insights certainly have wider implications, especially in light of the growing historical literature on criminal activity and organization in South Africa. There are several important arguments that run through We Are Fighting the World, making it a provocative and important work. Kynoch challenges readers to conceptualize criminality and its role in South Africa's history and historiography in new ways. Rather than seeing gangsters as predators and morally tainted, or as social bandits in a didactic tale of repression, resistance, and liberation, Kynoch argues we should understand them as part of the diverse social worlds that black South Africans created, worlds that were inhabited by creative and morally complex actors. This position is also rooted in another of the book's important insights – while the apartheid state could exert tremendous coercive power over the townships through the police and army, it had a limited ability to direct and shape the daily lives of black South Africans. Accordingly, it failed to provide effective policing and judicial services for township residents, particularly as the police concentrated on enforcing the pass laws and containing black political activity, creating the conditions for vigilantism, gang activity, and a culture of violence. Kynoch builds on this argument by contending that the roots of the violence that plagues South Africa today are very important. Most accounts look no further back than the 1980s, but this book traces the history of criminal organization and conflict back to the dislocations and violence of the early twentieth century and the deep racial and economic inequalities that were central to South Africa's industrial expansion. Moreover, he also argues for the importance of ethnic identities and allegiances among Africans in the new spaces of the mines and urban centres in this period, which helps to explain the centrality of ethnicity in political violence today. Kynoch's argument about ethnicity is a subtle and important one; while he recognizes that South Africa's white minority regimes manipulated ethnic as well as racial categories, he is also contending that Africans not only accepted these identities, but helped to shape them and give them power in their lives. Overall, this is an intriguing and thoughtful book. While some ele- ments of Kynoch's argument will mainly be of interest...

Zulus Abroad: Cultural Representations and Educational Experiences of Zulus in America, 1880–1945*

This article broadens the study of cultural representations of the Zulu from within South Africa to the United States by exploring the experiences of Zulu performers and students in America between 1880 and 1945. In American exhibitions, carnivals, circuses and fairs, whites celebrated and re-enacted Anglo-Saxon military victories over darker-skinned peoples with stark contrasts of ‘civilised’ whites and subjugated ‘uncivilised’ Zulus. African Americans, struggling to secure basic political and socio-economic rights in America, had more varied and ambiguous views of Zulus. Some impersonated Zulus for monetary gain and to fashion new identities, others created cultural distance between themselves and Africans by advancing stereotypical images of Zulus as exotic African primitives, while some politically-minded blacks portrayed Zulu resistance to British aggression as ‘the greatest revolt against white supremacy’ in modern history and as a potential model for diasporic black political activity. Meanwhile, Zulu students in America countered negative stereotypes with their intelligence and industriousness, self-consciously framing their continued acquisition of education, Christianity and entrepreneurial capitalism as part of the larger goal of collective racial uplift of their ‘benighted’ brethren in Africa. Whereas most American portrayals of the Zulu depicted Africans as permanent primitives, Zulu students shared the view that any African primitivism was due not to inherent inferiority but to a lack of exposure to the civilising influences of Christianity and education. Ironically, they pointed to recently emancipated African Americans as proof of black capabilities. Thus this article provides an empirical case study that offers a more expansive framework for African history, redresses the relative neglect of Africa and Africans within African Diaspora studies and contributes to the rich postcolonial literature that illuminates the cross-cultural trans-Atlantic traffic of peoples, ideologies and images along the global colour line.

The Greatest Fight of Our Generation: Louis vs. Schmeling by Lewis A. Erenberg

166 Michigan Historical Review Lewis A. Erenberg. The Greatest Fight ofOur Generation: Louis vs. Schmeling. New York: Oxford University Press, 2006. Pp. 288. Illustrations. Index. Notes. Paper, $15.95. After the Brown Bomber's crushing victory over the Black Uhlan of the Rhine in their notorious two-minute, four-second 1938 bout for the tide "Heavy Weight Champion of the World," the African American leader Marcus Garvey reported that Joe Louis carried the future of his race "upon his shoulders." Although Schmehng's ignominious defeat garnered no such pronouncements, as the exemplar of Nazi power and physical potency, he had entered the ring with a weight equally as daunting: Adolph Hider's vision of Aryan supremacy and the fate of wounded yet rebounding German pride and manhood. In The Greatest Tight of Our Generation: Louis vs. Schmeling, Lewis A. Erenberg paints a vivid and compelling portrait of the matches, professional careers, and intertwining hves of these two seemingly disparate, yet surprisingly similar world-class pugilists and situates both men upon the larger-than life stage of international politics. Beginning with accounts of each fighter's early hfe, The Greatest Tight chronicles the triumphs and tribulations of the two contenders from the Great Depression to their career-defining match and rematch, their parallel formations as Nazi and Democratic icons during World War II, their postwar self-reinventions, and the longtime foes' eventual reconciliation. Deftly synthesizing the numerous extant works, biographies, and autobiographies with additional sources, including American and German boxing magazines and African American newspapers, Erenberg drives his narrative forward to the climactic fight of a generation and brings the world of professional boxing vividly to hfe. Likewise, he highhghts the similarities between the white, middle class German, and the black, working-class American, and pays particular attention to the role of the media and the agendas of the German and American governments. He effectively argues that both men were transformed from professional athletes into national heroes on the eve of World War II and adroidy exploits the rich opportunity to delve into questions of race, masculinity, national identity, and international politics within the Louis-Schmeling drama. Erenberg sk?lfully evaluates the importance of race and racism; yet he does not pay sufficient attention to the African American cultural and political agitation that helped set the stage for Louis's ascent. Viewing Louis's emergence first as an African American icon and then as a mainstream American democratic icon as two distinct events, he partially Book Reviews 167 divorces the fighter from the "upsurge of black political and cultural activity" during the 1930s (p. 182). Ultimately, the greatest strength of this work is Erenberg's insightful analysis of the international dimensions of Louis and Schmeling, which illustrates the reciprocal impact of national race relations and international affairs. The Greatest Fight ofOur Generation is informative, persuasive, and best of all, a great read. Laurie A. Woodard Yale University Paul Finkelman and Martin J. Hershock, eds. The History of Michigan Law. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2006. Pp. 304. Bibliography. Index. Notes. Cloth, $49.95. This book presents twelve essays on the legal traditions of a state that is, as the introduction notes, unlike its midwestern neighbors. Though the tide implies that the volume might be a dry summary of important decisions couched in dense legal jargon, readers will find that this is not the case. Organized in roughly chronological order, the essays range across many subjects, including labor law, constitutional changes, gender equity, civil rights, the tensions involved in adapting to free market capitalism, the legacy of the Northwest Ordinance, the abolition of the death penalty, temperance, the use and misuse of the environment, and the complex underpinnings and transformation of Michigan's legal-education system. Each essay offers a concise survey of the historical contexts that shaped the major legal and legislative decisions involved in the discussion. With a jurisprudence rooted in New England and New York, Michigan estabhshed a legal tradition quite different from that of Indiana and Illinois, whose traditions were shaped by a strong southern influence. Those states struggled to deal with the segregationist and precedent-dominated frameworks that would eventually stir conflict as the nineteenth century progressed. The...

The History of Michigan Law by Paul Finkelman, Martin J. Hershock

Book Reviews 167 divorces the fighter from the "upsurge of black political and cultural activity" during the 1930s (p. 182). Ultimately, the greatest strength of this work is Erenberg's insightful analysis of the international dimensions of Louis and Schmeling, which illustrates the reciprocal impact of national race relations and international affairs. The Greatest Fight ofOur Generation is informative, persuasive, and best of all, a great read. Laurie A. Woodard Yale University Paul Finkelman and Martin J. Hershock, eds. The History of Michigan Law. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2006. Pp. 304. Bibliography. Index. Notes. Cloth, $49.95. This book presents twelve essays on the legal traditions of a state that is, as the introduction notes, unlike its midwestern neighbors. Though the tide implies that the volume might be a dry summary of important decisions couched in dense legal jargon, readers will find that this is not the case. Organized in roughly chronological order, the essays range across many subjects, including labor law, constitutional changes, gender equity, civil rights, the tensions involved in adapting to free market capitalism, the legacy of the Northwest Ordinance, the abolition of the death penalty, temperance, the use and misuse of the environment, and the complex underpinnings and transformation of Michigan's legal-education system. Each essay offers a concise survey of the historical contexts that shaped the major legal and legislative decisions involved in the discussion. With a jurisprudence rooted in New England and New York, Michigan estabhshed a legal tradition quite different from that of Indiana and Illinois, whose traditions were shaped by a strong southern influence. Those states struggled to deal with the segregationist and precedent-dominated frameworks that would eventually stir conflict as the nineteenth century progressed. The editors of The History of Michigan Law make the argument thatMichigan was possibly the most egalitarian of the midwestern states in terms of embracing civil and women's rights. However, they and several of the essays' authors provide sobering counterexamples. Though Michigan was at the forefront of progressive change, the state's leaders found implementing these noble ideals a far more daunting task than merely proclaiming them. As the essays on race and labor law point out, many of the legal changes followed shifting 168 Michigan Historical Review social attitudes rather than taking the lead. That caution kept Michigan from becoming the utopia that boosters from an earher era proclaimed itwould become. This collection is particularly timely as it provides a series of short essays on important topics that tend to reside only in specialized texts. Although some of the entries address familiar themes, such as temperance, essays on theMichigan Women's Commission and Thomas Cooley provide insights into institutional and individual actors' roles that typically receive scant notice in reference texts, if they arementioned at all. The essay on conservation also highhghts a topic of great importance, but provides only limited scholarly historical analysis. This collection offers readers new perspectives on several issues and adds greatly to the existing literature. The length and clarity of the pieces make them excellent choices for classroom use at both the secondary and university levels. Matthew Lawrence Daley Grand Valley State University Matthew J. Friday. Among the Sturdy Pioneers: The Birth of the Chebqygan Area as aLumbering Community, 1778-1935. Victoria, B.C.: Trafford, 2006. Pp. 162. Bibliography. Illustrations. Index. Photographs. Paper, $19.99. "I never inmy hfe saw or heard of a place so absolutely jinxed as that town is" (p. 105). Despite this rather dismal recollection by a former resident, writing from Tacoma, Washington, in 1930, the history of Cheboygan, Michigan, has not always been one of gloom and doom. Although this small northern Michigan lumber town has had the characteristic ups and downs of any community dependent on exhaustible resources, Cheboygan managed to thrive for a remarkably long time and eventually sustain itself into the twenty-first century with a population not much smaller than it had in its halcyon days one hundred years ago. In his brief but very thorough community biography, Among theSturdy Pioneers: The Birth of theCheboyganArea as aLumbering Community, 1778-1935, Matthew J. Friday combines narrative history with perceptive insights that remind the reader of the challenges confronted by this...

Macrodynamics of Black Political Participation in the Post-Civil Rights Era

Research on black political life has demonstrated both the positive effects of black political empowerment and the negative effects of economic and social distress on black political participation. Using black respondents from the Roper Social and Political Trends data set, we estimate the effects of political, social, and economic factors on aggregate-levels of black civic activity in the time period from 1973 to 1994. We hypothesize that black political activity is stimulated by factors that enhance the political empowerment of black communities and is depressed by downward turns in the social and economic fortunes of black communities. We find that the positive influence of black political empowerment on macrolevels of black civic activity is countered by economic and social factors that swamp the benefits gained from black political success.

Time Longer Than Rope: A Century of African American Activism, 1850–1950. Ed. by Charles M. Payne and Adam Green. (New York: New York University Press, 2003. viii, 584 pp. Cloth, $70.00, ISBN 0-8147-6702-8. Paper, $24.00, ISBN 0-8147-6703-6.)

Telling of the horrors of enslavement and the immorality of Jim Crow segregation has often resulted in underrepresenting the continuity and intensity of African American protest. Although modern historians have taken a decided turn toward examining the roles African Americans played in the struggle for freedom and equality, scholarly work still often underplays the extent of black resistance. Time Longer Than Rope is a significant effort to “acknowledge the depth of African Americans' activist initiative” (p. 1). This adroitly written collection of essays, edited by Charles M. Payne and Adam Green, addresses the three main themes present in black resistance strategies: the quest for economic justice, the everyday characteristics of black political activity, and the emphasis on self-education and community building despite oppressive conditions. More important, the authors critically analyze the role gender, class, and color play in the selection of resistance strategies across time and place. Several essays examine how African Americans define and redefine community and how (re)con structing a black community may affect challenges to racial oppression. Still others have to do with issues of unity, interracial and intrara cial interactions, and how African Americans theorize their place within the American polity.

ORGANIZATIONAL INVOLVEMENT AND BLACK PARTICIPATION: CONTINUITY AND CHANGE

Empirical investigations of black political activity either do not include measures for associational affiliation among blacks or take into consideration differences among black organizations in their capacity to promote political activity among their members. In this investigation, a model of black political behavior was presented that included not only the standard predictors of political activity, but also incorporated measures for membership in different types of voluntary associations. Two important conclusions emerge from this study. First, this investigation demonstrated that since the 1960s, there has been an important transformation in the organizational infrastructure of the black community: blacks changed their voluntary memberships from political to nonpartisan organizations. Second, these findings showed that the decline in group‐based political mobilization since the 1960s is partly the result of this shift from partisan to nonpolitical affiliations.

South Africa in the twentieth century: a political history--in search of a nation state

Part I: The Clash of British Imperialism and Afrikaner Nationalism:. 1. Prelude to War: Afrikaner and British Imperial Nationalism. 2. War, Peace and Reconstruction. 3. Afrikaners, Blacks and Reconstruction. Part II: The White Union and Black Reaction:. 4. Responsible Government and the Union. 5. The New Union: White and Black Political Activity. 6. The Great War and its Aftermath. 7. The Pact Government and Segregation 1924--9. 8. From Pact to Fusion: Economic Depression and Black Opposition: 1929--39. Part III: World War II and Apartheid:. 9. World War II and its Aftermath 1939--48. 10. African Nationalism Transformed: 1939--48. 11. The National Party Government 1948--61. 12.African Opposition: Communists, Congress and the Pan Africanist Congress. Part IV: The Wind of Change:. 13. The New Republic, Sharpeville and the Granite Response. 14. Vorster and the Development of the Bantustans. 15. Black Resistance Inside and Outside the Republic. Part V: Renewed Black Challenge: . 16. Soweto and its Aftermath. 17. Reform, Security and White Divisions Under P. W. Botha. 18. The Black Rising: and Answering Fire with Fire. 19. Retreat from the Rubicon: The Failure of Reform. Part VI: Forging the New South Africa:. 20. In Search of a New South Africa. 21. Reaching Agreement: Negotiation, Tension and Violence. 22. Towards the Promised Land. References. Index.

Congressional Voting and the Mobilization of a Black Electorate in the South

T HE WITHERUNG OF THE SYSTEM of intimidation which kept black registration near zero for three generations in many parts of the South has opened the way for blacks to become a powerful force in many congressional districts. Over the last two decades the number of blacks registered to vote in the South has increased by more than two million. The share of the region's blacks who are registered has risen from 25 percent in 1956 to approximately 60 percent. If this increase has had a political impact, there should be some discernible policy consequences. Black political participation may have altered the policy stands of some southern legislators. In districts where black voters are numerous but still a minority, white candidates may believe it necessary to be somewhat responsive to black interests. This supposition may promote a conflict between political expediency, i.e., the need to build a biracial coalition in order to win public office, and traditional white fears of black political influence. To appear too responsive to blacks may cost white incumbents support from their own race. From this tension, comes an important issue addressed in this paper: have white representatives become more responsive to blacks as black political activity has accelerated?

Aspects of Afro-Brazilian Experience

It is fitting that two of the essays in this issue, Abdias do Nascimento's and Rodrigues Alves's, were originally presented to the First and Second Congresses of Black Culture in the Americas (Cali, Colombia, August 1977, and Panama, March 1980). These two events reflect a current phenomenon of vital, if underestimated, importance to the African world: emerging assertion of African political consciousness among Black people in so-called Latin America. To date, this area has been unduly marginalized or omitted from global discussions of Pan-Africanism or the African world. The so-called African triangle has involved only the United States and West Indies, continental Africa (Anglophone and Francophone) and Africans in Europe. There are many reasons for such minimization of the role of Afro-Latin Americans in African affairs; one of the most important is the language barrier. Information exchange has had to be filtered through translation channels, usually controlled by white dominant societies. Ruling strata in Latin America vigorously suppress all manifestations of Black political activity, and its extent is therefore severely under-

Politics and the Black Church in a Southern Community

Beginning in the late 1940s after the abolition of the allwhite Democratic primary, the Southern Black church increasingly became a focal point for newly emerging Black political activities. The significance of the Black church in politics was due to the fact that Black clergymen played crucial political middleman roles between the emerging Black electorate and interested white politicians.1 With the passage of time and the growth of Black political activity, however, more secular social and political institutions began to supplant the Black clergy as chief political cue givers for their communities (Davidson, 1972; Murray and Vedlitz, 1974). One result was that the Black clergy lost some of its political influence as other Black activists were able to develop their own secular power bases.