Kalangi walton. Panelist isrent dr. David goldberg who is associate professor at Wayne State University. Who is the detroit president president of the detroit chapter and tour leader and historian of all things africanamerican detroit. Communityincredible scholar out of detroit. A wonderful set of folks who will help us think about think about politics in detroit and michigan. I am going to throw it over to the panel. Thank you for being here. Thank you. Chair. E i have a couple of remarks really quick. I want to thank everybody for detroitnd hearing about politics in particular is radical. I think my panelists for being here. About theking the20th century up until beginning of the 21st century there is a span of influence of rosa parks, john conyers, and mayor Coleman Young. The radical black politics began in the 1800s. A couple of things that happened that really sets the stage for detroit being this hotbed of radical black politics is the uprising in 1833. 400 black people lead an to free to people who escape slavery. They had been captured by slight captures and the sheriff and deputy were also involved. They will first free lucy by having a black woman go into the jail cell with her and switch clothes with her. In andriff allows her because, to the sheriff, he could not tell which one he should be letting out and which one was still there. That is how she escapes. The next day theres 400 people outside to free thorton blackburn. The sheriff will be killed and that. One of the people who passes the gun to thorton, who is being transported by the slight catchers, is a man who is named madison lightfoot. He hands the gun to thorton and his reverend madison lightfoot. At the very onset of this black Community Organizing you had those in the religious Community Involved in Armed Struggle against slavery. Ofs is the beginning Institution Building by africanamericans. Black people are going to start churches. The Second Baptist Church freed lucy blackburn. It would be the center of the underground railroad and the first black school. Site for the 1846 ,onvention in michigan the Color Convention. Milton lambert will demand the right not only of the end of slavery, but for black people to vote, have schools. He is making these demands during the time when most black people in detroit are interested in ending slavery. He is adding onto that. They want. Its a ship. Demand. Really a radical the state legislature will respond the next year by passing a law that black people cannot vote. To make it clear where the state stood. Detroit,y history in both the Color Convention in this uprising medicine lambert is 13 years old during the uprising and one of the people involved. Goes on both sides and that how these radical leaders they are also involved in Armed Struggle. They do not see a contradiction. Today there are people who want t you to be on one side or the other. Say it isof that to time to listen to our past. I wanted to give our background. Important pieces are from the state of alabama. We would have been in montgomery this year for the conference. Two of the subjects talked about today are from alabama. We are going to start with dr. Mcguire. She will give the first presentation and introduce the topic herself. Thank you. Dr. Mcguire i wanted to talk about rosa parks. She is probably one of the most familiar historical figures in United States history. Most every Public School kid could tell you who rosa parks is and what she did. The popular presentation of rosa parks is often as a quiet but courageous woman. A woman whose humble righteousness shamed america into doing the right thing. A woman whose foot fatigue brought down the cradle of the confederacy. This is the way she is presented in every single museum, textbook, popular presentation. This quiet, humble, elderly down, and as for eulogist put it, so we could all stand. She is living an invented life outside history. She is presented as a matronly impulse andcted on emotion rather than intelligence or conviction or a political agenda. There is no sense of her as a leader, member of an active community, or as part of a group of citizens organized against systemic oppression. She is always presented alone as if one person can truly change history by sitting still. By telling a simplistic tail of rosa parks as this quiet woman who tiptoed into history we limit our understanding of her. It really hurts kids understanding of her radicalism, her importance in american democracy and limits their understanding of what they can do to make change in their world. How we might about talk about her differently and how we can teach young people about a radical rosa parks. A rosa parks that had an important day in december 1955, but had a life of commitment to radical politics and freedom. That is the rosa parks i think we need to Start Talking more about. We do not have a lot of time and we could talk about rosa parks forever, at least i could because she is so fascinating, but let me go through things quickly. Up at the foot of her grandfather. Age she wasyoung steeped into the history of black nationalism. She was raised to take pride in her skin color, her family, her history, and her roots. She was raised to not take any mess from anybody. She saw her grandfather and her family use armed selfdefense when necessary. When the ku klux klan marched through alabama, rosa parks was there, waiting for her grandfather to get his shotgun. , in many of her her autobiographical works, she wished she could see her grandfather use that gun. She believed in black nationalism. She married a man, not surprisingly, raymond parks, who carried a pistol in his pocket around town as a way to defend himself from violent White Supremacists in the community. From a very young age this married couple held voter League Meetings in their homes in the early 1940s. In the late 1930s, they held armed meetings to try and organize around the defense of the scottsboro boys who were accused of raping two alabama. En in she recalls sitting up at night with groups of men with their guns piled high on the dining room table talking about how they were going to work to free the scottsboro boys. In 1943, she joined the machemer chapter of the naacp montgomery chapter of the naacp after she was attempting to vote and denied. It was her third attempt to register to vote in her third denial. She was furious. She decided she would join the montgomery naacp and they immediately asked her to be secretary. We think of her secretarial role as paperwork or filing or taking notes, but rosa parks was a field secretary. What that meant was that she was the detective for that chapter. They sent her throughout alabama, investigating crimes, getting testimony from people who have been attacked or assaulted, in bringing that information back to the montgomery chapter where they would decide how they wanted to respond. One of the biggest cases she worked on right away in her was the assault reesi taylor. She was walking home from church when a group of white men kidnapped and raped her. Park Scott Taylors testimony and carried it back to montgomery where she and the most militant black activists for reesie taylor. Si theas second only to scottsboro cases. Rosa parks did that kind of work throughout the 1940s and into the early 1950s and it is that center ofis at the black radicalism in alabama. That puts her at the center of the montgomery bus boycott. Women who hadwo already been arrested were not going to be used by the Montgomery Branch of the naacp for several reasons. When the opportunity presented itself to get arrested she took it. She knew what that would entail. She knew she could go to jail. She knew what that meant as a black woman to go to jail in alabama. She took on extraordinary risk. Throughout the bus boycott we think she just got arrested and that was it, but she was a primary fundraiser for the Boycott Movement in montgomery. The naacp flew her all around the country where she gave speeches and raised tens of thousands of dollars. We often think of her as somebody who did not speak much, a quiet person, and while she may have been softspoken, she was very vocal about her resistance to White Supremacy and depression. Oppression. She was a real active speaker during those years. What is interesting as i found a document in the king papers at Boston College were rosa parks requested armed guards for her home during the bus boycott because she was a frequent target of what supremacist violence. You can see that tradition of her supporting armed resistance and selfdefense throughout the boycott. Unsafe shee feels so moves to detroit which she called the Promised Land that was not. Theything she hoped for, ability to move through freely, the access to decent housing a good paying job, that did not happen. It was just a segregated, just as unequal, just as many limits as in alabama. She set about doing what she had always done which was resist. To organize in the community, to build networks, to join organizations opposing things like segregated housing and pushing for better Educational Opportunities for kids in her neighborhood and community. She eventually began to work with john conyers which was her first paid political position which was incredible. She worked with him the rest of her life. In detroit, she joined black power groups. She supported the black panthers, she was an antivietnam war organizer, she opposed apartheid, she marched in washington against apartheid and the vietnam war. She has this history of a radical activist. In garvihat was rooted sim. This is where i will end. Eulogy for robert f williams. Robert f williams was an advocate of armed selfdefense out of North Carolina who became exiled from the United States and went to cuba and then china and other places. Rosa parks delivered his eulogy. That is the company she kept. That is the world she was immersed in and that is the work she did throughout her life. I think we need to start telling rosa parks story. Move her away from the bus seat and more toward the radical politics you was part of throughout her long history and that rosa parks, that rosa parks will interest young people and old people and everybody in between from now until the end of time. Thank you. Thank you, dr. Mcguire. Some recentbout news about rosa parks. The home she lived in for a short period of time is now in spain. It was in germany for a while. We need to move away from her sitting on that bus and move into her radical politics. Move away from that home she lived in for a short time. It was really her brothers home and moved to the house she was living in when she was involved in all this radical politics. I am part of the state committee that is going to make that a historic site. Int is her Virginia Park on Virginia Park neighborhood. Where the 1967 rebellion occurred, that same community, where the black madonna is not far from Bethel Baptist church. This, stop talking about but i want us to understand the way history is presented in the popular media, as dr. Maguire said, the same thing goes on about Historic Sites including her home. You have probably seen articles about her home taken from detroit and is now going through europe. That was not really her home. Im going to introduce our next presenter which will be dr. Walton. I will let him introduce his topic. Thank you, brother jordan. Thank you everyone that is isning us in my topic congressman john conyers from the Congressional Black Caucus to hr40 which is known as the reparations investigative commission, for lack of a better way to put it. There is a lot of mix up the it was a bill for reparations. It was a bill to study the potential of reparations, the nuances, who would qualify, and those types of things it was an exploratory commission. I am not going to scandalsis exwifes nor his sexual harassment, but i do want to mention they exist in all fairness. Anyway, it is important to note congressman conyers was a military veteran, he was an officer in the army, a korean war veteran prior to his education at Wayne State University where he received a lawelors degree and a llb degree and was first integrated into white liberal politics in detroit as a staffer for congressman john dingell. Viaentree into politics was white liberal establishment. However, he had history like mayor Coleman Young as being the labor activist. He was a labor attorney and referee for the michigan Workers Compensation department. That is where he got his start , politics, activism, and because of black labor in , he first was introduced to radical politics. Movementell, the labor. Preexistingfrom and continued black nationalism and black radicalism in detroit as well as white liberalism and white radicalism. That is important to note. Thenot list the long long list of black nationalist organizations in detroit during that time and prior to, but it is important to mention people wright, whiches h the museum is named after. That was a close friend of his. We have the panafrican the Orthodox Church the shrine of the black madonna. I was about to get tonguetied. Wayneican new africa, state university, and i could go on and on. I know brother goldberg is going to address some of this. It is key. Preexisting, liberal politics, radical politics, blackandwhite, with john conyers achieved and what he saw to do would not have been as realistic or as possible. If we sidestep that and ignoring history, right . Was the first first nonpolish well, second nonpolish and first black congressman from the original First District in michigan. That is key. The only other nonpolish prior to him goes back to prohibition and that was clancy who is most famous for him and the mayor and the sheriff getting caught drinking during prohibition. That is his claim to fame outside of being nonpolish. Electedman conyers was in 1964. This is important because if we check across the country this wave of black elected officials outside of adam clayton powell, we see it after the black Power Movement. This is prior to the black Power Movement and he would win in that district and that same Geographic Area after manifestations of redistricting. 25 reelections. Except one he all won over 84 . One of them was 77 and that was the low mark. Those are great numbers if we look at it. Byt was made possible supporting the coalitions that Heather Thompson points out in her book. Radicals,als, black black liberals uniting against white conservatives. That is the book. Dean of theirst house of representatives, first black dean, third longestserving member of the house and sixth longestserving congressman in u. S. History. Those things are important. I do have criticisms when people stay too long and it thwarts nextgenerations of black leadership. That is a different conversation. Was one of the 13 founding members of the Congressional Black Caucus founded in 1969. Detroit was afrom cofounder as well. Partially sparked by the background. Detroit politics and the Civil Rights Movement experiences. Montgomery, he went down and did Voter Registration comentgomery alabama. When he joined congress and got elected he identified a Key Committee to become a member of that would later be crucial in his understanding or push for the commission to explore reparations. Time asas viewed at the the most liberal member of congress. Politics,e of detroit because of the black Labor Movement brother goldberg is going to talk about, the black radicalism in detroit, his embracing those segments, he quickly became one of the top nixon and richard president nixons socalled enemies list. He was a vocal member of congress for nixons impeachment because of watergate. Now you say, why is all this important . Because it also explains his involvement in the Congressional Black Caucus, as well as the moveessional black caucus for the stand and march against apartheid, and several sit ins where several people were arrested, against apartheid, in the mid1980s. Congressman conyers was not just award,cp wart, naacp he was awarded the laurel wreath because of his involvement along with arthur ashe in the antiapartheid struggle. 1980s, ithe late know i fast forwarded, i didnt discuss the Republican National convention in detroit where they nominated ronald reagan, because we have limited time. But he first introduced in january 1989 hr 3745. Hr veloped a moniker of 40, and according to him based on a letter he posted on the ibew site was that he chose the number 40 because it embodied the 40 acres and a mule fallacy, as well as the reneging in the coastal carolinas and coastal georgia of the 40 acres and a mule document by general sherman. We have to talk about the reparations movement. So his push in 1989 didnt come out of the blue. We have to think about the culmination of various Reparation Movement organizations that culminated in the formation of cobra in 1987. So a year and a half before he introduces legislation, we had a big conference where these smaller reparation groups came together and formed a national organization. Tune with very in that because of his history. What he wanted, this commission to explore was not just reparations for slavery, and this is where the aztec ado people get it all messed up. , most importantly and realistically, in getting reparations from state and local governments, local municipalities and state governments, was the treatment of free slaves from 1865 until what we would say the present, but at that time, up until 1989. We are talking about jim crow segregation, where it is easy to prove in his lawyer ideology a tort action of the harm committed by local, state and federal governments. Time. I am running out of i want to mention that every year after that, he introduced a variation of that bill. Afterwards he introduced a variation of that bill. He was committed to that. Happen, and i have problems with it mainly because of the people they had speaking in front of congress, was that they didnt have enough experts. Celebrities,many to many literarys, they didnt have enough experts peers so i dont believe it was framed properly. But it was his endeavor and the work of cobra, the cbc brain trust on reparations, as well as an organization that grew out of nationaleavors, the africanamerican reparations committee. So this hr 40 we saw the achieved hisit goal. That is what people have wrong. It was just to explore the possibilities. Now, the real work has to be done. And that is what congressman plan has toed, now be developed, what reparations looks like and who will be qualified for reparations. And it opens up when more than the ado. O people in the 1900s would qualify, because they were subject of these things as well subject to these things as well. Thank you, brother elisha. I want to tell a few things together. If you did not know, you should that rosa Parks Campaign for john conyers in 1964. She was able to bring Martin Luther king jr. , who was averse to campaigning for politicians, but she was able to convince him to participate in one of the and go to work for congressman conyers for years. Strains ofthese two this panel being connected in history. We are going to move to our last presenters, brother david goldberg. And he is going to let you know what his topic is. Thank you. David thank you. I want to be quick because i want to try to get some questions from the audience. My topic is about the league of revolutionary black workers, from the black guard to the revolutionary Worker Movement to the league of black workers. Let me state a little about the components. The first components of black guard signifies the revolutionary action movement, ram, which had a large role in the early machinations of what would become the black revolutionary union movement. A group of students at wayne state in new york formed a group push the whiteo establishment and the black establishment as well. That included radical black activist milton henry at the time, and his brother richard. They saw them as quite moderate, ironically. This gives you an idea of the militancy of this group. They were engaged in learning about Armed Struggle. They looked to Robert Williams and Robert Williams emphasis on selfdefense. But when he was in cuba, he was a proponent of guerrilla warfare. This is where ram was looking. To give you their ideology, they used to call themselves maoists. They definitely see themselves in both the tradition of penn after their traditions of both panafricanism and the third world. The revolutionary movement in the league of black revolutionary workers, i assume many of you are familiar with these formations. Get toskip over and their influence on electoral politics, because that is our theme here. The biggest thing i dont think a lot of people know about is that the league had mentis influence on radicalizing the black panther party, reorienting it toward anticapitalist struggle at the point of production. There is a gentleman from detroit named kenny boorstin, goes out west, joins the panthers, start organizing workers at the gm plant in fremont, also organizes black Railroad Workers at the San Francisco muni railroad system. They export this kind of activism to the west, and it is picked up for a brief time by the panthers, and then not given full institutional support. But it did influence them. More importantly, it had an impact on local politics in detroit. Heathers book looks at the context of what is happening in detroit in terms of the black community and white committee. I am more interested in how they radicalized the black community. There is a struggle between the old guard civil rights leadership in the black power leadership. And i would argue what emerges a. Young. S is coleman you wouldnt have a figure like young 1973 if it hadnt been for the black power struggle. I think the league was the backbone of detroit, but it was also the most advanced expression of black liberation and ideology in the country. I think also, as we have activists today fighting White Supremacy and racial capitalism, it is the benchmark example to turn to when looking at the struggle today. Thank you for your time. I hope we can get some questions. Author Brandon Winford discusses his book, John Hervey Wheeler, black banking, and the economic struggle for civil rights. A panel of scholars examines the role mr. Wheeler played in the Civil Rights Movement in North Carolina for his position as president of mechanics and 1950s bank in the and 60s. Glad to be here and so very, very excited to talk about brother winfords excellent book. Let me jump into my comments. Dr. Winford crafted and informative book that chronicles the life of one of the unsung titans of civil rights. Dr. Winford places John Hervey Wheeler in the center of the civil rights narrative, casting new light on the role this banker, activist and humanitarian played. The argument of this work is that wheeler exemplified the activist business demand that