The avant guardian
The Avant Guardian Podcast Launch
https://youtu.be/PNqcxOiJ1lo David Wark Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation “was sold as a sensation and became one.” It was the first American blockbuster. It was the first film screened at the White House. President Woodrow Wilson said it was “like writing history with lightning.” It struck, then the crosses began

Democracy Behind Bars
NEARLY 6 MILLION AMERICANS WITH CRIMINAL RECORDS including incarceration are denied the opportunity to vote. Not only are these citizens legally prevented from voting, but the right to vote and democracy itself are incarcerated—behind bars of racially motivated, antebellum, and morally antiquated laws that affect voters across race, class, and

A Conversation on Reparations
Join us for a conversation addressing the call for reparations with Professor Randall L. Kennedy, Michael R. Klein Professor of Law at Harvard Law School,

The Life and Legacy of Congressman John Lewis and Reverend CT Vivian
John Robert Lewis. Cordy Tindell Vivian. Two elders in the struggle for freedom and liberation have transitioned to the ancestral realm. From the ends of the earth, to the hearts of cities across our nation, from the mouths of liberals and conservatives, cries of anguish are heard across the country.

When Discrimination and a Pandemic Collide
From the Harvard Kennedy School PolicyCast Hosted byThoko Moyo Produced byRalph RanalliSusan Hughes First there was the shock of realizing that the COVID-19 pandemic would be widespread and lengthy. Now issues of race, equity, and the coronavirus are quickly coming to the fore, as data pours in showing how the
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AT PROTESTS, MOSTLY WHITE CROWDS SHOW HOW PANDEMIC HAS WIDENED RACIAL AND POLITICAL DIVISIONS
The crowds protesting California’s stay-at-home orders aimed at stopping the spread of the novel coronavirus have a litany of grievances: Open the beaches. Free the churches. End the tyranny of a governor who has gone too far.

LAUNCH OF THE AVANT GUARDIAN PODCAST
Senior Fellow and Staff Director of the William Monroe Trotter Collaborative for Social Justice at the Harvard Kennedy School, Devon Crawford, and longtime friend of Humanity in Action, Reverend Cornell Brooks, helped launched The Avant Guardian podcast series to honor William Monroe Trotter’s struggle for racial equity.

For centuries, the story of democracy in the United States has been about an expanding definition of citizenship and what an American looks like. Brooks encourages us to remember the art of conversation in an increasingly digital world and promotes removing obstacles to voting, even making voting a requirement.