Freedom Road: Could North Omaha Win Obama One Electoral Vote in Nebraska?

"The Selma of the North": Civil Rights Insurgency in Milwaukee

Between 1958 and 1970, a distinctive movement for racial justice emerged from unique circumstances in Milwaukee. A series of local leaders inspired growing numbers of people to participate in campaigns against employment and housing discrimination, segregated public schools, the membership of public officials in discriminatory organizations, welfare cuts, and police brutality.

The Milwaukee movement culminated in the dramatic—and sometimes violent—1967 open housing campaign. A white Catholic priest, James Groppi, led the NAACP Youth Council and Commandos in a militant struggle that lasted for 200 consecutive nights and provoked the ire of thousands of white residents. After working-class mobs attacked demonstrators, some called Milwaukee “the Selma of the North.” Others believed the housing campaign represented the last stand for a nonviolent, interracial, church-based movement.

Patrick Jones tells a powerful and dramatic story that is important for its insights into civil rights history: the debate over nonviolence and armed self-defense, the meaning of Black Power, the relationship between local and national movements, and the dynamic between southern and northern activism. Jones offers a valuable contribution to movement history in the urban North that also adds a vital piece to the national story.

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Blurbs:

Think you know the full story of the civil rights era? Patrick Jones's masterful study of the movement in Milwaukee will make you think again. Meticulously researched and elegantly written, The Selma of the North provides a devastating rebuttal of many of the conventional narratives of the civil rights movement. Here a vibrant nonviolent movement in the de-industrializing Midwest grows into a Black Power movement led by urban youth and a white Catholic priest who use confrontational direct action to lay bare the fissures of racial inequality in the 'liberal' North.
--Jeanne Theoharis, Brooklyn College, editor of Freedom North and Groundwork

A well-researched, well-written, and important history. Based on a rich array of sources, this book enhances our understanding of civil rights activism in the postwar urban North and establishes a useful foundation for the comparison of similar developments elsewhere in the country.
--Joe William Trotter, Jr., Carnegie Mellon University, author of Black Milwaukee

This book fills a serious gap in the literature of the civil rights revolution, joining studies on other cities in laying the groundwork on race and civil rights in the postwar urban North. Jones tells a good story, capturing events that might otherwise be lost to history.
--Arnold R. Hirsch, University of New Orleans, author of Making the Second Ghetto

The Selma of the North is an insightful and invigorating addition to the growing literature on black freedom struggles outside of the South. Jones's important and informative account writes Milwaukee back into the narrative of the civil rights-Black Power era and in the process expands our understanding of postwar America.
--Peniel E. Joseph, Brandeis University, author of Waiting Till the Midnight Hour

The Selma of the North is a riveting new story of the civil rights movement in America, a tale on par with Selma, Birmingham, and Montgomery in its power and importance. Jones's magisterial research and magnetic prose illuminate the untold story of the battle for the urban north in the 1960s, a battle that shows how race has always been the Achilles heel of white progressives. This story transcends easy dichotomies of black and white, North and South, radical and reformist. How did a group called 'the Commandos' define nonviolence? How did a white Catholic priest become a 'Black Power' leader? If this is not a saga for the age of Obama, I don't know what is.
--Timothy B. Tyson, Duke University, author of Radio Free Dixie and Blood Done Sign My Name

Friday, October 10, 2008

Could North Omaha Win Obama One Electoral Vote in Nebraska?

That is the argument many folks around here are making. For those not in the know, North Omaha is the section of town where most black residents live. It is also the third poorest African American community in the entire nation and the very poorest in the U.S. for black children. A full 59% of all African American kids grow up in poverty here. You read that right: 6 out of 10 black children are poor in North O. And, the saddest reality is that most white Omahans, and most white Nebraskans, either have no clue about the desperate straights of North Omaha, or simply do not care. North Omaha is not an election issue. Politicians pimp for votes among the residents here, but they do it on the down low and never actually raise the pertinent local issues in their campaigns. Neither Scott Klebb, the moderate Democrat running for U.S. Senate against former Republican Governor and Bush Ag Secretary Mike "Snoozer" Johanns, nor Jim Esch, another moderate Democrat running against conservative Republican Lee "helmut hair" Terry, Jr., for a spot in the House of Representatives says much of anything at all about the offensive racial and economic inequalities evident in North O. It is a tragedy and a shame. So, for North Omaha to be the decisive balance that wins Obama an electoral vote here in Nebraska would be deliciously ironic. A downtrodden, and fairly poweless, community delivering for our nation's first black president! I'd love to see that come to pass...

... but even if it does, an Obama presidency, in itself, will do little to change the reality in North Omaha. For that, we need a grassroots movement to pressure officials in power at the local, county, state and federal levels. And for that, we will need a radical shift in consciousness among whites, a development that is unlikely, to say the least. There will need to be a new sense that the metro area is an organic whole, where we all bear responsibility to uplift those neighborhoods that are struggling most. Residents of all races and ethnicities will have to be willing to grapple with the reasons behind North Omaha's deterioration, the history and legacy of racial injustice, divestment, abondonment and neglect. And, it will take a massive infusion of resources, private and public, combined with vigorous effort/action, again privately and publicly, to revitalize this hard-hit area of our city. Nothing short of this will make a difference. And, keep in mind, this is not purely a local story. This is a pattern repeated in medium and large city after medium and large city across the country. There is a national urban crisis. This is a national tragedy, a national shame.

So, as much as election day, 2008, might be a nice day for residents of North O, if in fact they can deliver the goods to Obama, it is not the end of the story. In fact, it doesn't even scratch the surface of what needs to happen most around here and across the nation in poor, urban, segregated communities of color.

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"The Selma of the North": Civil Rights Insurgency in Milwaukee

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Friday, October 10, 2008

Could North Omaha Win Obama One Electoral Vote in Nebraska?

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