Freedom Road: Support the "Gulf Coast Housing Recovery Act of 2007"

"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.

Buy it here!

Spread the word...

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, August 31, 2007

Support the "Gulf Coast Housing Recovery Act of 2007"

Please watch this (3min 30sec)...

...then go here and take a look at Chris Dodd's "Gulf Coast Housing Recovery Act of 2007":

Chris Dodd's "Gulf Coast Housing Recovery Act of 2007"

Here is what ACORN, which has been working on the ground in New Orleans since the hurricane hit, has to say about the bill:

Two years after Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast, damaging a million homes in four states and destroying 300,000 residences, at least 106,000 mostly low-income families remain displaced.

Although billions of dollars have been allocated to house evacuees, little direct assistance has reached homeowners or created new rental housing.

Instead, ACORN - helped by hundreds of volunteers - has gutted 3,500 New Orleans homes without any kind of government assistance.

The Gulf Coast Housing Recovery Act, S. 1668, cosponsored by Sens. Christopher Dodd (D-Conn.) and Mary L. Landrieu (D-La.), would mitigate the problems faced by evacuees struggling to return and provide a variety of housing solutions necessary for the region’s renewal.

Almost three-quarters of the homes destroyed by the storm were affordable to low-income families. On the storm’s second anniversary, 65,000 families are still living in FEMA trailers and manufactured homes and 11,5000 families are continuing to receive Department of Housing and Urban Development disaster assistance, according to the National Low Income Housing Coalition. The return of these families is vital to the Gulf Coast’s economic recovery.

The Gulf Coast Housing Recovery Act of 2007, now in the Senate, would accomplish several important tasks to jump start progress. To help homeowners, the act authorizes funds to cover the Road Home shortfall, allowing homeowners to rebuild, and requires the Federal Housing Administration to use pre-hurricane credit histories so storm survivors can become homeowners again.

To help those who were renters before Katrina, the bill designates $1.7 billion in FEMA funds for rental housing, authorizes the repair and rehabilitation of public housing and supplies replacement housing vouchers. FEMA is required to transfer funds to HUD to provide rental assistance to families still in need of temporary housing, and the State of Louisiana is required to use $55 million for community development pilot programs.

Finally, the Gulf Coast Housing Recovery Act establishes much needed accountability so that funds are used properly, setting up monitoring and reporting requirements for FEMA, HUD and the states to prevent fraud, waste and abuse.

When Congress returns to Washington after Labor Day, the Senate should approve the Gulf Coast Recovery Act of 2007 to help residents finally return and begin rebuilding their lives.

Take action now to write your senators, tell them to vote for S. 1668.

To check out ACORN's full coverage of Katrina two years later click here!

...please write a letter and spread the word. This is the least we can do...

Freedom Road

My Book:

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

Blurbs:

The Archive:

Visitors? (since 12/10/07)

Friday, August 31, 2007

Support the "Gulf Coast Housing Recovery Act of 2007"

No comments:

Post a Comment