
Parting the Waters: America in the King Years 1954-63

it may be said of the Reconstruction Era that the Southern aristocracy took the world and gave the poor white man Jim Crow…a psychological bird that told him that no matter how bad off he was, at least he was a white man better than the black man.”
Taylor Branch • At Canaan's Edge: America in the King Years, 1965-68
“While not himself a racist, Mr. Goldwater articulates a philosophy which gives aid and comfort to the racist,” King declared. “His candidacy and philosophy will serve as an umbrella under which extremists of all stripes will stand.”
Taylor Branch • Pillar of Fire: America in the King Years 1963-65
At the root of the American Negro problem is the necessity of the American white man to find a way of living with the Negro in order to be able to live with himself. And the history of this problem can be reduced to the means used by Americans—lynch law and law, segregation and legal acceptance, terrorization and concession—either to come to terms
... See moreJames Baldwin • Notes of a Native Son
boy it was a common occurrence for white persons to attend our church services and share in the worship. But it was quite impossible for any of us to do the same in the white churches of the community. All over the world, wherever ghettos are found, the same basic elements appear—a fact which dramatizes the position of weakness and gives the widest
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