NPR: How Texas Prevented Black Women From Voting Decades After The 19th Amendment
In 1918, when she was 25 years old, Christia Adair went door-to-door organizing for women’s right to vote in Texas. “This effort was to pass a bill where women would be able to vote like men,” Adair remembered later in a 1977 oral history interview with the Schlesinger Library at Radcliffe College. “Well, we still didn’t know that that didn’t mean us. But we helped.”
When the bill passed, Adair went to the polls for the first time. The memory of what happened stuck with her the rest of her life.
The Atlantic: There’s a Generational Shift in the Debate Over Busing
During the second Democratic presidential debate, Senator Kamala Harris of California challenged former Vice President Joe Biden regarding a topic that has received little attention in recent presidential elections: school desegregation. Harris described Biden’s recent remarks in which he fondly recalled his “civil” working relationships with segregationist senators such as James O. Eastland of Mississippi and Herman E. Talmadge of Georgia as “hurtful.” “It was not only that, but you also worked with them to oppose busing,” Harris continued. “And you know, there was a little girl in California who was part of the second class to integrate her public schools, and she was bused to school every day. And that little girl was me.”
USA Today: 2020 Democrats defend Kamala Harris after Trump Jr. retweets, deletes post about her race
California Sen. Kamala Harris’ rivals for the Democratic presidential nomination defended her after criticisms based on her race circulating on social media, which were amplified when Donald Trump Jr. shared one such post with his more 3.6 million followers on Thursday.
The Tennessean: National Museum of African American Music gets $5.5 million from Vanderbilt, Belmont, more
As construction continues on its future home in downtown Nashville, the National Museum of African American Music has also made considerable financial headway, thanks to a slew of new investments. The museum has announced it has received more than $5.5 million in private-sector investments over the last month. That includes a pledge from Vanderbilt University totaling $2 million, and contributions of $1 million each from R.H. Boyd Publishing Corporation, Clearbrook Hospitality and Belmont University, as well as gift of $500,000 from Bank of America.
CNET: Facebook creates civil rights task force as review of policies continues
Facebook is making an internal civil rights task force permanent, COO Sheryl Sandberg said in a blog post Sunday, a decision that grew out of an ongoing review of the civil rights impact of the social network’s policies and practices. The task force, which includes key leadership and is to be chaired by Sandberg, will focus on Facebook’s content policies, the fairness of its artificial intelligence, and issues regarding privacy and elections, areas Facebook has struggled with.
