Bøker av Adam Fairclough

"e;A masterful and revelatory examination of Reconstruction populated by a cast of compelling characters who leap to life in all their glory, gore, and pathos."e;--Lawrence N. Powell, author of The Accidental City: Improvising New Orleans"e;Illuminates a complex period, city, and state and advances a reinterpretation of Reconstruction politics that is both welcome and overdue."e;--Paul D. Escott, author of Uncommonly Savage: Civil War and Remembrance in Spain and the United StatesThe chaotic years after the Civil War are often seen as a time of uniquely American idealism--a revolutionary attempt to rebuild the nation that paved the way for the civil rights movement of the twentieth century. But Adam Fairclough rejects this prevailing view, challenging prominent historians such as Eric Foner and James McPherson. He argues that Reconstruction was, quite simply, a disaster, and that the civil rights movement triumphed despite it, not because of it.Fairclough takes readers to Natchitoches, Louisiana, a majority-black parish deep in the cotton South. Home to a vibrant Republican Party led by former slaves, ex-Confederates, and free people of color, the parish was a bastion of Republican power and the ideal place for Reconstruction to have worked. Yet although it didn't experience the extremes of violence that afflicted the surrounding region, Natchitoches fell prey to Democratic intimidation. Its Republican leaders were eventually driven out of the parish.Reconstruction failed, Fairclough argues, because the federal government failed to enforce the rights it had created. Congress had given the Republicans of the South and the Freedmen's Bureau an impossible task--to create a new democratic order based on racial equality in an area tortured by deep-rooted racial conflict. Moving expertly between a profound local study and wider developments in Washington, The Revolution That Failed offers a sobering perspective on how Reconstruction affected African American citizens and what its long-term repercussions were for the nation.

Provides an overview of the enormous contributions made by African American teachers to the black freedom movement in the United States. Beginning with the close of the Civil War, Adam Fairclough explores the development of educational ideals in the black community up through the years of the civil rights movement.

Civil rights historian Fairclough chronicles the odyssey of black teachers in the South from emancipation in 1865 to integration 100 years later. This book is indispensable for understanding how blacks and whites interacted after the abolition of slavery, and how black communities coped with the challenges of freedom and oppression.

Demonstrates the persistence of racial inequalities and the importance of race as a factor in politics. This book concludes that a deep-seated culture of corruption compromises the ability of public officials to tackle intransigent problems of urban poverty and inadequate schools.

Charts the stages of Martin Luther King's philosophical and political growth, examining his opposition to the Vietnam War, his response to Black Power, and his growing concern for economic justice. Fairclough rounds out his portrait with an assessment of King's legacy to America and his continuing relevance to the struggle for freedom and equality.

This work looks beyond the towering figure of Martin Luther King, Jr, to disclose the workings of the organization that supported him. It shows how Julian Bond, Jesse Jackson, Wyatt Walker, and others played a hand in the triumphs of Selma and Birmingham and the frustrations of Albany and Chicago.