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Gale Research Complete: Archives Unbound Guide

A subject focused guide for the Archives Unbound Collections available in Gale Research Complete

African American Studies Collections

Black Economic Empowerment: The National Negro Business League

Source Institution:
Library of Congress
Extent:
15,779 images
Date Range:
1901-1928
 
Booker T. Washington, founder of the National Negro Business League, believed that solutions to the problem of racial discrimination were primarily economic, and that bringing African Americans into the middle class was the key. In 1900, he established the League "to promote the commercial and financial development of the Negro," and headed it until his death. This collection comprises the National Negro Business League files in Part III of the Booker T. Washington Papers in the possession of the Library of Congress.

Papers of Amiri Baraka, Poet Laureate of the Black Power Movement

Source Institution:
Auburn Avenue Research Library on African American Culture and History, Atlanta-Fulton Public Library System
Extent:
9,297 images
Date Range:
1913-1998
 
The collection consists of materials from the years 1913 through 1998 that document African American author and activist Amiri Baraka and were gathered by Dr. Komozi Woodard in the course of his research. The extensive documentation includes poetry, organizational records, print publications, articles, plays, speeches, personal correspondence, oral histories, as well as some personal records. The materials cover Baraka's involvement in the politics in Newark, N.J. and in Black Power movement organizations such as the Congress of African People, the National Black Conference movement, the Black Women's United Front. Later materials document Baraka's increasing involvement in Marxism.

Reconstruction, Jim Crow, and the Enforcement of Federal Law in the South, 1871-1884

Source Institution:
U.S. National Archives
Extent:
59,185 images
Date Range:
1871-1884
 
This AU collection on law and order documents the efforts of district attorneys from southern states to uphold federal laws in the states that fought in the Confederacy or were Border States. This publication includes their correspondence with the attorney general as well all other letters received by the attorney general from the states in question during that period, including the correspondence of marshals, judges, convicts, and concerned or aggrieved citizens. This publication comprises the letters and enclosures contained in the source-chronological file for various states in the South.

Republic of New Afrika

Source Institution:
Federal Bureau of Investigation Headquarters Library
Extent:
14,163 images
Date Range:
1968-1980
 

The FBI believed the Republic of New Afrika to be a seditious group and conducted raids on its meetings, which led to violent confrontations, and the arrest and repeated imprisonment of RNA leaders. In addition, the group was a target of the COINTELPRO operation by the federal authorities, but was also subject to diverse Red Squad activities of the Michigan State Police and Detroit Police Department-among other cities.

This collection provides documentation collected by the FBI through intelligence activities, informants, surveillance, and cooperation with local police departments. These documents chronicle the activities of Republic of New Afrika national and local leaders, power struggles within the organization, its growing militancy, and its affiliations with other Black militant organizations.

African America, Communists, and the National Negro Congress, 1933-1947

Source Institution:
Schomburg Center, New York Public Library
Extent:
98,600 images
Date Range:
1933-1947
 
The Negro Labor Victory Committee, founded in 1942, was an organization of black and white trade union officials from the American Federation of Labor, the Congress of Industrial Organizations, and the Railroad Brotherhoods. It was organized to encourage black workers to fight for equality within organized labor, government, and the Armed Forces.
This collection comprises the files of John P. Davis, Edward Strong, and Revels Cayton, as well as financial records. Included with the National Negro Congress records are Davis' files from the Negro Industrial League, 1933, of which he had been executive secretary; Davis' files from the Joint Committee on National Recovery, 1933-1935, an ad-hoc lobby to protect black interests in the federal government; and his subject/reference files on different aspects of the "Negro question." Also, records of the Negro Labor Victory Committee, 1942-1945, including files of Charles A. Collins, executive secretary, and M. Moran Weston, field secretary, consisting of correspondence, subject/organization files, and printed matter.

Black Liberation Army and the Program of Armed Struggle

Source Institution:
The Federal Bureau of Investigation Library
Extent:
8,452 images
Date Range:
1970-1983
 

The Black Liberation Army (BLA) was an underground, black nationalist-Marxist militant organization that operated from 1970 to 1981. Composed largely of former Black Panthers (BPP), the organization's program was one of "armed struggle" and its stated goal was to "take up arms for the liberation and self-determination of black people in the United States." The BLA carried out a series of bombings, robberies (what participants termed "expropriations"), and prison breaks.

If one were to examine, African American history, one would be surprised to find a long history of militant armed struggle. Slave rebellions, urban "guerilla" activities in the 1960s, rural defense leagues, were all part of a tapestry of black militancy. An icon of black armed struggle, the Black Liberation Army, was a linchpin in understanding the development of the "armed rebellion" phenomenon in the late 1960s through early 1980s. The idea of the Black Liberation Army emerged from conditions in African American communities: conditions of poverty, indecent housing, massive unemployment, poor medical care, and inferior education. The BLA arose because of the political, social, and economic oppression of felt by African American people in the urban areas.

Black Nationalism and the Revolutionary Action Movement: The Papers of Muhammad Ahmad 

Source Institution:
Personal Collection of Dr. Muhammad Ahmad
Extent:
17,210 images
Date Range:
1962-1999
 
This collection of RAM records reproduces the writings and statements of the Revolutionary Action Movement (RAM) and its leaders. It also covers organizations that evolved from or were influenced by RAM and persons that had close ties to RAM. The most prominent organization that evolved from RAM was the African People's Party. Organizations influenced by RAM include the Black Panther Party, League of Revolutionary Black Workers, Youth Organization for Black Unity, African Liberation Support Committee, and the Republic of New Africa. Individuals associated with RAM and documented in this collection include Robert F. Williams, Malcolm X, Amiri Baraka, General Gordon Baker Jr., Yuri Kochiyama, Donald Freeman, James and Grace Lee Boggs, Herman Ferguson, Askia Muhammad Toure (Rolland Snellings), and Kwame Ture (Stokely Carmichael).

Franklin D. Roosevelt and Race Relations, 1933-1945

Source Institution:
Franklin D. Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, NY
Extent:
15,428 images
Date Range:
1933-1945
 
This new series contains a collection of essential materials for the study of the early development of the Civil Rights Movement-concerned with the issues of Lynching, Segregation, Race riots, and Employment discrimination. FDR assumed the presidency of a nation in which white supremacy was a significant cultural and political force. Many states denied or severely restricted voting rights to African Americans and used their political power to further diminish their status and to deny them the benefits and opportunities of society. There was constant pressure on FDR to support anti-lynching legislation. But civil rights were a stepchild of the New Deal. Bent on economic recovery and reform and having to work through powerful Southern congressmen, whose seniority placed them at the head of key congressional committees, the president hesitated to place civil rights on his agenda. FDR's record on civil rights has been the subject of much controversy. This new collection from FDR's Official File provides insight into his political style and presents an instructive example of how he balanced moral preference with political realities.