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28/7/05
1:14 pm
Page 75
U.S. politician Reverend Jesse Jackson delivers an address on the
importance of the black vote in London, March 9, 2005. The former
Presidential candidate backed the Operation Black Vote campaign to
encourage black participation in the 2005 general election in Britain.
REUTERS/Toby Melville
hold them to account. One cannot ask why black
Americans are not better organised without wondering
why Americans in general, from trade unions to
feminists, have failed to forge their collective strength
into some kind of meaningful political muscle.
But black America is different. The home of its political
radicalism lies not in the factory, like labourism, or in
the colleges, like student activism, but in the churches.
There was good reason for this. The church was the
only independent organisation African Americans
were allowed during slavery and on through into
segregation, which ended just 40 years ago. The
church became the focal point not just for worship
but resistance. The preacher’s role was not just the
spiritual adviser but the political leader. Think of the
black Americans who have risen to prominence during
the last century. There are a few, like Marcus Garvey
(although the fact that he was of Jamaican descent
was significant), W.E.B Dubois, Harold Washington
and Angela Davis, who emerged through other social
movements be they pan-Africanism or communism.
But there are more, like Adam Clayton Powell (head
of the Abyssinian Baptist church in Harlem), Martin
Luther King, Elijah Muhammad, Malcolm X, Louis
F