Stay Connected
Atlanta Black Star/Politics/National
NationalNewsRace

3 Slain Civil Rights Activists Among Those To Receive Presidential Medal Of Freedom

Posted byBy Thomas L. Scott | Published on: CommentsComments (0)

ABS_Medal of FreedomThe highest civilian award in the United States will be posthumously awarded to three civil rights activist who were murdered during the 1964 “Freedom Summer.”

James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner will be honored with the Presidential Medal of Freedom during the ceremony at the White House on Nov. 24.

The three young men, who had been working to register Black voters in Mississippi, went to investigate the burning of a Black church. They were arrested by police and then released to the Ku Klux Klan after dark.  The Klansmen beat and murdered them. Their bodies were found six weeks later.

“From activists who fought for change to artists who explored the furthest reaches of our imagination; from scientists who kept American the cutting edge to public servants who help write new chapters in our American story, these citizens have made more extraordinary contributions to our country and the world,” President Obama said in a statement.

Meryl Streep, Stevie Wonder and 14 other Americans will receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Ethel Kennedy, Tom Brokaw, novelist Isabel Allende, composer Stephen Sondheim, veteran U.S. Representative John Dingell and Charles Sifford, who helped desegregate golf, will be honored.

The late choreographer Alvin Ailey, physicist Mildred Dresselhaus, Native American writer and activist Suzan Harjo, former judge and congressman Abner Mikva, former U.S. Representative Patsy Takemoto Mink, the late Mexican-American congressman Edward Roybal, actress Marlo Thomas and economist Robert Solow will receive the award as well.

Still independent.

We hope this story was worth your time. For over 14 years, Atlanta Black Star has stayed Black-owned and independently run. We didn't get here by waiting on ad budgets that were never built to prioritize us. Our readers did that.

Corporate support for Black media has always been thin. Outlets like ours get roughly 1% of the $170 billion spent on U.S. advertising each year, and that margin is shrinking further as advertisers walk back the DEI-linked commitments they made in 2020. That's the backdrop. It's not why we're asking.

The wider picture isn't any steadier. Newspaper ad revenue has fallen more than 80% since 2005, and local newsrooms are closing at a rate of roughly two a week nationwide. When outlets go under, it's rarely the ones built to center a Black perspective from the ground up that get to stick around.

We know a request for support isn't why you came here. But without readers choosing to fund this work directly, the depth of reporting we can do at home and abroad shrinks along with everyone else's. If you're not in a position to give, that doesn't change how much we value you as a reader.

If you are able to, a recurring contribution does more for us than a single one-time gift, because it lets us plan the next investigation instead of just the next invoice. It takes about 30 seconds, no long form, no account. Thank you for continuing to support independent journalism and freedom of the press.

Give once Give monthly Support another way

Related Stories

Back to top