In 1964, Fannie Lou Hamer stood before the Democratic National Convention (DNC). She delivered one of the most searing indictments of American democracy.

Fannie Lou Hamer was born in 1917, the 20th child of Lou Ella and James Lee Townsend, sharecroppers east of the Mississippi Delta. She first joined her family in the cotton fields at the age of six.

It wasn’t called voter suppression back then, but civil rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer knew exactly how white authorities in Mississippi felt about Black people voting in the 1960s.

This year’s Democratic National Convention in Chicago is a historic moment as Vice President Kamala Harris becomes the Democratic presidential nominee. Harris’ ascent to this position — as ...

Her work has previously appeared in USA Today and Washington Life Magazine. When former sharecropper Fannie Lou Hamer first learned that Black people were finally allowed to vote, she knew exactly ...

There are moments in our national life when the weight of injustice feels almost immovable, when truth is twisted, rights are ...

Civic education is not just important — it is essential. Too many of our young people do not know who represents them.

Organizer Charlie Cobb recalls being convinced by Fannie Lou Hamer. "Mrs. Hamer backed me up into a corner and said, 'Well, Charlie, I'm glad you came. What's the problem with having more people come?

She is the author of Set the World on Fire: Black Nationalist Women and the Global Struggle for Freedom and Until I Am Free: Fannie Lou Hamer’s Vision of America, which will be published by ...

In 1964, Fannie Lou Hamer stood before the Democratic National Convention (DNC). She delivered one of the most searing indictments of American democracy. “Is this America, the land of the free ...