National

Legacy of ‘First Lady of the Black Press’ Still Relevant Today

Published

10 years ago

July 29, 2015

Oakland Post

Ethel Payne

By Jazelle Hunt
NNPA Washington Correspondent

WASHINGTON (NNPA) – When James McGrath Morris set out to write his latest book, he didn’t know how timely it would be. When Eye on the Struggle: Ethel Payne, The First Lady of the Black Press hit shelves, Essence magazine had just released its Black Lives Matter issue. The Justice Department had closed its investigation into Trayvon Martin’s murder, with no charges. Mainstream media was scrambling to report on police violence and systemic racial ills, and Black Americans took much of this coverage to task for its racist, shallow, or negligent portrayals.

“We get these events filtered through the mainstream media. The mainstream media is still very White. I don’t mean they don’t hire people of color…it’s a perspective issue. The fact the media had a debate over the use of the word ‘terrorist’ [for Dylann Roof] in South Carolina is an indication,” said Morris.

“So what I found is that Ethel Payne’s story, her perspective, her form of journalism 50 years ago, still has relevance today. Because while we may have made leaps in terms of segregation…the dominant filter today remains a White-controlled media.”

Ethel Payne was poking holes in that filter at a time when the White majority fought against the tide of sustained agitation to secure civil and human rights for all. At the Chicago Defender, Payne was the eyes and ears of the Civil Rights Movement, reporting from its front lines in the Deep South, press conferences at the White House, and iconic rulings at the Supreme Court. In 1953, she became the third Black person to join the White House Press Corps, and was known for persistently prodding President Dwight D. Eisenhower on Jim Crow laws and desegregation efforts.

In the ’50s and ’60s, she jetted around the globe for international stories such as Black soldiers in Vietnam and the Nigerian Civil War, becoming the first Black woman to be a fulltime foreign correspondent. Yet, she always returned for on-the-ground coverage of moments that would become history, like the start of the Montgomery bus boycott and the desegregation of Little Rock, Ark.’s Central High School.

In 1972, Payne joined CBS and became the first Black woman commentator at a major network. In 2002, she was memorialized on a postage stamp.

With 40 years of tireless journalism and a legacy honed at a Black-owned newspaper, Payne earned her reputation as the “First Lady of the Black Press.”

“When The New York Times or The Washington Post would report on the passage of the Civil Rights Act of ‘64 or the Voting Rights Act of ‘65, the tone of the articles was that these were munificent gifts being given to a disenfranchised people,” Morris said.

“Whereas, if you opened up the Afro American or the Pittsburgh Courier or Chicago Defender, what you were seeing was coverage of the fact that these were victories, hard-won victories by people who laid their lives on the line. Nothing was being given. In fact, [Payne’s] coverage often highlighted the inadequacies of these pieces of legislation.”

In the early ‘70s, Ernest Green, a member of the Little Rock Nine, made a quip to Payne about what desegregation would do to such coverage.

“He said to her that the successes she and others made with the Civil Rights Movement were going to put the Black Press out of business. Obviously, that was too strong of a determination, because there’s still a viable Black press, but his bigger point was right in that the White media was going to raid the Black press for the best reporters, offer them jobs at much higher pay. And if you’re raising a family, what are you going to do?” Morris recounted.

“Many of the best reporters were lured away. But also, importantly, the economic basis of the Black press was undercut. Because when the White press refused to cover Black communities – high school tournaments, weddings, graduations, obituaries – there was an economic reason for [Black papers].”

Further, another side effect of integration and the Civil Rights Movement is that subsequent generations do not get a thorough and true education on Black history, or how the Movement happened. Payne said as much at a speaking engagement at her childhood church, [Greater] St. John A.ME. Church.

“She told her audience that, ours was a generation who laid their lives on the line to send our kids to college, but in doing so forgot to tell them our story. I like to expand that…we tend to teach the Civil Rights Movement focused on its leadership,” he said.

“Ethel Payne was part of the lesser-known group, she’s in the second, third tier of the Civil Rights Movement. I see younger people…waiting for somebody else to come and lead them. But these movements come from everyday people.”

Morris, a former journalist who also taught high school history for a decade, has been writing biographies and narrative nonfiction for many years. In searching for a new subject, he stumbled upon Payne’s name, which was unknown to him at the time. With a little more research, he was startled to find that few historians had taken a deep look at her contributions to journalism and the Civil Rights Movement.

“For me, [this book] has been the greatest experience of my life. It’s been really an honor, for me as an author, to do a book that matters,” Morris said. “I’ve had the privilege of learning that race really matters, but I didn’t know it because I was able to stay removed from it. That, to my mind, is Ethel Payne’s gift to me.”

Payne’s personal papers and journals are housed in Washington, D.C. with the Library of Congress’ Manuscript Division and the Moorland-Spingarn Research Center at Howard University, and in New York at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture.

Eye on the Struggle: Ethel Payne, The First Lady of the Black Press is available at major book retailers. Signed copies can be purchased via www.jamesmcgrathmorris.com/eyeonstruggle.html.

“She went as a reporter to the front lines of the Civil Rights Movement…to report back to African Americans…to activate them,” Morris said. “The more people learn about Ethel Payne, I think they too will feel a sense of power.”

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Activism

California Rideshare Drivers and Supporters Step Up Push to Unionize

Today in California, over 600,000 rideshare drivers want the ability to form or join unions for the sole purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid and protection. It’s a right, and recently at the State Capitol, a large number of people, including some rideshare drivers and others working in the gig economy, reaffirmed that they want to exercise it.

Published

2 hours ago

April 28, 2025

Oakland Post

Shutterstock

By Antonio‌ ‌Ray‌ ‌Harvey‌
California‌ ‌Black‌ ‌Media‌

On July 5, 1935, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed into federal law the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). Also known as the “Wagner Act,” the law paved the way for employees to have “the right to self-organization, to form, join, or assist labor organizations,” and “to bargain collectively through representatives of their own choosing, according to the legislation’s language.

On April 8, the rideshare drivers held a rally with lawmakers to garner support for Assembly Bill (AB) 1340, the “Transportation Network Company Drivers (TNC) Labor Relations Act.”

Authored by Assemblymembers Buffy Wicks (D-Oakland) and Marc Berman (D-Menlo Park), AB 1340 would allow drivers to create a union and negotiate contracts with industry leaders like Uber and Lyft.

“All work has dignity, and every worker deserves a voice — especially in these uncertain times,” Wicks said at the rally. “AB 1340 empowers drivers with the choice to join a union and negotiate for better wages, benefits, and protections. When workers stand together, they are one of the most powerful forces for justice in California.”

Wicks and Berman were joined by three members of the California Legislative Black Caucus (CLBC): Assemblymembers Tina McKinnor (D-Inglewood), Sade Elhawary (D-Los Angeles), and Isaac Bryan (D-Ladera Heights).

Yvonne Wheeler, president of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor; April Verrett, President of Service Employees International Union (SEIU); Tia Orr, Executive Director of SEIU; and a host of others participated in the demonstration on the grounds of the state capitol.

“This is not a gig. This is your life. This is your job,” Bryan said at the rally. “When we organize and fight for our collective needs, it pulls from the people who have so much that they don’t know what to do with it and puts it in the hands of people who are struggling every single day.”

Existing law, the “Protect App-Based Drivers and Services Act,” created by Proposition (Prop) 22, a ballot initiative, categorizes app-based drivers for companies such as Uber and Lyft as independent contractors.

Prop 22 was approved by voters in the November 2020 statewide general election. Since then, Prop 22 has been in court facing challenges from groups trying to overturn it.

However, last July, Prop 22 was upheld by the California Supreme Court last July.

In a 2024, statement after the ruling, Lyft stated that 80% of the rideshare drivers they surveyed acknowledged that Prop 22 “was good for them” and “median hourly earnings of drivers on the Lyft platform in California were 22% higher in 2023 than in 2019.”

Wicks and Berman crafted AB 1340 to circumvent Prop 22.

“With AB 1340, we are putting power in the hands of hundreds of thousands of workers to raise the bar in their industry and create a model for an equitable and innovative partnership in the tech sector,” Berman said.

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Activism

California Holds the Line on DEI as Trump Administration Threatens School Funding

The conflict began on Feb. 14, when Craig Trainor, acting assistant secretary for civil rights at the U.S. Department of Education (DOE), issued a “Dear Colleague” letter warning that DEI-related programs in public schools could violate federal civil rights law. The letter, which cited Title VI of the Civil Rights Act and the 2023 Supreme Court ruling in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, which ended race-conscious admissions, ordered schools to eliminate race-based considerations in areas such as admissions, scholarships, hiring, discipline, and student programming.

Published

3 hours ago

April 28, 2025

Oakland Post

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By Joe W. Bowers Jr
California Black Media

California education leaders are pushing back against the Trump administration’s directive to dismantle diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs in its K-12 public schools — despite threats to take away billions in federal funding.

The conflict began on Feb. 14, when Craig Trainor, acting assistant secretary for civil rights at the U.S. Department of Education (DOE), issued a “Dear Colleague” letter warning that DEI-related programs in public schools could violate federal civil rights law. The letter, which cited Title VI of the Civil Rights Act and the 2023 Supreme Court ruling in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, which ended race-conscious admissions, ordered schools to eliminate race-based considerations in areas such as admissions, scholarships, hiring, discipline, and student programming.

According to Trainor, “DEI programs discriminate against one group of Americans to favor another.”

On April 3, the DOE escalated the pressure, sending a follow-up letter to states demanding that every local educational agency (LEA) certify — within 10 business days — that they were not using federal funds to support “illegal DEI.” The certification requirement, tied to continued federal aid, raised the stakes for California, which receives more than $16 billion annually in federal education funding.

So far, California has refused to comply with the DOE order.

“There is nothing in state or federal law that outlaws the broad concepts of ‘diversity,’ ‘equity,’ or ‘inclusion,’” wrote David Schapira, California’s Chief Deputy Superintendent of Public Instruction, in an April 4 letter to superintendents and charter school administrators. Schapira noted that all of California’s more than 1,000 traditional public school districts submit Title VI compliance assurances annually and are subject to regular oversight by the state and the federal government.

In a formal response to the DOE on April 11, the California Department of Education, the State Board of Education, and State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond collectively rejected the certification demand, calling it vague, legally unsupported, and procedurally improper.

“California and its nearly 2,000 LEAs (including traditional public schools and charter schools) have already provided the requisite guarantee that its programs and services are, and will be, in compliance with Title VI and its implementing regulation,” the letter says.

Thurmond added in a statement, “Today, California affirmed existing and continued compliance with federal laws while we stay the course to move the needle for all students. As our responses to the United States Department of Education state and as the plain text of state and federal laws affirm, there is nothing unlawful about broad core values such as diversity, equity and inclusion. I am proud of our students, educators and school communities who continue to focus on teaching and learning, despite federal actions intended to distract and disrupt.”

California officials say that the federal government cannot change existing civil rights enforcement standards without going through formal rule-making procedures, which require public notice and comment.

Other states are taking a similar approach. In a letter to the DOE, Daniel Morton-Bentley, deputy commissioner and counsel for the New York State Education Department, wrote, “We understand that the current administration seeks to censor anything it deems ‘diversity, equity & inclusion.’ But there are no federal or State laws prohibiting the principles of DEI.”

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Arts and Culture

BOOK REVIEW: Love, Rita: An American Story of Sisterhood, Joy, Loss, and Legacy

When Bridgett M. Davis was in college, her sister Rita was diagnosed with lupus, a disease of the immune system that often left her constantly tired and sore. Davis was a bit unfazed, but sympathetic to Rita’s suffering and also annoyed that the disease sometimes came between them. By that time, they needed one another more than ever.

Published

6 hours ago

April 28, 2025

Oakland Post

Love Rita Book Cover. Courtesy of Harper.

By Terri Schlichenmeyer

Author: Bridgett M. Davis, c.2025, Harper, $29.99, 367 Pages

Take care.

Do it because you want to stay well, upright, and away from illness. Eat right, swallow your vitamins and hydrate, keep good habits and hygiene, and cross your fingers. Take care as much as you can because, as in the new book, “Love, Rita” by Bridgett M. Davis, your well-being is sometimes out of your hands.

It was a family story told often: when Davis was born, her sister, Rita, then four years old, stormed up to her crying newborn sibling and said, ‘Shut your … mouth!’

Rita, says Davis, didn’t want a little sister then. She already had two big sisters and a neighbor who was somewhat of a “sister,” and this baby was an irritation. As Davis grew, the feeling was mutual, although she always knew that Rita loved her.

Over the years, the sisters tried many times not to fight — on their own and at the urging of their mother — and though division was ever present, it eased when Rita went to college. Davis was still in high school then, and she admired her big sister.

She eagerly devoured frequent letters sent to her in the mail, signed, “Love, Rita.”

When Davis was in college herself, Rita was diagnosed with lupus, a disease of the immune system that often left her constantly tired and sore. Davis was a bit unfazed, but sympathetic to Rita’s suffering and also annoyed that the disease sometimes came between them. By that time, they needed one another more than ever.

First, they lost their father. Drugs then invaded the family and addiction stole two siblings. A sister and a young nephew were murdered in a domestic violence incident. Their mother was devastated; Rita’s lupus was an “added weight of her sorrow.”

After their mother died of colon cancer, Rita’s lupus took a turn for the worse.

“Did she even stand a chance?” Davis wrote in her journal.

“It just didn’t seem possible that she, someone so full of life, could die.”

Let’s start here: once you get past the prologue in “Love, Rita,” you may lose interest. Maybe.

Most of the stories that author Bridgett M. Davis shares are mildly interesting, nothing rare, mostly commonplace tales of growing up in the 1960s and ’70s with a sibling. There are a lot of these kinds of stories, and they tend to generally melt together. After about fifty pages of them, you might start to think about putting the book aside.

But don’t. Not quite yet.

In between those everyday tales, Davis occasionally writes about being an ailing Black woman in America, the incorrect assumptions made by doctors, the history of medical treatment for Black people (women in particular), attitudes, and mythologies. Those passages are now and then, interspersed, but worth scanning for.

This book is perhaps best for anyone with the patience for a slow-paced memoir, or anyone who loves a Black woman who’s ill or might be ill someday. If that’s you and you can read between the lines, then “Love, Rita” is a book to take in carefully.