Jesse Jackson: “The Fight for Civil Rights Continues” (2005)

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Defining the proper role and place of the movement for Civil Rights in America has been difficult because of the shorthand that has characterized the 1960s uniquely as that era. In truth, every generation for the past 346 years has been and is still today engaged in the struggle for full citizenship and equality. In fact, in 1830 the first series of national meetings of Colored men began with a civil rights agenda that stood for an end to slavery, the provision of the vote and education and a stake in the new America as full citizens.

Fighting slavery and its progeny was necessary because it had built the foundation for our social space at the bottom of society. It also distorted the project of American democracy and led almost logically to a civil war, and it would also follow that the Constitution should be amended to create a new framework of racial relations based on equality.

Thus the goals in these amendments defined the task of Black leadership...