COVID-19 Update:
As of 22 November 2020 the RIAS Library will again be open to individual visitors. We can only accommodate a limited number per day, so please book an apppointment in advance. Stay safe!
"From the Vaults" is the RIAS library and archives blog, in which we highlight remarkable historical persons and events through documents from our collections.
From Civil Rights to Black Power: The Radicalization and Decline of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)
In June of 1966, Civil Rights activists from around the country gathered in Mississippi to organize black communities in support of their newly acclaimed voting rights. They rushed to the southern state after James Meredith, who had planned to do a solo March Against Fear to encourage black voter registration, was shot and wounded two days into his journey. Many prominent Civil Rights leaders took over his march along the 220-mile route through the Mississippi Delta, speaking in several cities and helping many African Americans register. That month, no speech stood out as much as Stokely Carmichael’s on 16 June at a rally in Greenwood. When it was his turn to take the stage, the chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) announced a new direction for his organization: Black Power. Read more.