For the freedom of her race
Subtitle: Black women and electoral politics in Illinois, 1877-1932
By: Lisa G. Materson.
Publisher: University of North Carolina Press
Published: 2009
Place of publication: Chapel Hill
Language: eng
Number of pages: 344
ISBN-13: 9780807832714
Subjects: African American women -- Illinois -- Political activity -- History; African Americans -- Suffrage -- Illinois -- History; African American churches -- Political aspects -- Illinois -- History; African Americans -- Migrations -- History; African Americans -- Civil rights -- Illilnois -- History; Sex role -- Political aspects -- Illinois -- History; Elections -- Illinois -- History; Political parties -- United States -- History; Illinois -- Politics and government -- 1865-1950; Chicago (Ill.) -- Politics and government -- To 1950
Description: "Focusing on Chicago and downstate Illinois politics during the incredibly oppressive decades between the end of Reconstruction in 1877 and the election of Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1932 - a period that is often described as the nadir of black life in America - Lisa Materson illuminates the impact that migrating southern black women had on midwestern and national politics, first in the Republican Party and later in the Democratic Party." "Materson shows that as African American women migrated beyond the reach of southern white supremacists, they became active voters, canvassers, suffragists, campaigners, and lobbyists, mobilizing to elect representatives who would push for the enforcement of the Reconstruction Amendments in the South. In so doing, black women kept alive a very distinct strain of Republican Party ideology that favored using federal power to protect black citizenship rights. Materson also examines the Republican failure to enact antilynching legislation, which began the move of black women toward the Democrats, and she discusses women's embrace of the Democratic Party with the election of FDR in 1932." "For the Freedom of Her Race is an important contribution to the story of African American women's role in electoral politics in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, illuminating questions about voting rights, electoral organization, and the struggles for racial and gender equality in the United States."--Jacket.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.