Links to today’s show transcripts:
“What to the American Slave Is Your 4th of July?”: James Earl Jones Reads Frederick Douglass’s Historic Speech
This Fourth of July holiday special begins with the words of Frederick Douglass. Born into slavery around 1818, Douglass became a key leader of the abolitionist movement. On July 5, 1852, in Rochester, New York, he gave one of his most famous speeches, “The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro.” He was addressing the Rochester Ladies Antislavery Society. This is actor James Earl Jones reading the speech during a performance of historian Howard Zinn’s acclaimed book, “Voices of a People’s History of the United States.” He was introduced by Zinn.
James Forman Jr. on “Locking Up Our Own: Crime and Punishment in Black America”
Yale University law professor and writer James Forman Jr. won the 2018 Pulitzer Prize in the general nonfiction category for his new book, “Locking Up Our Own: Crime and Punishment in Black America.” The prize committee praised the book for its “examination of the historical roots of contemporary criminal justice in the U.S., based on vast experience and deep knowledge of the legal system, and its often-devastating consequences for citizens and communities of color.” Forman is the son of civil rights activists James Forman Sr. and Constancia Romilly, who met in the 1960s while organizing with SNCC, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee.