The Ticket to Freedom
The Ticket to Freedom
The NAACP and the Struggle for Black Political Integration
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People is the United States’ largest and oldest civil rights organization. After many years of neglect and faultfinding by contemporary activists, historians, and the media, Manfred Berg restores the NAACP to its rightful place at the heart of the civil rights movement. Berg reveals the group’s eminently political character as he assesses both its historical achievements and its failures. He suggests that while the NAACP did make significant gains in furthering the progress of America’s black citizens at the grassroots level, its national agenda should not be discounted. Berg challenges criticisms of recent years that the NAACP’s goals and methods were half-hearted, ineffective, and irrelevant and reveals a resourceful, dynamic, and politically astute organization that has done much to open up the electoral process to greater black participation.
Berg convincingly argues that the NAACP had an acute sense of political realism, and that its pursuit of political influence through the ballot paid off handsomely. Rebutting many of the common criticisms of the organization, he places the NAACP where it belongs—at the center of the struggle for black equality.’—Adam Fairclough, University of East Anglia‘This is a first-rate contribution to the study of civil rights in the United States. It is a thorough, clearly written, and meticulously researched analysis of the NAACP’s political activities from its inception through the civil rights movement.’—David Goldfield, University of North Carolina, Charlotte
Manfred Berg is a professor of history at the Free University of Berlin, and executive director of the Center for U.S. Studies at the Leucorea Foundation of the Martin Luther King University of Halle-Wittenberg. He has authored or edited nine books.
