SACRAMENTO MAYOR KEVIN JOHNSON by George E. Curry NASHVILLE (NNPA) – The education of Blacks has reached a state of crisis that demands a strong response from all African-Americans, Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson told members of the National Newspaper Publishers Association at its annual convention here.
Catherine Jones sits outside her namesake restaurant, in Elmwood Place, Ohio. Jones understands the community's need to install speed cameras to quell speeding, but now she is among many small business owners worried that the cameras have given the village a speed trap stigma. (AP Photo/Al Behrman, File) by Dan Sewell ELMWOOD PLACE, Ohio (AP) — This little village had a big problem. Each day, thousands of cars — sometimes as many as 18,000 — rolled along Elmwood Place's streets, crossing the third-of-a-mile town to get to neighboring Cincinnati or major employers in bustling suburbs or heavily traveled Interstate 75. Many zipped by Elmwood Place's modest homes and small businesses at speeds well above the 25 mph limit. Bedeviled by tight budgets, the police force was undermanned. The situation, villagers feared, was dangerous. Then the cameras were turned on, and all hell broke loose.
This Aug. 17, 1969 black-and-white file photo shows music fans seeking shelter is a grass hut at the Woodstock Music and Art Festival in Bethel, N.Y. where the sign above reads "Have a Marijuana." (AP Photo, File) by Alicia A. Caldwell and Nancy Benac WASHINGTON (AP) — It took 50 years for American attitudes about marijuana to zigzag from the paranoia of "Reefer Madness" to the excesses of Woodstock back to the hard line of "Just Say No." The next 25 years took the nation from Bill Clinton, who famously "didn't inhale," to Barack Obama, who most emphatically did.
This June 25, 2013 file photo shows representatives from the NAACP Legal Defense Fund standing outside the Supreme Court in Washington awaiting a decision in Shelby County v. Holder, a voting rights case in Alabama. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File) by Suzanne Gamboa WASHINGTON (AP) — Take a glance at the anniversary calendar this year and it's clear that in America, racial progress comes in fits and starts. The Emancipation Proclamation declared slaves to be free 150 years ago. Within a decade, a trio of amendments to the Constitution made them citizens. Over the next century, the Supreme Court and Jim Crow segregation in the South snatched their rights away, Medgar Evers was murdered trying to get them back, and Martin Luther King Jr.'s populist protests yielded laws that restored them before King, too, was killed.
Witness Rachel Jeantel continues her testimony during George Zimmerman's trial in Seminole circuit court in Sanford, Fla. June 27. (AP Photo/Orlando Sentinel, Jacob Langston, Pool) by Kyle Hightower SANFORD, Fla. (AP) — George Zimmerman's defense attorney insisted during several testy exchanges with an important prosecution witness Thursday that Trayvon Martin injected race into a confrontation with the neighborhood watch volunteer and insinuated the young woman was not believable because of inconsistencies in her story. However, 19-year-old Rachel Jeantel stood firm in her testimony about the night Zimmerman shot the unarmed Black 17-year-old after a fight that Jeantel said she overheard while on the phone with Martin. Jeantel has said Martin told her he was being followed by a "creepy-ass cracker" — implying Martin was being followed by a White man because of his race.
MRS. THELMA P. PAYTON (Courtesy: Tuskegee University) TUSKEGEE, Ala.— Thelma P. Payton, the wife of Tuskegee University’s fifth president, Dr. Benjamin F. Payton, died June 20 at the Gulf Coast Medical Center in Fort Myers, Fla. She served as first lady of the university from 1981 to 2010.
HISTORIC DREAM SPEECH—Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., head of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, addresses marchers during his "I Have a Dream" speech at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington Aug. 28, 1963. (AP Photo) by Freddie AllenFor New Pittsburgh CourierWASHINGTON (NNPA)—The hoopla surrounding the observance the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom often ignores that lack of progress made since 1963 on tough issues such as persistent unemployment and wage disparities, according a newly-issued report.
PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File) WASHINGTON (NNPA) – President Obama has pledged that his administration will do “everything in its power” to repair the damage done by the United States Supreme Court on Tuesday when it struck down a key provision of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. “I am deeply disappointed with the Supreme Court’s decision today,” he said in a statement. “For nearly 50 years, the Voting Rights Act – enacted and repeatedly renewed by wide bipartisan majorities in Congress – has helped secure the right to vote for millions of Americans. Today’s decision invalidating one of its core provisions upsets decades of well-established practices that help make sure voting is fair, especially in places where voting discrimination has been historically prevalent.”
This undated image released by Smithfield Foods shows celebrity chef Paula Deen wearing a Smithfield apron as she stands in front of various Smithfield meat products. (AP Photo/Smithfield Foods via PRNewsFoto) by David Bauder NEW YORK (AP) - Paula Deen was dropped by Wal-Mart and her name was stripped from four buffet restaurants on Wednesday, hours after she went on television and tearfully defended herself amid the mounting fallout over her admission of using a racial slur. The story has become both a day-by-day struggle by a successful businesswoman to keep her career afloat and an object lesson on the level of tolerance and forgiveness in society for being caught making an insensitive remark.
Attorney General Eric Holder expresses disappointment in the Supreme Court's 5-4 ruling in the Alabama voting rights case, Shelby County v. Holder, June 25, at the Justice Department in Washington. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite) by George E. Curry WASHINGTON (NNPA) – The Supreme Court’s decision to strike down Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act, the part determining which states and political subdivisions are subject to the preclearance provision of the law, is likely to spark voting rights challenges around the nation, according to a study by New York University.
