Mrs. Mary “White” Ovington was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1865, she was a suffragette, socialist, Unitarian, journalist and a vice president and co-founder of the NAACP, National Association Advancement of Colored People. As the board member, executive secretary and chairman. With her influence The NAACP fought a long legal battle against segregation and racial discrimination in housing, education, employment, voting and transportation. Through books and articles she shares perspectives on the universal relevance of the need to “campaign for black civil rights” because she sees the challenges beyond racial identity as a human rights issues.

Mrs. Ovington wrote a profound article, in The Crisis magazine of January 1915, titled “Segregation”, which was fifty years after the end of slavery and forty years before the Civil Rights movement, placing her perspective dead center in a much bigger plan. The case she makes for “civil rights” and how “black people” should be treated, was extremely progressive back then and would be highly controversial now, especially from a white woman.

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Segregation

By Mary “White” Ovington

(The Crisis, January 1915)

Repost: 3/11/2018