Childwatch Column

  • An Update in a Long Fight for Justice

    On April 2, 109-year-olds Viola Fletcher and Lessie Benningfield Randle appeared together at a Tulsa courthouse in a hearing before Oklahoma’s Supreme Court. Mother Fletcher and Mother Randle, as they are known in their communities, are the last two known survivors of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre.

  • A New Site for Truth-Telling

    On March 27, the Freedom Monument Sculpture Park officially opened in Montgomery, Alabama—the newest extraordinary Legacy Site created by the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI).

    | National

  • Reminders of Renewal

    As Christians prepare to celebrate Easter, in the midst of this holy season for so many faith traditions, I return again to the Easter Sunday service Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. preached in April 1957 at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, titled “Questions that Easter Answers.”

  • Reporting on the Road Ahead

    The National Urban League has just released the 2024 edition of its signature publication The State of Black America, and this year the report centered on examining the 60th anniversary of the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964.

  • Black History, Women’s History: Septima Clark

    As Black History Month ends and Women’s History Month begins, it’s always a special privilege to honor leaders who overlap in both—Black women who did their part to change American history.

    | National

  • Black History Month: Celebrating the Arts

    Every year, the Association for the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH), the organization established in 1915 by “the Founder of Black History” Dr. Carter G. Woodson, designates a theme for the observance of Black History Month, and the 2024 theme is African Americans and the Arts.

    | National

  • Child Poverty

    The Child Tax Credit: Moving Forward

    The new Tax Relief for American Families and Workers Act doesn’t include all of the improvements that were part of that expansion, but it is still an important step that will benefit approximately 16 million young people—including more than one in three Black and Brown children under 17.

    | Texas