Brown v. Board of Education convenes first public program at Dole Institute

LAWRENCE -- The Brown v. Board of Educational national commission will open a national series of public programs commemorating the 50th anniversary of the historic decision with a panel discussion by three notable speakers. The discussion will begin at 7 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 18, at the Robert J. Dole Institute of Politics at the University of Kansas.

The two-hour program, "Race, Law and the American Creed: Examining the Social and Legal Impact of Brown v. Board of Education," is free and open to the public. KU's Dole Institute for Politics is requesting that people planning to attend make reservations by Sept. 15. Reservations may be made by calling (785) 235-3939 or by e-mail to the Brown Foundation at brownfound@juno.com.

Historians V.P. Franklin, editor of the Journal of African-American History; David R. Roediger, director of the Center on Democracy in a Multicultural Society at the University of Illinois; and Roger Wilkins, distinguished professor of history at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va., will discuss the impact of this decision.

The KU program is the first in a series being sponsored in cities around the nation by the Brown v. Board of Education 50th anniversary national commission.

"The decision is one of the most important judicial opinions in the country's democratic history," said Deborah J. Dandridge, KU archivist and a member of the Brown v. Board of Education 50th anniversary national commission. "It revolutionized race relations, extended the protection of equal rights to all U.S. citizens, and inspired oppressed peoples around the world to believe in the U.S. creed of freedom and equality.

"In this first program in a state that has a history of leadership in civil rights issues, including this case, we hope to examine the ongoing struggle with fulfilling the decision's many promises," Dandridge said.

The national series will include programs at the University of Texas Institute of Texan Cultures in San Antonio on Oct. 9 and 10, focusing on Latino education; at Clark-Atlanta University in Atlanta on Nov. 5, on women's civil rights; and at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in New York City on Dec. 7, on education issues of faith communities. Two more programs will be scheduled in January and February.

The series will culminate March 14 through 17 at KU with a conference on "The Legacies and Unfinished Business of Brown v. Board."

Biographical sketches

V.P. Franklin is a member of the Teachers College faculty at Columbia University in New York. His teaching focus is the history of African-American education, urban educational history and student activism. His books include "Martin Luther King Jr.: A Biography and Living Our Stories" and "Telling Our Truths: Autobiography and the Making of the African-American Intellectual Tradition."

David Roediger is the Kendrick C. Babcock professor of history at the University of Illinois. He specializes in the history of labor, race relations and the South. He won the Organization of American Historians Merle Curti Prize in 1992 and has received fellowships from the American Council for Learned Societies, American Philosophical Society, Exxon Educational Foundation, National Endowment for the Humanities and Newberry Library. His books include "Colored White: Transcending the Racial Past" and "Wages of Whiteness: Race and the Making of the American Working Class."

Roger Wilkins teaches history at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va., and serves as a frequent commentator and analyst on American public policy and social justice issues. His books include "A Man's Life," "Quiet Riots" and "Jefferson's Pillow." He also is the publisher of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People's journal, the Crisis.

Wilkins was born in 1932 in Kansas City, Mo., where his father was a business manager with the Kansas City Call, a prominent African-American newspaper. Wilkins was a child when his father died. His family moved to New York and later to Michigan, where Wilkins spent his formative years. He received his bachelor's degree in 1953 from the University of Michigan. He earned a law degree in 1956 and interned with Thurgood Marshall at the Legal Defense Fund of the NAACP. Wilkins worked in several capacities as an advocate for justice, beginning his career as a caseworker in the Ohio Welfare Department. Later, Wilkins served as attorney general under President Lyndon B. Johnson.

In 1972, Wilkins began writing for the editorial page of the Washington Post just as the Watergate scandal was breaking. In 1973, he shared a Pulitzer Prize for his Watergate editorials with reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein and cartoonist Herb Block. Wilkins then moved on to the New York Times, where he was the first African-American on the editorial board as well as a columnist. Wilkins also has worked for the Institute for Policy Studies, the Washington Star, National Public Radio and CBS Radio.