City Charter change - 1957

APRIL 17
LECTURE

Race, Class, and "Civic Progress:" The St. Louis NAACP and the 1957 City Charter Flight Clarence Lang, University of Michigan

FREE Lecture--10 a.m. Lee Auditorium, Missouri History Museum

In the 1950s, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People spearheaded a grassroots campaign to block the passage of the 1957 City Charter. This NAACP-led coalition opposed the charter’s lack of civil rights protections, and the absence of fair employment practice guarantees in the civil service code. Anti-charter activists viewed plans to reorganize the Board of Aldermen as an effort to undercut the burgeoning electoral influence of an expanding Black populace. This movement marked the beginnings of the modern Civil Rights Movement in St. Louis. Join Clarence Lang, doctoral candidate from the University of Michigan, as he examines the role of the NAACP, and the battle to defeat the charter. The NAACP’s effort announced the beginnings of a postwar local movement for better employment, civil rights and Black electoral power — a movement rooted in a working-class base and direct action strategy.

For more information about the program, please visit www.mohistory.org.