Five (5) Civil Rights Lessons We Can Learn from Dr. W.E.B. DuBois this Black History Month

Dr. W.E.B. DuBois

Dr. W.E.B. DuBois, was perhaps the greatest scholar of African American History and Civil Rights in history. Dr. W.E.B. DuBois, graduated from Fisk University, and then later Harvard University, eventually earning the Ph.D. in history from Harvard. Thereafter, Dr. DuBois went on to teach at several colleges, including Historically Black College, Atlanta University. Dr. DuBois was a voracious scholar, and put his scholarship to work by helping to found the Niagara Movement, which eventually became the NAACP, and served as the editor of its magazine, the Crisis.

Dr. W.E.B. DuBois initially planned to share his agenda at a national conference in 1904 in New York City, with Booker T. Washington, Founding President of Tuskegee Institute, now University, who was considered by many at that time to be the unofficial leader of Black America. Dr. DuBois hoped that he and President Washington could agree on some common goals for their people. Dr. DuBois’ priorities for Civil Rights Activism are still relevant and instructive for today’s struggles for civil and human rights, and social justice.

While Dr. DuBois’ agenda included a total of 10 recommendations, I have only included five (5) for this post, (I will likely share the other five (5) in a future post). These five recommendations are:

Full political (essentially voting)rights for African Americans

African American Higher Education especially for Black youth

A National publication to address African Americans’ issues

An organized legal fight for civil rights in the courts.

A study of the state of African Americans in this country.

What can we learn from Dr. DuBois?

Voting Rights

First and foremost voting rights are imperative. Dr. DuBois had a keen understanding that if citizenship means anything, it must mean full participation and rights in voting so that African Americans can decide who represents them in government.

2. Higher Education

Next, Dr. DuBois’ status as one of the more highly educated members of Black leadership in history, as well as his life and work as an educator, underscores the value that he placed on an education in the fight for civil rights.

3. National Publication

Dr. DuBois, throughout his prolific writing and his editorial work with the Crisis, recognized the power of Black media to tell stories by the people who lived it. All of these areas, education, law, media, voting, and sociology are important keys to continuing the fight against racial oppression and white supremacy.

4. Civil Rights Law

Also, Dr. DuBois understood and highlighted the need for continued legal redress and litigation in the courts, as a battlefield for the struggle for civil rights. As courts seem increasingly ready to reduce or narrow civil rights gains of the past, this point is never more relevant than right now.

5. State of Black America

Furthermore, Dr. DuBois, realized that an actual deep study was needed to really understand the plight of African Americans and the lingering affects of slavery, and eventually Jim Crow segregation that stunted the growth of African Americans in many areas of life.

So during this Black History Month, let’s remember Dr. W.E.B. DuBois and his recommendations for the advancement of civil rights for African Americans, and recommit ourselves to strive for these same ideals today.

Continue in Civil Rights…

Brian