Sublime

Above all, she taught me the importance of using my voice as a Black woman in America to call out injustice wherever I see it. Her story and the lessons she taught through her words and example provide a model for how I approach the ongoing fight for human rights.

the age of forty-four, Hamer set out to let her light shine when she became a member of SNCC, working alongside many of the activists who had played such a pivotal role in her entrance into the civil rights movement.

Johnson had persuaded Graham, and Graham had persuaded Rauh, and Rauh had persuaded Wilkins—and now, in that law library on K Street, Wilkins persuaded the Leadership Conference. In the late afternoon, at the end of a long day, the conference issued a statement saying that “Disappointing as the Senate version is, it does contain some potential good

in 1971, while speaking at the NAACP Legal Defense Fund Institute in New York City: “But you see now, baby, whether you have a Ph.D., D.D., or no D, we’re in this bag together. And whether you’re

The light Hamer began to shine when she walked out of the mass meeting on August 27, 1962, illuminated the way for millions of people, from all walks of life, in the decades to follow.