The study of poverty has flourished in recent decades. Why haven’t the lives of the poor improved?
The War on Poverty comes to life in this newly updated edition of a book that explores how welfare mothers in Las Vegas built an organizing juggernaut that transformed lives.
Scranton Joe, once the neoliberal Senator from Delaware, translated left ideas into unthreatening but inspiring language Wednesday night. Which is a huge accomplishment.
Policymakers in the 1960s had the answers - give political and economic power to the people - but walked away. Instead, policymakers blamed black people for the instability, ignoring the buildup of centuries of racial oppression.
Beginning in 1964 and stretching through today, conservative leaders systematically undermined the programs that shaped Johnson’s War on Poverty, frequently deploying racist and sexist arguments to take away public assistance from the poorest Americans. Their rhetoric didn’t directly undo these social programs, but it chipped away at their foundation and altered Americans’ perceptions about the proper role of government.
Forty years after founding the Children’s Defense Fund, which advocates for federal and state resources for children, Edelman is still at work in the fund’s red brick building on E Street NW, displaying at 74 the same passion she had in 1967, when she was a 27-year-old civil rights attorney leading Sen. Robert F. Kennedy through the Mississippi Delta.
Spread the word