Black American Biographies

For Americans, the pursuit of happiness has long been bound up with striving for excellence and achievement. But, although the Declaration of Independence found the fundamental equality of all people (or at least of men) to be self-evident and the right to liberty inalienable, for African Americans the pursuit of not just achievement and excellence but of liberty and equality was long obstructed by barriers of “race” and class and by the social and economic framework of life in the United States. As this book details, the black experience in America has been marked by hardship unlike that experienced by any other ethnic group in the country. Within these pages, readers will meet or rediscover a host of African Americans who have overcome these barriers to make important contributions to American political, religious, social, economic, and cultural life. In doing so, these men and women not only improved the lot of African Americans but that of all Americans.