Includes bibliographical references (pages 178-188) and index.

Part 1. Home of the free, land of the slave

Walkers appeal / David Walker

We are natives of this country / Peter Williams, Jr.

The tears of those who will be left behind / James Forten, Sr.

I am a fugitive slave / Jerman Wesley Loguen

A deep and cruel prejudice / John Sweat Rock

Part 2. Emancipation and reconstruction

I want women to have their rights ... I will sahle every palce I go to / Sojourner Truth

Marked was their valor / Robert B. Elliot

We are determined / Blanche Kelso Bruce

Who would be free. themselves must strike the blow / Frederick Douglass

The progress of colored women

Part 3. Renewed racial strategies

The friendship of the two races / Booker T. Washington

This awful slaughter / Ida B. Wells-Barnet

The principles of the universal Negro Improvement Association / Marcus Garvey

In the people we have the real source of ... endless life and unbounded wisdom / W.E.B Du Bois

Part 4. The civil rights revolution

A talk to teachers / James Baldwin

I have a dream / Martin Lurther King, Jr.

Address to Mississippi youth / Malcolm X

Stokely carmichael on black power / Stokely Carmichael

The business of America is war, and it is time for a change / Shirley Chisholm

Black manifesto / James Forman

Part 4. A time for assessment

Black people and the unions / Vernon F. Jordan, Jr.

We can form a national community / Barbara Jordan

Lifting as we climb / Angela Y. Davis

We must dream new dreams / Jesse L. Jackson