Stories
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- Eliminating Poverty and Economic Inequality
Gullah-Geechee culture, once isolated, now on the brink as world encroaches
Editor’s note: This is the first story in the “Gullah-Geechee vs. Greed” series about the fight to preserve the last of the Black communities on these islands of the southeast Atlantic coast. From the outside, Bobby Grovner’s house on Sapelo Island, Georgia, is a humble but neat affair, its freshly mowed lawn roughly abutting the…
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- Dismantling White Supremacy
SPLC sees rising tide of violence as Hate Crimes Awareness Month kicks off
The deluge of hate crimes in the U.S. has accelerated in the last few years. But the scariest part of the constant roar of violence and mayhem is the knowledge that a large portion of those acts goes unreported. That is why the Southern Poverty Law Center has named October as Hate Crimes Awareness Month.…
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- Eliminating Poverty and Economic Inequality
SPLC rolls out second annual Mississippi Truth, Poverty and Democracy Tour
For three days in October 2024, a bus crisscrossed the Mississippi Delta region carrying dozens of community leaders, legislators and representatives from aid groups, bringing them into rural communities where people who most need their services and leadership live. That Southern Poverty Law Center outreach effort was so successful — and the challenges facing people…
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- Strengthening Democracy & Voting Rights
How youth organizers built a powerhouse for historic change in Georgia
The relentless flashpoints of 2020 ignited a searing flame that laid bare injustice and lit a path for collective resistance. For Yana Batra, then 16, it was a moment that sparked a movement. “That year in 2020 and everything that came with it was so pivotal,” said Batra, now a senior at Georgia Tech. “You…
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- Eliminating Poverty and Economic Inequality
Victims of Jackson, Mississippi, water crisis face eviction from their homes
For weeks this summer, Doris Glasper’s taps were dry. She had paid her rent and utility bills. She knew that much. But her apartment complex’s owner had not. He owed more than $100,000 to JXN Water, the city’s water authority, and the residents of Blossom Apartments were suffering the consequences. The 70-year-old grandmother shares a…
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- Dismantling White Supremacy
Black men in Georgia learn how to lead their communities through SPLC program
In June, 10 men walked into a Columbus, Georgia, meeting room as strangers. Seven weeks later, they would leave as allies. Together, they comprise the inaugural class of the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Black Male Leadership Institute, an initiative the SPLC’s Georgia state office launched this summer. The theme for the institute emerged for Lakisa…
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- Strengthening Democracy & Voting Rights
Georgia Justice Project’s work to enfranchise voters receives SPLC grant
Last year, the Georgia Justice Project (GJP) began placing yard signs around the state with a simple message: “Felony sentence complete? You can vote.” A man driving past a gas station in Conyers saw the sign, pulled over and immediately phoned GJP. “He’s like, ‘Is this true?’” said Ann Colloton, policy and outreach coordinator for…
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- Dismantling White Supremacy
Emmett Till’s sacrifice, memory invoked on 70th anniversary of his murder
Content warning: This article contains graphic descriptions of violence. Reader discretion is advised. Civil rights activist Flonzie Brown Wright was 12 years old in the summer of 1955 and living in Madison County, Mississippi, when her two cousins, ages 15 and 17, came down from Chicago to visit their grandmother in the neighboring, more rural…
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- Strengthening Democracy & Voting Rights
Alabama Youth Council students make their own rules while learning to lead
Rebecca Solaque was after something she couldn’t quite name. Then she found it this spring — in the Jefferson County branch of the Alabama Youth Council, a group of about 10 high school students that meets biweekly at the Hoover Public Library. “I was looking for a sense of community,” said Solaque, a 16-year-old high…
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- Strengthening Democracy & Voting Rights
Redistricting fight in Louisiana city continues five years after census
St. Mary Congregational Church is a small worship center on Louisiana Street just outside downtown Abbeville, Louisiana. Unlike the massive St. Mary Magdalen Catholic Church a few blocks away, the simple, wood-framed building fits snugly into the middle of the neighborhood block, with only its bright white paint and steeple giving its presence away. Attendance among…
