This month we celebrate our black sisters and brothers, starring those who helped found the modern Women's Movement.
 Black feminism dates back to the nineteenth century when women such as Maria Stewart, Anna Julia Cooper and Sojourner Truth challenged the conventions and mores of their era to speak against slavery and in support of black women's rights. These women did not refer to themselves as feminists; however their beliefs and activism ignited a tradition of anti-racist and anti-sexist political movement and thought which now defines black American feminism. (left: Sojouner Truth, Abraham Lincoln)
The 20th century feminist movement was inspired by the black civil rights movement. Several black women active in the fight for black civil rights played an outstanding role in the founding of the National Organization for Women. When Betty Friedan awakened thousands with The Feminine Mystique, women in leadership roles realized that here at last was someone who had the renown and drive needed to lead a feminist movement.
 Among those who urged Betty to use her fame to form an NAACP for women was the late great Rev. Anna Pauline (Pauli) Murray (1910-1985). Pauli Murray was a founder of the Congress of Racial Equality in 1942, and by the time she graduated from Howard Law School in 1944 she was an unabashed feminist as well, coining the concept "Jane Crow" piggybacking the fledging women's movement onto the demand for civil rights. In 1966 she helped found NOW. Other black women in that exceptional group were Aileen Hernandez, and the late Anna Arnold Hedgeman and Ollie Butler Moore. (right: Aileen Hernandez)
 Once NOW was formed two prominent black women, Shirley Chisholm and Florynce Kennedy, immediately joined the New York chapter. Chisholm, the newly elected Congresswoman from Brooklyn, in speaking for the need for a feminist movement, declared she'd suffered as much from sexism as racism. "Flo" Kennedy, a lawyer who had represented black civil rights leaders, attended the first New York NOW meeting in early 1967 and was active in NOW and in the Women's Liberation movement. She helped organize many actions, including the demonstration against the Miss America pageant in Atlantic City and a "pee-in" at Harvard to protest the lack of women's toilet facilities. In the 1960's and 70's the door of her apartment off Fifth Avenue was ever open to feminists to partake of soul food and wisdom sprinkled with her unique bon mots.
Although black women didn't join NOW in droves, in small cities around the country many employed in city and state governments joined with their white sisters to force the establishment of Status of Women Commissions and changes of sexist laws.
Young black women were joining radical feminist groups, but by 1973 some who felt racially oppressed in the Women's Movement and sexually oppressed in the Black Liberation Movement founded the National Black Feminist Organization to address "the unique issues affecting black women in America." San Francisco women then started Black Women Organized for Action, and there were stirrings as well in the Boston area. (right: Shirley Chisholm politician, educator, and author)
The Black Women's Movement spawned several important organizations committed to the struggle against all forms of oppression. As one member said, "White women are our natural allies; we can't take down the system alone." Many black feminists insist that the liberation of black women mandates freedom for all people, since it would require the abolition of racism, sexism, and class oppression.
In 1979 the NOW conference adopted an affirmative action bylaw, reserving a minimum number of board seats for women of color. Today black women are almost equally represented in NOW and other feminist organizations.
There is no doubt the cause of feminism has spread so widely and been so successful because of the support and involvement of black women from the beginning. So this month, and always, VFA honors black women, without whom there could not have been a feminist movement.
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