The text is a historical-circumstantial speech given on 23rd November 1939 by Mary McLeod Bethune during a panel discussion on NBC radio's weekly public affairs broadcast of "America's Town Meeting of the Air.” During the show, the panelists were asked to answer the question “What does American democracy mean to me?” and the text is Bethune’s response to this query. It was addressed to the whole nation of the United States, as it was broadcast on the radio. Her aim was to motivate the African American population and any individuals who sympathized with her cause. This speech was delivered during a period of political tension. Hitler had invaded Poland in September 1939, and even though France and Britain had declared war on Germany, the US was reluctant to engage in…show more content… White Southerners initiated the Black Code, a novel form of segregation. By 1877, when federal soldiers left the South and Reconstruction ended, African Americans saw little improvement in their lives. In the 1890s, southern states introduced a new version of Black Codes known as Jim Crow Laws. These laws made it illegal for blacks and whites to use the same public facilities. These laws persisted until the 1950s and 1960s when civil rights movements campaigned against them. Eventually, the U.S. Congress declared these laws unconstitutional. Mary McLeod Bethune, one of the most significant Black American educators, civil and women’s rights leaders, and government officials of the past century, was born on July 10th, 1875, in a small cabin near Maysville, South Carolina. She was born into the era of Jim Crow America, a time of violence and segregation aimed at Black Americans in the South following the Civil War. She was the daughter of parents who had been enslaved but were freed as a result of the Civil War. As a child, Bethune began working in the cotton fields with her
