This panel brings together academic and on-the-ground experts on voting rights and African American disenfranchisement with particular attention to New Jersey. Christopher Matthews, curator of “The Black Freedom Struggle in Northern New Jersey (1613-1860),” will address the struggle for voting rights in 19th-century New Jersey. James E. Harris will speak to the efforts of the Montclair Branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People to advance voting rights. Andra Gillespie, author of The New Black Politician: Cory Booker, Newark, and Post-Racial America (2012), will review a the history of voter suppression in the United States–including the recent Georgia Senate Bill 202. Part of the Office for Faculty Advancement This is What Democracy Looks Like? series.

Moderator: Leslie Wilson, Professor of History and Associate Dean of the College of Humanities & Social Sciences, Montclair State University

Panelists:

James E. Harris, 1st Vice President, Montclair Branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People–involvement of NAACP

Christopher Matthews, Professor of Anthropology, Montclair State University

Andra Gillespie, Associate Professor of Political Science and Director of the James Weldon Johnson Institute

Sponsors: African American Caucus, Disability Resource Center, Office for Faculty Advancement, Sprague Library, Disability Caucus, and E3 (Educate, Equip, Empower) Student Coalition