Word: elliott
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Hanging prominently in the foyer of Joseph Elliott's home in Summerton, S.C., is a portrait of the Confederate Army general, Robert E. Lee. Nearby, however, Elliott just as proudly displays newspaper clippings of his late great-uncle, a real-life Atticus Finch who defended blacks in the era of Jim Crow. Elliott, 64, has struggled a lifetime to reconcile these mixed images of the South. But one picture noticeably absent from his gallery is that of his late grandfather, R.M. Elliott, a wealthy sawmill owner and former Summerton school-board chairman who, in the 1940s, refused to provide...
...heroes, Elliott knows, were the black families in Summerton who filed the lawsuit Briggs v. Elliott contesting the school district's discriminatory treatment of their children. It was the first of the four cases to be heard that would be combined in the U.S. Supreme Court's 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision outlawing school segregation. The white community's response was hostile. Harry and Eliza Briggs, who lived in a cabin on the Elliott estate, were fired from their jobs and had to move to Florida to find new work. Other black families who signed the Briggs' petitions...
...Elliott grew up without questioning segregation. But he changed in the 1960s, especially after a teaching stint at a black school run by Methodists. He now believes that it's his mission, particularly as R.M. Elliott's grandson, to bring about the same change of heart in his white neighbors. "We owe those black families a great debt for what they did to further democratize this country," he says. "If whites reject the significance of the case and the bravery of the plaintiffs, then we're really rejecting our democracy...
...Patriots In Our Midst," Michael Elliott contested Harvard professor Samuel Huntington's view that Mexican Americans are not interested in assimilating into U.S. society [April 12]. I reject Huntington's unfounded fears about immigration in general and Mexican Americans in particular, whether they are new immigrants or those of us whose roots reach centuries deep into U.S. history. Perhaps Huntington should venture outside academia's cocoon and learn to appreciate the patriotism and contributions made to America by those who are not Anglo-Protestant. American Hispanics serve as an important conduit to all of Latin America, which is probably...
...Iraq, as Americans would have known if they had studied the history of the British there. And in his new book, Colossus, he worries that the U.S. may not have the will or the wallet to stick at its imperial mission long enough to make a difference. --By Michael Elliott...