Equal Justice Initiative’s Legacy Sites

​and the Fight for Truth, Justice, and Remembrance

I’ve just completed a long-planned civil rights tour through Alabama. When we planned it last summer, my girlfriends and I had envisioned it as both sobering and celebratory, aligning with what we hoped would be the inauguration of the first Black woman president. The election didn’t turn out as we had hoped. Instead of celebrating progress, we were witnessing a coordinated effort to dismantle DEI initiatives and civil rights gains—an unrelenting rollback fueled by white supremacy and the emboldened forces of Trump’s terror. The weight of injustice, past and present, settled over us, leaving us grieving and devastated for the future—feeling stuck, uncertain, and overwhelmed by what we are up against.

The trip was educational and restorative, and I will highlight two standout stops—the Legacy Sites (featured below) and the Mothers of Gynecology Health and Wellness Museum and Clinic (coming in the next issue)—both exemplary organizations that are Getting Stuff Done for Social Good.

 The Cycle of Progress and Rollback
The Legacy Sites comprise three museums—the Legacy Museum, the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, and the Freedom Monument Sculpture Park—in one experience. The Legacy Sites are not just a place to learn history—it’s an immersive, deeply personal experience that forces visitors to step into the reality of an enslaved person. From the moment you enter, you are not just observing the past but feeling it. You stand in holding pens modeled after slave warehouses, hear the anguished voices of the enslaved, confront haunting imagery of widespread lynchings, and come face-to-face with the brutal reality of what was endured. This museum does not permit passive observation—it demands that you bear witness.

The museum laid bare an undeniable truth: every step forward for racial justice has been met with a fierce and calculated backlash. Its exhibits powerfully illustrated how moments of  progress have triggered violent resistance, systemic oppression, and deliberate attempts to reverse those gains, weaving together a pattern that continues to shape our reality today.
For example, after the Civil War, Black Americans were granted citizenship and the right to vote under the 14th and 15th Amendments, ushering in a brief but significant period of progress during Reconstruction. Black men were elected to Congress, public education expanded, and formerly enslaved people began building political and economic power.

But white supremacists quickly responded with violence and legal barriers to strip away these gains. The Ku Klux Klan emerged, terrorizing Black communities, assassinating Black officials, and using violence to suppress Black voters. When federal intervention temporarily weakened the Klan, Southern states turned to legislation—introducing poll taxes, literacy tests, and grandfather clauses designed to disenfranchise Black citizens. Those who resisted faced brutal consequences, including arrest, beatings, and lynchings. White mobs turned these murders into public spectacles, gathering at town squares to watch Black men, women, and children be tortured and killed, often taking photographs and body parts as souvenirs.

For nearly a century, Black Americans endured legalized segregation, disenfranchisement, and state-sanctioned violence. Peaceful efforts to challenge Jim Crow laws were met with deadly violence. Black churches and homes were bombed, and children were murdered—including the 1963 Birmingham church bombing, which killed four young girls, along with two boys who were also victims of racially motivated killings that same day. Civil rights leaders were assassinated, and nonviolent protesters were brutally beaten, attacked by police dogs, and hosed down in the streets. And public lynchings continued.  

Despite the overwhelming violence, the Civil Rights Movement persevered. Activists forced the country to confront its moral failings through sit-ins, bus boycotts, marches, and legal challenges. Finally, after years of resistance, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 dismantled segregation and secured legal voting rights. 

But as history has shown, progress was met with immediate and calculated backlash.  Southern states refused to comply with school integration orders, with some shutting down entire public school systems rather than allow Black children to attend. White parents pulled their children out of public schools and funneled them into newly created private “segregation academies.” Meanwhile, politicians began shifting tactics, using "law and order" rhetoric to criminalize Black communities. The War on Drugs and tough-on-crime policies of the 1970s and 1980s disproportionately targeted black men and led to skyrocketing incarceration rates. Prisons became the new plantations, stripping Black Americans of their rights and creating a new system of racial control under the guise of public safety.

Where We Stand Today
The election of Barack Obama, a moment of historic progress, triggered a fierce backlash—one we still live through today. The Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act, paving the way for voter suppression laws designed to weaken Black political power. White nationalist movements resurged, emboldened by leaders who amplified their rhetoric. Donald Trump rode that wave into office, attacking DEI, fueling anti-Black policies, and now, in his second term, he is dismantling civil rights protections, gutting DEI programs, and further embedding white nationalist ideology into policy.

Seen through the lens of history, Trump’s ruthless, calculated assault on DEI and human rights is not just predictable—it is a blatant continuation of white supremacist efforts to entrench power and roll back progress. 

History shows us that every moment of progress has been met with fierce resistance—but it also proves that those who refuse to surrender are the ones who shape the future. In these dark times, when injustice feels overwhelming and the path forward is clouded with setbacks, we must remember that we are not powerless. 

I am deeply grateful to the Equal Justice Initiative for reinforcing this truth. For their creativity, tenacity, and fearless truth-telling, the Equal Justice Initiative deserves to be celebrated as an organization that is Getting Stuff Done for Social Good. ​