Today, we’re revisiting our 2021 interview with Dr. Hasan Kwame Jeffries for our Perfecting Democracy series about his book Bloody Lowndes: Civil Rights and Black Power in Alabama’s Black Belt and how race and racism influence voting in the United States.

In this episode, journalist Ron Bryant asks Dr. Jeffries what lessons we can learn from how people viewed the Civil Rights Movement as it was unfolding and why understanding slavery is essential to grasping American democracy.

This episode is a rebroadcast of "Perfecting Democracy," a series exploring the topic of civic and electoral participation using history and jurisprudence to illuminate contemporary issues. The series offers a humanities perspective on electoral engagement in Ohio and America’s multivocal democracy. In each episode, experts from around the state share thought-provoking insights on how best to understand our democracy and why it matters. Perfecting Democracy was made possible by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the Federation of State Humanities Councils.

And, later this year, join us for The Ohio Country, a forthcoming series from WYSO Public Radio and funded by Ohio Humanities. Native men and women from different tribes and their allies—plus teachers, artists, scholars, parents, landowners, foresters, young people, and historians, too—will tell their stories about the about the lands above the Ohio River, known as the Ohio Country. You can listen in this feed, at WYSO.org, ohiohumanities.org, and in all those other places where you get podcasts.