The Ghost of James Baldwin: Racial Conservatism, Critical Race Theory, and the Fear of a Black Idea

TNS contributing writer, Nicholas Mitchell highlights the cultural work of James Baldwin that pre-dated critical race theory and set a framework for today's dissent and scholarly efforts.

James Baldwin speaking; Photo by Marion Jorrin/Pix/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images

In the summer following the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Black revolt across the country, the United States was a society standing the closest to the abyss of an open race war that it had ever been. White flight was abdicating urban centers to the c…