Louis E. Burnham

Louis E. Burnham

Louis Everett Burnham (September 29, 1915 – February 12, 1960) was an African-American civil rights activist and journalist.

Quotes

• Occasionally speaking of Black people generally, in conversation with the still youthful Lorraine Hansberry: "They are beautiful, child."
  • During 1951-1953; quoted in Robert Nemiroff, ed (1995). To be young, gifted, and Black : Lorraine Hansberry in her own words. New York: Vintage Books. p. 79. ISBN 0679764151. OCLC 1020218040. Retrieved on 13 November 2020. 

• From one end of the South to the other law and order have broken down. A public climate has been created in which a Negro’s life is worth no more than a White man’s whim.
  • Behind the lynching of Emmett Louis Till. New York: Freedom Associates. 1955. OCLC 1127513283. Retrieved on 23 August 2020. 

• It is worth noting that if Emmett Till had been a Mississippi farm boy instead of a Chicago lad on vacation in Mississippi, the world probably would never have known his fate.
  • Behind the lynching of Emmett Louis Till. New York: Freedom Associates. 1955. OCLC 1127513283. Retrieved on 23 August 2020. 

• The forward surge of the Negro people is the most distinctive and progressive feature of Southern politics.
  • Behind the lynching of Emmett Louis Till. New York: Freedom Associates. 1955. OCLC 1127513283. Retrieved on 23 August 2020. 

• How, then, should American literature deal with these people, crushed for centuries beneath an insufferable weight of exploitation, calumny and derision, yet always rising, their presence and their struggle ever mocking the strident pretensions of the nation?
  • National Guardian. 1959.  quoted in Washington, Mary (2014). The other blacklist : the African American literary and cultural left of the 1950s. New York New York: Columbia University Press. p. 205. ISBN 9780231526470. OCLC 1088439510. Retrieved on 13 November 2020. 

• Much of what Negroes fight for today is not to gain new ground but to restore positions once dearly won and foully taken away.
  • "Not new ground, but rights once dearly won". National Guardian (New York). 15 February 1960. Retrieved on 13 November 2020. 

Quotes about Louis E. Burnham

• He had a mordant wit, always saw the humorous side to keep us all 'cracked up,' and could recite poetry by the yard. At the same time, he had an ability to put words down on paper with a speed and precision... He had a far-above-average ability to marshal his facts through well-documented research and translate his material into well-written and convincing prose.
  • Howard Eugene Johnson with Wendy Johnson (2014). "The Young Communist League". A Dancer in the Revolution: Stretch Johnson, Harlem Communist at the Cotton Club. New York: Fordham University Press, Empire State Editions. pp. 66–67. ISBN 978-0823256563. OCLC 878144606. Retrieved on 16 August 2020. . From a friend during Burnham's youth, Howard "Stretch" Johnson, who often met Burnham at his mother's house

• [An] altogether commanding personality... His voice was very deep and his language struck my senses immediately with its profound literacy, constantly punctuated by deliberate and loving poetic lapses into the beloved color of the speech of the masses of our people... The things he taught me were great things: that all racism was rotten, White or Black, that [emphasis in the original] everything is political; that people tend to be indescribably beautiful and uproariously funny.”
  • Robert Nemiroff, ed (1995). To Be Young, Gifted and Black: Lorraine Hansberry in Her Own Words. New York: Vintage Books. p. 79. ISBN 0679764151. OCLC 1020218040. Retrieved on 22 August 2020. 

• Above all none can forget his honesty and utter sacrifice.
  • Bois, W. E. B. (1985). "Louis Burnham (28 April 1960)". in Herbert Aptheker. Against racism : unpublished essays, papers, addresses, 1887-1961. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press. p. 300. ISBN 9780870231346.  From Du Bois' eulogy at Burnham's memorial service.

• [Burnham was] one of the loveliest human beings I've ever met... A rich cultural apostle who swam in music, poetry, and literature... always pleasant company... a great facility to move in all kinds of circles... a most eloquent public speaker [who] could engage an audience at will.
  • Abt, John (1993). Advocate and activist : memoirs of an American communist lawyer. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. p. 160. ISBN 9780252020308. OCLC 27265102. Retrieved on 13 November 2020. 

• A man touched with grace, easy to be with and reassuring. In his writings, lectures, and conversation, he never dissembled. His seriousness, manifest in his painstakingly careful speech, was leavened by high humor. The love that people bore him was demonstrated in his hosts of friends—from the teenagers on his Brooklyn block, through the bearded youngsters who came to him for counsel, to the patrician figure of Du Bois, his mentor and his colleague.
  • Cedric Belfrage and James Aronson (1978). Something to Guard: The Stormy Life of the National Guardian, 1948-1967. New York: Columbia University Press. pp. 149–159. ISBN 9780231928847. OCLC 1151243007. 

• He led primarily by virtue of the power of attraction of his example... He left his imprint on a whole generation of Southerners... He was a hero in the practical struggles for equality and justice in the Deep South who had marched often in the shadow of death in Willie McGhee country in Mississippi, and under the guns of the police chief “Bull” Conner in Birmingham, Alabama... He was a talented writer and an incomparable orator. He was a fine scholar and an inspiring organizer of social action.
  • (1962)"And Further on Negro History Week". Freedomways 2 (1): 8–9.

• Even today, you know, when I’m kind of in deep middle age, older people will come up to me who remember my father and — who just remember. He had a lot of grace, and was a very welcoming person, and he’s remembered in that way.
  • Ross, Loretta J.. Linda Burnham. Smith College. Retrieved on 13 November 2020.