The wpa did in california, and then you fall down this rabbit hole and you find that theres everything else. And its a its a universe. So now what we are is a National Team that is identifying, mapping and interpreting the physical legacy of, the new deal, which is absolutely colossal. Its all around us. Its indispensable, able, but we dont see it. And thats accidental. So what were doing, we have a very active chapter in new york city, some of whom are here today. And what were doing is excavating a lost civilization. Its what i call the lost ethical language of new deal, public works. These objects which are everywhere, are trying to speak to us in a language which we have been persuaded to forget. And the effort to erase the roosevelt legacy. About april 12, 1945, when roosevelt safely dead and they could to do that. So thats what were trying to do. And we established a few years ago a prize, the best book on roosevelt or the new deal out of a of books being published year theres we a distinguished panel and the awardee gets a thousand books but the great honor of having the and the living new deal prize are speaker today who will introduce the awardee is Kimberley Johnson who is of graduate studies at the department of social and cultural analysis at and she will introduce victoria wolcott who is this years. Thank you very much. Hi thank you all for coming. It is my huge pleasure to award this best book award to victoria for her book heres the book its available living in the future utopianism and the Long Civil Rights Movement. The committee was really impressed about the quality and scope and that the depth of this book, it was a really strong in an overall pool of very very strong books and i think what we were struck by was, i think to pick up on gregs point, the ethical components that we often think about the new deal is a political system where Economic System but it really was i think in very careful and caring that walcott presents it. It really is a time where people are trying to figure out how can we make the world better for us . And i found the book incredibly inspiring. So im not going to talk a lot because i think patricia say more, but the trophy could come up and mason mason williams, who is an assistant professor at williams college, was also on the Book Committee at the core committee. And it is our pleasure to award to victoria the best book award, one of the major. Things think i can get perspective as we. Thank you so much this is such a huge honor to receive that award and i to thank the committee for reading all the books and for all the work that theyve put into this really vibrant, wonderful and clifford lab and the staff here at the fdr library and museum. So im going to talk a little bit about the book today. Im going to try to make some local connections to to hyde park. This will be a little bit less of roosevelt centered than some of the talks youve heard. But as ken kimberly was suggesting, the of ideas that i discuss, this utopian book project that very much resonate in the new deal. The administration, particularly in the thought of Eleanor Roosevelt, but the roosevelts were generally. So im just going to Say Something very about the book and then im going to talk about some sort of specific threads that kind of go through it. This is a book that examines utopian communities and groups that drew from utopian ideas from roughly the 1920s through the 19 or early 1960 piece, with examining issues of how they impacted the post 1955 civil rights movement. And im going to talk about three general categories. One is that really pull my examples together, one category is interracial ism. The second is nonviolence, and the third is cooperatives. But before i do that, i want to talk about one little thread just to give you a of my methodology when writing this book and how utopia thought connects disparate groups and ideas and provides fuel, the Long Civil Rights Movement and this is this thread is about novel a utopian novel published in 1888 by the american journalist Edward Bellamy. Oh, very widely popular, a utopian novel. This is a novel which the julian west wakes up in the year 2000 to discover that the United States has become a socialist utopia and he really bellamys work really epitomize is the position of a group known as socialist. And this in contrast to the scientific socialism of marx and engels. And so the utopian socialist believed that you could create the socialist utopia without violent struggle and without class conflicts makes what makes it more utopian. Now, bellamys novel has really nothing to say about race, so the question is why is it important for my story . Let me just talk a little bit about that right after the novel was published, again, hugely popular, you had this creation of were called nationalist clubs and these nationalist clubs, which by 1892 there was 150 of these clubs and they tried to kind of work on ideas and plans to create the utopia that bellamy talks about in his novel, they were very influential in the populist movement in the 1890s, but the progressive era, the early 20th century. And although bellamy did not believe in labor because they created too much conflict, his work actually was hugely in the labor of the early 20th century, particularly unionism and Workers Education, which i talk about actually in the first chapter of, the book. So fast forward to the thirties, which is of course the decade that we love here. And bellamys ideas experienced a real revival in the 1930s, which, like the late 19th century in which he was writing, was another period of economic distress and class conflict. And his ideas were particularly important in the state of california which was a hotbed utopianism in the early 20th century. The historian robert klein claims that between 1850 and 1950, california witnessed the formation of a larger number of utopian colonies than any other state in the union many of these were socialist utopian communities, and they also heavily influenced by a form of religious practice called theosophy, which kind of combines kind of western religion with eastern religion. Now, one individual who particularly was influenced by bellini was the journalist upton sinclair. And as you may know, in 1934, he ran governor of california in the epic the end poverty in california. And he actually wrote a utopian novel to launch his campaign. This is what california is going to look like if im governor. Essentially, he was influenced by the large scale public works programs depicted in bellamys, the redistribution of resources, and also the importance of cooperative aves, which ill talk a little bit more about in a bit. So one group of sinclair support ers was called the utopian society of america. Again, very by bellamy. It was founded in angeles in 1933. It an interracial organization that again pulled together ideas about socialism and also of theosophy which had been drawn from some of these eastern religious ideas believed this notion of universal brotherhood. So as a result the utopian society opposed segregate and worked actively for anti discrimination legislation. They met in secret, but they also had these big kind of rallies and performances and these included, according to one of the founders, they epitomized mans struggle for Economic Security and general wellbeing, tracing the progress of that struggle up through past and looking into the near future for the attainment of its goal. And again, this idea of evolutionary versus path to socialism. And by 1934, at the height of the epic campaign, they claim to have 600,000 members. But again, theres no membership, a little hard to actually verify that. So sinclair, as im sure know lost his election. Thats its whole story unto itself and the utopian society essentially dismantles after that loss but some of the movements followers gravitated to a really Important Organization for my book, the Father DivinePeace Mission. And i actually found that they made up the largest white constituency of that group and ill talk a little bit more about Father Divine a little bit later, but just note here, it was the most successful utopian community in the 20th century. It was fully and economically prosperous, and it was led by this charismatic africanamerican leader, Father Divine, who borrowed from bellamys teachings and from theosophy as well. The number of Peace Missions are the extensions essentially in california reach 20 by 1935. Largest concentration outside of new york state and. As roy owens, a White Californian follower, noted Father Divines organization furnished, religiously inclined utopia ins a familiar theology that contained political concepts resonant with their past affiliations. So these idealistic white utopians join with their africanamerican counterparts to develop the Peace Mission and communal life nationwide and indeed international aid. In addition, their extensive cooperative enterprises, the interracial Peace Mission, registered integrated public accommodation and carried out acts of non violent direct action. I have one more story about. The novel looking backward to tell. So this is a story about a young africanamerican at midcentury. She grew up in alabama and she attended a majority white progressive school, Antioch College in ohio in 1946. While there became active in civil rights organizations. And that activist Bayard Rustin. Times in 1948. She also worked with Henry Wallace campaign for the presidency, attending the Progressive PartyConvention Year musically gifted, she had actually performed with paul robeson. She attended the new england conservatory of music in boston in 1951. While there, the spring of 1952, she gave a book, a seminary student who had befriended Martin Luther king jr. The book was Edward Bellamys 1988 utopian novel looking. She inscribed gift in the book, she says, dear martin, i should be interested to know your reaction to bellamys predictions about our society. In some ways it is rather encouraging to see how our social order has since bellamys time, there is still hope for the future, lest we become too impatient. King responded. In a long two months later, he says, quote, i welcome the book because much of its content is in line with my basic ideas. I imagine you already know that i am much more socialistic in my economic theory than Capital Stock today. Capitalism has outlived its usefulness. It has brought about a system that takes from the masses to luxuries to the classes, which is phrase he uses throughout his career. He finishes his letter with this basic thesis. I would concur. I would certainly welcome the day to come when there will be a nationalization of industry let us continue to hope, work, pray that in the future we live to see a wallis a better distribution wealth and a brotherhood that transcends race or color. This is the gospel that i will preach the world at this point. I must thank a million times for introducing me to such a stimulating book. You sweet and thoughtful, indeed. So coretta gives martin essentially this gift of utopia, and he uses bellamys words actually again, and other speeches leading up to the sort of the mass part of civil rights movement. So i chose the bellamy example because of what it reveals about king, but i could have done something similar with influence of robert owens ideas about the shakers the influence of anarchism, etc. To talk about this longer history. So what i hope my book accomplishes is the weaving of these threads together to form a more cohesive narrative about utopia. So what i mean when i say utopia, let me just briefly do some definitions here and i should say theres a voluminous amount of social political theory on utopia, but as many of you probably know, that term is coined by. Sir thomas moore in 1516. There are, of course other origins of it as well. But he combines the greek word for good place eu utopia with you, meaning no place. Thats from its inception, utopias have been considered fantastical and out of reach. A waste time. But this also suggests a kind of playfulness and an imagination and i think this is really important. So for me alignment power sergeants definition of utopianism as form of quote social dreaming that allows communities to envision a radically Different Society from the one in which the dreamers lives is very, very helpful. In a similar vein, a very important historian, robin d. G. Kelly, has written about what he calls freedom dreams. He says, i have come to realize that. Once we strip radical social movements to their bare essence and understand the collective desires of people in motion, freedom and love lay at the very heart of the matter. But just as our dreams reflect, images and patterns of our waking lives freedom dreams draw from past utopian experimentations. So the activists i study formed actual intentional like the father devine movement, but they also draw from utopian ideas and practices that, you see, particularly in something that social scientists call pre figurative. And this is another really important term. Those engaged in prefigured did politics are trying to quite literally create the world that they want to live in right their demanding immediate change so their emphasis is always on the means rather than the ends. So these are folks who tend to live communally tend to emphasize egalitarian ethics as well. And tend to associate utopianism with either the antebellum period of the early 19th century or maybe with the sixties and seventies with the commu koons and that kind of countercultural moment. But there is actually a lot of sort of mid 20th century utopian history, often overlooked and part of that is because the twin of fascism and stalinism in the particularly and fifties suggested utopian thinking was dangerous works, such as Arthur Schlesinger is the vital center daniel bells the end of ideology and judith scars after utopia, as well as Hannah Arendt and adorno and some others as well, basically argued that utopian thinking had led to the urge to construct grand designs for the political future of mankind. No disclosure is gone the last vestiges. If faith required for such an enterprise have vanished. And these thinkers often mischaracterized midcentury radical pacifism, which is really the milieu im discussing here, in which cooperation, not domination was was the emphasis. Indeed, most radical pacifists were deeply critical of the soviet union and among the first to speak out about the dangers of fascism. In addition, utopian have been part of a longer commentary tradition rather than a dominion in a state. And there is a very strong strand of anarchism among, these groups as well, which im happy to address. So new left in pre figurative political movements helped ameliorate these critiques. But of course comes with its own baggage as well so now i want to shift to these three categories i mentioned at the outset just to kind of unpack a little bit. And the first category is that interracial ism which connected of these groups. And as i was, i had a full draft of the book and i realized that i was unhappy with the way that interracial ism has been sort of highlighted and discussed in much of the historiography. So i wanted to break it down more. So i created these three categories of interracial ism, which i think are helpful. The first one is what i call liberal interracial ism. This is basically racial mixing among, educated elites that provide crucial intellectual and physical spaces to discuss racial equality. This often stops short social equality and calls education moral suasion and rather than immediate kinds of change. But it does play, i think, a really crucial role in this broader history. Liberal internationalism, for example created spaces, for social change, physical houses and churches in, major cities and civil rights activists often got their feet wet in these spaces moving on to more radical activities. The second category is labor ism, which of course is highly for the new deal era class movements to create Strategic Allied alliances across racial lines. Communist party, socialist party labor unions, first generated by progressive unions such as the ill get you International LadiesGarment Workers Union and propagated through Workers Education, labor racialism, elevated racial cooperation even among the working classes as integral to a more egalitarian future. Unionization was the central goal, but it also called often for gender and racial equality, as well as promoting cooperatives. Theres sometimes an ambivalent attitude towards nonviolence with this group, its still very significant. Let me just give you a quote from fania kahn from 1921. So she was a jewish labor activist who was important in the formation, Workers Education. And she says it has always been our conviction that the Labor Movement stands, consciously or unconsciously for the reconstruction of society it, strives toward a new life, dreams of a world where economic and social justice will prevail for the welfare, mankind will be the aim of all activity, where our society will be organized, a cooperative commonwealth, and where love, friendship and, fellowship will replace selfishness. So this, for example, the brookwood college. Many of you probably arent familiar with that particular organizer, but then as well as the Highlander Folk School. But you may be more familiar with a really good examples of the product of this labor interracial ism. And then the third category is utopian internationalism, an ideology or set of practices that both en