American Historical Ephemera and Photography

17 pinback buttons, approx. 2 1/2 in. diameter and smaller, including: 3 buttons promoting Shirley Chisholm for President. Chisholm was the first Black woman to be elected to the US Congress. In 1972, she was the first Black candidate for a major-party nomination for President of the United States and the first woman to run for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination. -- 3 buttons promoting Adam Clayton Powell, the first African American Congressman elected from New York. -- 2 buttons promoting Dwight Eisenhower, each with slogan, "My Friend Ike" with portrait of Eisenhower above a handshake between a white hand and Black hand. -- "Father Divine is God!" referencing spiritual leader Reverend M. J. Divine, who founded the International Peace Mission movement. -- Button for "Oliver Laws Memorial Ambulance Fund." -- 3 buttons promoting integration, including "Segregation Must Go By '64," and "Fight Discrimination, Defend the Bill of Rights." -- Button calling to "Free the Scottsboro Boys." The "Scottsboro Boys" as they came to be called, were a group of nine African American preteens, teenagers, and young men falsely accused of raping two white women on a freight train in northern Alabama in March of 1931. Eight of the defendants were convicted and sentenced to death by an all-white jury, while the ninth was granted a mistrial by the judge on account of his youth. Public outcry and protests in the north succeeded in getting the convictions overturned by the Supreme Court in 1932, citing the defendants' inadequate legal representation. The process of retrial, reconviction, and appeal went on for years, and ultimately the "Scottsboro Boys" served a collective 100+ years in prison. -- And 3 others.

Together, 17 pinback buttons. Condition generally good, with toning, occasional soiling, wear consistent with age and use.