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Why is a Senate Office Building Still Named for an Unrepentant Segregationist and White Supremacist?

Texas Senator Ted Cruz decried efforts to "sanitize history" and argued that "the journey of the United States has been a steady journey toward freedom" by way of explaining why he did not support removing segregationist Senator Richard Russell's name from a Senate office building. But few Democrats will candidly support change either.

The Children of the Nazis' Genetics Project

While much of Nazism was associated with destruction, it's racist ideological core was also preoccupied with creating or restoring racial purity, including through the Lebensborn program which viewed officers of the SS as the fathers of a new Aryan vanguard. 

Can the Long-Maligned Cuyahoga River Drive Revitalization in Cleveland?

The river was a central thread in the city's industrial development and growth, and a punchline for its decline. Can it become a place Clevelanders love? 

Indiana Legislature Votes to Defund IU's Kinsey Institute

Conservative lawmakers invoked the specter of child sexual exploitation to argue for defunding the leading American center for research on human sexuality. 

Inside the Bombshell Proposal for the University of Florida's Hamilton Center

The center was proposed through an end-run around faculty governance and pushed by influential lobbyists committed to fighting supposed "ideological uniformity" on campus. Is it a partisan invasion or a nonpartisan effort at civic education? 

You Can't Have Ideological Conflict When One Side Abandons Ideas

by Timothy Noah

Sociologist Daniel Bell described ideology as "the commitment to the consequences of ideas." If this doesn't describe the GOP today, the author wonders how well the term "party of ideas" ever applied. 

Georgia Grand Jury to Recommend Indictments in Trump Effort to Overturn Vote

The grand jury forewoman suggested that the identities of the parties recommended for indictment were "not rocket science" and that no one will be surprised when the names are revealed.

Mystery Solved: Student Photographed Integrating Virginia High School in 1962 Identified

A photo used by the school district for years to mark its history didn't identify Robert Christian, then 12 years old, until now. 

Beinart: Some of Carter's Critics Should Apologize While they Can

by Peter Beinart

Peter Beinart says that Jimmy Carter's 2007 book "Peace Not Apartheid" had flaws, but many of its harshest critics ignored whether its claims about the Israeli occupation were factual and leaped to insinuation and outright accusation that Carter was motivated by antisemitism. 

Is the Times Repeating Past Mistakes in its Transgender Reporting and Editorials?

The paper's now-notorious reluctance to cover the growing AIDS crisis and insistence on using clinical terminology like "homosexual" to describe gay men are now seen as failures of journalism. Is the paper's recent coverage of transgender issues following the same path? 

Florida Professor Claims Job Threatened for Teaching About Racism

Samuel Joeckel, who works at a private Christian university in Florida without tenure, claims that the Palm Beach Atlantic University provost came to his classroom to tell him that his contract would be reviewed after a parent complained about "indoctrination" in his class. 

Florida Students Plan Walkouts in Protest of Administrators' Cooperation With DeSantis Trans Crackdown

Six colleges are known to have complied with a request by the governor's office for information about health services provided to transgender students, which student leaders say is part of a threat to gender-affirming healthcare in the state. 

Israel's Judicial Struggle is Tectonic

by Michael Oren

The former Israeli ambassador to the United States writes that massive protests against Netanyahu's judicial reforms will determine whether there is a future for democracy in Israel. 

From "Birth of a Nation" to "Till": The Politics of White House Screenings

The Bidens hosted a group of about 100 historians, civil rights leaders, and members of Congress to screen the biographical film adaptation of the story of Emmett Till and his mother's quest for justice. 

Those "Local" School Battles in Texas are Part of a Decades-Long Statewide Plan to Undermine Public Schools

Advocates of privatizing public schools have bankrolled and organized parents' groups around a range of values issues with the goal of undermining confidence in local schools. In Texas, it seems to be working to break down the longstanding opposition of rural families to voucher programs. 

College Board Has Scrubbed Website of Previous Statements of Independence from Florida Officials

by Judd Legum

After its communications with Florida officials in 2022 were revealed, the College Board removed statements from its website that claimed the company did not have such communication before making changes to the curriculum of its African American studies course. 

Who Poisoned Pablo Neruda?

by Ariel Dorfman

"In retrospect I wonder if perhaps I was so tired of tales of torture and disappearances, so full of death and grief, that I could not deal with one more affront. I preferred to shield the sacred figure of Neruda from the violence."

Did Lewis Powell Sign a Slow Death Warrant for Affirmative Action?

The Times court reporter Emily Bazelon dives into the decision by Justice Powell to decide the 1978 Bakke case through reference to "diversity" instead of racial justice, a rationale that stripped away much of the unjust history of higher education. 

New Jersey Announces Increased Adoption of AP African American Studies

Governor Phil Murphy announced that the course will appear in 26 high schools (instead of the current 1), but the move is largely symbolic because of changes made to the course and the tiny percentage of the state's schools adopting the course. 

Nikki Haley's Confederate Flag Story

The former South Carolina governor, now once again a presidential candidate, has claimed credit for taking the Confederate flag off of the state house. A timeline shows she was often more conciliatory to the powerful pro-Confederate constituency in the state.