The Books Briefing: Can Democracy Survive Without Journalism?

Throughout the summer of 1916, “tired of being kicked and cursed,” tens of thousands of African Americans migrated from the South to the North in hopes of a better life—inspired in no small part by the nation’s leading Black newspaper, The Chicago Defender.

The paper printed accounts of murders by lynching, and demanded federal military intervention to stop the killings. But after observing the economic impact of Black people leaving the South, s publisher, Robert Abbott, became convinced “that. The newspaper published success stories of men finding employment in the North, as well as encouraging editorial cartoons and poetry, and its readers praised it for its role in the exodus.