Contact sheet of photographs from the National Day of Mourning for the Children of Birmingham

These images reflect Baldwin’s mood as he addressed a crowd at the federal courthouse in Manhattan in September 1963. A week earlier, white supremacists committed one of the most heinous acts of terrorism in modern American history: murdering four girls and injuring others by bombing a Black church in Birmingham, Alabama. Activists planned the rally in response, demanding federal protection for Black people. Baldwin offered both a warning and hope: “The future is going to be worse than the past if we do not let the people who represent us know that it is our country. … We can change the government, and we will.” The ensuing years put Baldwin’s hope to the test, but he continued to fight, and write, to challenge oppression.