Media 2070 FINAL - Flipbook - Page 48
But the struggle against WBLT continued. In 1964, the
Office of Communication of the United Church of Christ
(UCC) — led by the Rev. Everett C. Parker — filed a
license challenge with the FCC against WLBT. Mississippi
NAACP President Aaron Henry and Jackson’s Rev. R.L.T.
Smith joined in the license challenge, which argued that
the station had failed to serve the city’s Black community
or fairly cover controversial issues regarding race
relations.31
Parker had been inspired to hold Southern broadcast
stations accountable following a meeting he took part in
with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. During the meeting,
Parker asked what he could do to help the civil-rights
struggle. Dr. King replied, “Can you do something about
the TV stations in the south?”32
But the FCC denied the petition, stating that the public did
not have legal standing to contest a license unless it had
an economic stake in the outcome or had an issue with
electrical interference from a broadcaster.33 But in 1966, a
federal court ruled in favor of the UCC and local Jackson
activists, saying for the first time that citizens did have
legal standing to challenge licenses.34
of the station in 1980.” The group’s chairman was the
NAACP’s Aaron Henry.35
The heroism of local Black leaders and the UCC in
successfully challenging the license of a powerful whiteowned broadcast station is not a well-known part of our
nation’s history. But it gave everyday people the power
— and legal right — to hold their local broadcasters
accountable. It also paved the way for the integration
of local broadcast stations — as well as the birth of the
modern media-justice movement and the rise of publicinterest organizations that advocate for democratizing
media and technology.
And throughout the 1960s, the civil-rights struggle and the
racial-justice uprisings also forced the federal government
to take action to address the ways in which the news media
had harmed the Black community.
1. Pamela Newkirk, Within the Veil: Black Journalists, White Media, New York University Press, 2000, p. 39
2. Armistead S. Pride and Clint C. Wilson II, A History of the Black Press, Howard University, 1987, p. 50
3. Ibid, pp. 94–95; Linda Peavey and Ursula Smith, “Ida B. Wells’ Determined Quest for Equality,”
Memphis Magazine, April 9, 2019: https://memphismagazine.com/features/ida-b-wells-determinedquest-for-equality/; “Our Namesake,” Ida B. Wells Society, accessed on Aug. 13, 2020: https://
idabwellssociety.org/about/our-namesake/; “Biographies: Ida B. Wells,” PBS, accessed on Aug. 13,
2020: https://www.pbs.org/blackpress/news_bios/wells.html; Kenneth W. Goings, “Memphis Free
Speech,” Tennessee Encyclopedia, accessed on Aug. 13, 2020: https://tennesseeencyclopedia.
net/entries/memphis-free-speech/; David Smith, “Ida B. Wells: The Unsung Heroine of the Civil
The historic ruling would lead to a federal court revoking
WLBT’s license in 1969 — marking the first time that
a court revoked the license of a U.S. broadcaster. And
after years of litigation, a majority Black-owned company
“received the license in 1979 and took over ownership
Rights Movement,” The Guardian, April 27, 2018: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/apr/27/
ida-b-wells-civil-rights-movement-reporter; Phil Edwards, “How Ida B. Wells Became a Trailblazing
Journalist,” Vox, July 18, 2015: https://www.vox.com/2015/7/16/8978257/ida-b-wells; 2020
posthumous Pulitzer Prize awarded to Ida B. Wells, accessed on Sept. 13, 2020: https://www.pulitzer.
org/winners/ida-b-wells
4. Whose Spectrum is it Anyway? Historical Study of Market Entry Barriers, Discrimination and Changes in
Broadcast and Wireless Licensing, 1950 to Present, Federal Communications Commission, December
2000: https://transition.fcc.gov/opportunity/meb_study/historical_study.pdf, pp.7–8. The Federal
Radio Commission was created in 1927 to regulate the radio industry. In 1934, the agency was
Milestones of Black Resistance Media
1827
The nation’s first
Black newspaper —
Freedom’s Journal
— is founded in New York
City.
48
1847
1888
The North Star
— the first of several
papers that Frederick
Douglass published
— proclaims in its
inaugural issue that
it will fight to abolish
slavery and advocate
for the rights of full
Black citizenship in the
North.
The Memphis
Free Speech is
founded by Rev. Taylor
Nightingale on the
grounds of Nightingale’s
church, the First (Beale
Street) Baptist Church.
Local teacher and
activist Ida B. Wells
later becomes a staff
journalist and 1/3
owner.
WWW.MEDIA2070.ORG
1927
The Pittsburgh
Courier sponsors
a radio program —
The Pittsburgh Courier
Hour— that airs on
WGBS in New York
City. It becomes the
first radio program
devoted to “Negro
journalism.”