Overview
At the River I Stand (1993) Higgins Labor CLASSics
This year’s installment of the Higgins Labor Program May Day movie comes in April, which is fitting given it is the 50th anniversary of the month that saw a dramatic climax of the Civil Rights in Memphis, Tennessee. This documentary skillfully reconstructs the two eventful months that transformed a strike by Memphis sanitation workers into a national conflagration, and disentangles the complex historical forces that came together with the inevitability of tragedy at the death of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in April 1968.
The film also brings into sharp relief issues that have only become more urgent in the intervening years: the connection between economic and civil rights, debates over strategies for change, the demand for full inclusion of African Americans in American life and the fight for dignity for public employees and all working people.
The film also brings into sharp relief issues that have only become more urgent in the intervening years: the connection between economic and civil rights, debates over strategies for change, the demand for full inclusion of African Americans in American life and the fight for dignity for public employees and all working people.
