May/June 2001

CONTENTS

COVER STORY (Cover photograph: Don Edmonds/AP)
— The Agenda - Can the Congressional Black Caucus prevail with a GOP-controlled White House and Congress?

ISSUES & VIEWS
— Census 2000
The latest census is sure to stand out as one of the most important in our nation's history. For the first time respondents were allowed to identify themselves as more than one race. Together, Blacks and Hispanics represent one in four Americans. What do the numbers mean?
By Roderick J. Harrison

— Race and the Death Penalty
The U.S. death penalty has never been administered fairly and evenly, but has been reserved for the poor and oppressed. African Americans remain its primary target.
By Steven Hawkins

FEATURES
— New Leader, Old Foe
Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-Texas) is the new chair of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC). With a Republican in the White House and Democrats in the minority on Capitol Hill, will she lead the CBC on a power surge or sputter?
By Michael Fletcher

— Home Invasion
Predatory lenders are using deceptive practices to pressure the poor, minorities and particularly the elderly, into signing up for high-cost, unaffordable loans that often cause homeowners to lose their property.
By C. Stone Brown

— Juneteenth: African American Independence Day
A look at the movement to recognize the 1865 day when slaves in Texas learned they were free.
By Michelle McCalope

— The Voice of a Race
An excerpt from a son's biography of his father, The Undiscovered Paul Robeson: An Artist's Journey, 1898-1939
By Paul Robeson Jr.

— The Power of the Spirit
President Bush's "faith-based" initiative has divided African American religious and community leaders — rallying some, riling others.
By Hamil R. Harris

DEPARTMENTS
- Editor's Note

- Up Front
After 20 years, HIV/AIDS disproportionately threatens the Black community
* Questions for Harvard Prof. Werner Sollors on interracial marriage
* According to Reports
* Milestones
* Lives
- The Color Line: David Levering Lewis on he problem of the 21st century
- Crisis Forum
- Theater: Profile of Playwright August Wilson who eighth play, King Hedley II, recently debuted on Broadway - By A. Bryant
-Technology:
* Dotcom chat with Don Rojas, founder of the The Black World Today web site
* Trish Dziko of the Technology Access Foundation for youth in Seattle
- Books
* Speaking Volumes: Author A'Lelia Bundles talks about her great, great grandmother Madame C. J. Walker
* Review: Radical Equations: Math Literacy and Civil Rights by Robert Moses and Charles E. Cobb Jr.
* Writer Alex Simmons is penning the first African American character in the Batman comics
- Backstory: Living in Poet Sterling Brown's House - By Marcia Davis
- The NAACP Today: Highlights
* Preview of the 92nd Annual Convention in New Orleans
* Vernon Jordan to be awarded the Spingarn Medal
* Branch Profiles: Pine Bluff, Ark. / Prince Georges County, Md.

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New CBC Chair Rep.
Eddie Bernice Johnson
(D-Texas)