SPLC. Learning for Justice
Spell Freedom: Citizenship and Democracy
August 08, 2026
Hasan Kwame Jeffries and Elaine Weiss explore the crucial role of Citizenship Schools in the Civil Rights Movement and offer lessons for democratic engagement today.
“But it’s also to give a sense of democracy, because it was not just the vote. What does the vote mean? The vote means you can make the nation live up to its promise of democracy. …
Democracy is a verb. It’s something you do. It’s not just something out there. You practice democracy. And so that was part of the learning. It was that you are a first-class citizen.”
This video and discussion toolkit features a conversation between historian Hasan Kwame Jeffries and journalist and author Elaine Weiss, recorded in June 2026 at the Learning for Justice Social Justice Track during the Children’s Defense Fund’s Ella Baker Child Policy Training Institute in Knoxville, Tennessee.
Drawing on Weiss’ book Spell Freedom: The Underground Schools That Built the Civil Rights Movement, the conversation traces the courage, community trust and civic education at the heart of the movement and invites us to consider what those lessons mean for democratic engagement today.
The conversation emphasizes the idea that democracy is not something we can take for granted, but rather it must be built, practiced and protected.
Read the article and watch the video