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  • 2022-02-08 (xsd:date)
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  • Was Einstein a Member of the NAACP? (en)
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  • Nobel Prize winning scientist Albert Einstein was also an ardent civil rights advocate, particularly after he moved to the United States in late 1932 from Germany. Proof of his commitment to advocacy lies in the fact that he was member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Shortly after his departure, Adolf Hitler and the Nazi party took over the German government. In 1933, the German government passed a law purging Jewish faculty from universities. Einstein’s apartment in Germany was raided, his property confiscated, and he essentially became a refugee in America. But even before he left Germany, Einstein had been corresponding with W.E.B. Du Bois, a co-founder of the NAACP. In 1931, Einstein accepted an invitation from Du Bois to write a short piece for the magazine, The Crisis. In his piece, which was introduced by Du Bois, he encouraged Black people to not let racism ruin their self worth: Einstein would go on to support progressive and civil rights causes in the United States, cultivating relationships with the Black community in the heavily segregated town of Princeton, where he worked at the Institute for Advanced Study. He even offered to appear as a character witness for Du Bois in the 1950s when the civil rights leader was indicted by the government for failing to register as a foreign agent when he circulated a pro-Soviet petition. Einstein’s offer convinced the judge to drop the case against Du Bois. The Smithsonian noted that Einstein joined both the NAACP and the American Crusade Against Lynching (ACAL), founded by his friend, Black musician and activist Paul Robeson. Einstein even served as the co-chair of the ACAL. The NAACP pointed out in a 2013 Facebook post that Einstein was a member of their organization: In a 1946 commencement speech at Lincoln University, a historically Black college, Einstein said segregation was not a disease of colored people. It is a disease of white people. I do not intend to be quiet about it. But Einstein’s travel writings about people of different races were troubling in their racist descriptions. He described Chinese people as industrious but filthy. It would be a pity if these Chinese supplant all other races, he wrote. For the likes of us the mere thought is unspeakably dreary. Einstein can be seen as a complicated figure, who believed in civil rights and experienced antisemitism himself, and who also held outdated and racist views about other communities. Given that his membership with the NAACP has been acknowledged and celebrated by the group itself, we rate this claim as True. (en)
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