The Strange Ritual of Commencement Speeches
Where everything and nothing is at stake
![An infinite number of speech bubbles inside one another](https://cdn.theatlantic.com/thumbor/OnPbntaNJS7zSwijiWb7F3nlOqA=/438x0:1564x1126/80x80/media/img/mt/2024/05/Atlantic_Commencment_01-5/original.gif)
Where everything and nothing is at stake
John Brown and the Secret Six—the abolitionists who funded the raid on Harpers Ferry—confronted a question as old as America: When is violence justified?
As a child, I saw the country in its photos, stories, and advertisements—and learned some hard truths about America.
When the Supreme Court heard oral arguments on the future of affirmative action, I knew I had to be there.
The abolitionists have long been portrayed as heroes. A new book views them, and their family, in a different light.
How will they interpret the past?
A white man of the Jim Crow South, he couldn’t escape the burden of race, yet derived creative force from it.
A historian looks back at the legacy of slavery and Jim Crow in her home state.