History Is A Weapon:
A Sitemap

History Is A Weapon is a left counter-hegemonic education project.

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☉ = Secondary Source

Our amnesia only
serves the masters
The Reason You Learned To Read

To 1776

The Diario of Christopher Columbus (1492)
"With Such People I Want No Peace" by Acuera (c. 1540)
Brief Account of the Devastation of the Indies by Bartoleme de Las Casas (1542)
Letter of Francisco de Montejo Xiu (1567)
Who Is Your Mother? Red Roots of White Feminism Paul Gunn Allen (1986) ☉
Richard Frethorne on Indentured Servitude (1623)
A True Narrative of the Rise, Progresse, and Cessation of the Late Rebellion in Virginia, Most Humbly and Impartially Reported by His Majestyes Commissioners Appointed to Enquire into the Affaires of the Said Colony (1677)
Proclamation of the New Hampshire Legislature on the Mast Tree Riot (1734)
Letter Written by William Shirley to the Lords of Trade about the Knowles Riot (1747)
Gottlieb Mittelberger's Journey to Pennsylvania in the Year 1750 and Return to Germany in the Year 17-54 (1754)
Thomas Hutchinson Recounts the Reaction to the Stamp Act in Boston (1765)
Account of the New York Tenant Riots (1766)
Samuel Drowne's Testimony on the Boston Massacre (1770)
George Hewes Recalls the Boston Tea Party (1834)
Three Documents on Slave Revolts (1720 to 1793)
Four Petitions Against Slavery (1773 to 1777)
Joseph Clarke's Letter about the Rebellion in Springfield (1774)
African Slavery in America by Thomas Paine (1775)
A People's History Of The United States by Howard Zinn ☉

1776 to 1830

New York Mechanics Declaration of Independence (1776)
Common Sense by Thomas Paine (1776)
A Narrative of Some of the Adventures, Dangers and Sufferings of a Revolutionary Soldier by Joseph Plumb Martin (1830)
Samuel Dewees Recounts the Suppression of Insubordination in the Continental Army after the Mutinies of 1781 (1844)
Speech to the United States Congress by Corn Tassel (1785)
Letter to George Washington by Henry Knox (1786)
Federalist No. 10 (1787)
Letter to President Washington by Big Tree, Cornplanter, and Half-Town (1790)
Letter to Jefferson by Benjamin Banneker (1791)
A Great Difference between Red and White
by Sago-Yo-Watha (Red Jacket) (1805)
Sleep not longer, O Choctaws and Chickasaws by Tecumseh (1811)
Tecumseh's Speech to the Osages (Winter 1811-12)
Two Documents on the Cherokee Removal (1829 and 1830)

1830 to the Civil War

David Walker's Appeal by David Walker (1830)
Military Dictatorships in the Americas (1830 to 2010) [Chart]
Slaves Are Prohibited to Read and Write by Law North Carolina Statute (passed 1830-1)
Black Hawk's Surrender Speech (1832)
The Demand For Order And The Birth Of Modern Policing by Kristian Williams ☉
Address Delivered at the African Masonic Hall, Boston by Maria Stewart (1833)
Letter to Lydia Maria Child by James R. Bradley (1834)
Dispatch on Texas Colonists by Miguel Barragan (1835)
An Eyewitness Account of the Flour Riot in New York (1837)
Angelina Grimké Weld's speech at Pennsylvania Hall (1838)
"The Cherokee Removal Through the Eyes of a Private Soldier" by John G. Burnett (1890)
Henry Bibb's Letter to William Gatewood (1844)
Woman in the Nineteenth Century by S. Margaret Fuller Ossoli (1845)
From The Narrative Of The Life of Frederick Douglass by Frederick Douglass (1845)
The Diary of Colonel Ethan Allen Hitchcock (1845/6)
Desertion Handbill by Juan Soto (1847)
"The War with Mexico" North Star Editorial (1848)
Declaration of Sentiments by Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1848)
Address to the New England Convention by Frederick Douglass (1849)
On the Duty of Civil Disobedience
by Henry David Thoreau (1849)
A Plea For The Oppressed by Lucy Stanton (1850)
Ain't I A Woman? by Sojourner Truth (1851)
The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro by Frederick Douglass (1852)
What Time of Night It Is by Sojourner Truth (1853)
"America" by James Monroe Whitfield (1853)
"Not Christianity, But Priestcraft" by Lucretia Mott (1854)
"Speech of Reverend Theodore Parker at the Faneuil Hall Meeting" (1854)
Fourth of July Address at Reidsville, New York by John Quinney (1854)
Marriage Protest of Lucy Stone and Henry B. Blackwell (1855)
The Impending Crisis of the South by Hinton Rowan Helper (1857)
John Brown's Last Speech (1859)
Jermain Wesley Loguen's Letter to Sarah Logue (1860)
Selections from Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl Harriet Jacobs (1861)
A Voice from Harper's Ferry by Osborne P. Anderson (1861)

The Civil War to 1900

"Voting by Classes" by "Mechanic" (1863)
The Great Riots of New York by Joel Tyler Headley (1873) ☉
Four Documents on Disaffection in the South During the Civil War (1864/5)
Mississippi Black Codes (1865)
Martin Delany's Advice to Former Slaves (1865)
Worse Than Slavery by David M. Oshinsky ☉
Keeping the Thing Going While Things Are Stirring by Sojourner Truth (1867)
"On the Eligibility of Colored Members to Seats in the Georgia Legislature" by Henry McNeal Turner (1868)
Susan B. Anthony Addresses Judge Ward Hunt (1873)
The Battle of the Little Bighorn, Narrated by an Indian Who Fought in It by Two Moons (1876)
Annals of the Great Strikes in the United States by J. A. Dacus (1877)
Two Statements by Chief Joseph of the Nez Perce (1877 and 1879)
"We Would Rather Have Died" Chief Standing Bear (1879)
Excerpt from A People's History of The United States Howard Zinn (1980) ☉
"Address of August Spies" (1886)
"Red-Handed Murder: Negroes Wantonly Killed at Thibodaux, La." Anonymous (1887)
Open Letter from the New Orleans Mass Meeting by Reverend Ernest Lyon (1888)
"I Denounce the So-Called Emancipation as a Stupendous Fraud" by Frederick Douglass (1888)
Wall Street Owns The Country by Mary Elizabeth Lease (1890)
Speech to the Women's Christian Temperance Union by Mary Elizabeth Lease (1890)
The Massacre at Wounded Knee South Dakota by Turning Hawk, Captain Sword, Spotted Horse, and American Horse (1891)
"The End of the Dream" by Black Elk (1932)
Reverend J. L. Moore on the Colored Farmers' Alliance (1891)
The Convict Lease System by Ida B. Wells (1893)
Lynch Law By Ida B. Wells (1893)
Statement from the Pullman Strikers (1894)
Coxey's Speech, 50 years late by Jacob S. Coxey (1894, 1944)
"Characteristics of the Early Factory Girls" by Harriet Hanson Robinson(1898) ☉
The Omaha Platform of the People's Party of America
Calixto Garcia's Letter to General William R. Shatter (1898)
"The Negro Should Not Enter the Army" Statement of the Missionary Department of the Atlanta, Georgia, A.M.E. Church (1899)
Open Letter to President McKinley by Colored People Of Massachusetts I. D. Barnett et al. (1899)
Lewis H. Douglass on Black Opposition to McKinley (1899)
The First Vietnam: The U.S.-Philippine War of 1899 by Luzviminda Francisco (1973) ☉

1900 to the First World War

The Axe at the Root by William Thurston Brown (1901)
Crime and Criminals: Address to the Prisoners
in the Chicago Jail by Clarence Darrow (1902)
"Agitation—The Greatest Factor for Progress" by Mother Jones
The War Prayer by Mark Twain (1904)
"The Roosevelt Corollary" and "To Roosevelt" by Theodore Roosevelt and Rubin Dario (1904, 1905)
Manifesto and Preamble
of the Industrial Workers of the World (1905, 1908)
"Comments on the Moro Massacre" by Samuel Clemens (1906)
Patriotism: A Menace to Liberty by Emma Goldman (1908)
The General Strike by "Big Bill" Haywood (1911)
"Proclamation of the Striking Textile Workers of Lawrence" (1912)
The Truth about the Paterson Strike by Elizabeth Gurley Flynn (1914)
Arturo Giovannitti's Address to the Jury (1912)
Speech to Striking Coal Miners by Mother Jones (1912)
I Incite This Meeting to Rebellion by Emmeline Pankhurst (1912)
When Civil War is Waged by Women by Emmeline Pankhurst (1913)
Remember Ludlow! by Julia May Courtney (1914)
"Let My People Go": An Address delivered at the conference of the Society of American Indians by Carlos Montezuma (1915)
"My Last Will" by Joe Hill (1915)
Strike Against War by Helen Keller (1916)
Address to the Jury in U.S. v. Emma Goldman and Alexander Berkman by Emma Goldman (1917)
"The Subject Class Always Fights the Battles" by Eugene Debs (1918)
Eugene Debs' Statement to the Court Upon Being Convicted of Violating the Sedition Act (1918)

1918 through the Depression

Plain Words (1919)
"Women As Leaders" by Amy Euphemia Jacques Garvey (1925)
Propaganda by Edward Bernays (1928)
The Negro is the Race Oppressed by All the Imperialists by Lamine Senghor (1927)
A selection from Black Bolshevik by Harry Haywood
"I Am A Union Woman" by Aunt Molly Jackson (1931)
"You Have to Fight for Freedom" by Sylvia Woods (published 1973)
A Selection of the Poetry of Langston Hughes
Organizing the Unemployed in the Bronx in the 1930s by Rose Chernin
Fannie Henderson Witnesses Southern Lynch Law (1933)
The Mis-Education of the Negro by Carter Godwin Woodson (1933)
Strange Fruit by Billie Holiday and Abel Meeropol (1937)
"You Cannot Kill the Working Class" by Angelo Herndon (1937)
"Back of the Yards" by Vicky Starr ("Stella Nowicki"; Published 1973)
War Is A Racket by Major General Smedley Butler (1935)

War World Two through the Fifties

The Six Pamphlets of the White Rose Society (1942/3)
Admiral Gene Larocque Speaks to Studs Terkel About "The Good War" (1985)
Messages to America: The Letters of Ho Chi Minh (1945-69)
A Short Primer on Iran: Several Helpful Readings
Quinby's Warning by Edwin Jay Quinby (1946)
A Letter to Negro Soldiers (1954)
The Montgomery Bus Boycott from the Women's Political Council (1955)
Paul Robeson's Unread Statement before the House Committee on Un-American Activities (1956)
Reciprocal Bases of National Culture and the Fight for Freedom by Frantz Fanon (1959)
A Historical Survey of Organizations of the Left Among the Chinese in America by H. M. Lai (published 1972) ☉

The 1960s

They Can't Turn Back by James Baldwin (1960)
An Appeal for Human Rights (1960)
"Bigger Than A Hamburger" by Ella Baker (1960)
Appeal to Adlai Stevenson by Robert Williams (1961)
"Why do the Yankees hate the Cuban Revolution?" by Fidel Castro (1962)
The American Revolution: Pages From a Negro Worker's Notebook by James Boggs (1963)
Malcolm X on Afro-American History
Letter from a Birmingham Jail by Martin Luther King Jr. (1963)
Mississippi Goddam by Nina Simone (1963)
The Revolution Is At Hand A speech by John Lewis (1963)
A Message to the Grassroots A speech by Malcolm X (1963)
My Dungeon Shook by James Baldwin (1963)
The Ballot or the Bullet A speech by Malcolm X (1964)
From The Autobiography of Malcolm X
Testimony of Rita L. Schwerner (1964)
An End To History by Mario Savio (1964)
Sex and Caste: A Kind of Memo by Casey Hayden and Mary King (1965)
Attention All Military Personnel A pamphlet of the Vietnam Day Committee (1965)
The Basis of Black Power: a SNCC position paper (1966)
"Who Will Revere the Black Woman?" by Abbey Lincoln (1966)
The Weapon of Theory by Amilcar Cabral (1966)
"Create Two, Three, Many Vietnams: Message to the Tricontinental" by Che Guevara (1967)
The S.C.U.M. Manifesto by Valerie Solanas (1967)
"There Was No Rules At All" — Stories from Vietnam
by Haywood T. "The Kid" Kirkland (1984)
The Thoughts of Muhammad Ali in Exile, c. 1967
"To Draft Board 1"by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. (1967)
Alzada Clark Organizes Black Women Workers in Mississippi (1967 -)
Founding Statement and Platform of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (1967 and 1969)
Coming of Age in Mississippi by Anne Moody (1968)
Ellen Willis Replies by Ellen Willis (1968)
Catonsville 9 Statement by Daniel Berrigan (1968)
"They Were Butchering People" by Larry Colburn (2003)
African History in the Service of the Black Liberation by Walter Rodney (1968)
Power Anywhere Where There's People A speech by Fred Hampton (1969)
The Freedom Schools: Concept And Organization by Staughton Lynd
Black Panther Party Platform, Program, and Rules
The Port Huron Statement by the Students for a Democratic Society
The Radical Education Project: An Introduction And An Invitation
The League of Revolutionary Black Workers: A Historical Study by A. Muhammad Ahmad
'Be Down with the Brown!' by Elizabeth ("Betita") Martinez (published 1998)
A Question of Class by Dorothy Allison (published 1994)
Die Nigger Die: A Political Autobiography by H. Rap Brown (1969)
"A War I Opposed And Despised" by Bill Clinton (1969)
I Wor Kuen's 12 Point Program and Platform (1969)
The Redstockings Manifesto (1969)
Women, Power, and Revolution by Kathleen Neal Cleaver (published 1998)
Abortion Is a Woman's Right by Susan Brownmiller (published 1999)
Stonewall by Martin Duberman (published 1993)
Federal Bureau of Intimidation by Howard Zinn
Selections from Even the Women Must Fight: Memories of War from North Vietnam
The Campaign Against The Underground Press by Geoffrey Rips (1981; Appendix) ☉
Alcatraz Proclamation and Letter (1969)

The 1970s

First They Came For: The Untold Violent Persecution of Communists Worldwide ☉
Refugees from Amerika: A Gay Manifesto by Carl Wittman (1970)
"The Problem Is Civil Obedience" by Howard Zinn (1970)
The Woman-Identified Woman by the Radicalesbians (1970)
Suppressed Speech on the 350th Anniversary of the Pilgrim's Landing at Plymouth Rock by Wamsutta (Frank B.) James (1970)
An Open Letter to My Sister, Angela Y. Davis by James Baldwin
The Women's Liberation and Gay Liberation Movements by Huey Newton (1970)
National Liberation and Culture by Amilcar Cabral (1970)
The Revolution Will Not Be Televised by Gil Scott-Heron (1970)
What is Radical History? by Howard Zinn (1970) ☉
Women vs. Connecticut Organizing Pamphlet (1970)
Excerpts from Scanlan's Guerrilla War in the U.S.A. January 1971 Issue
Remembering the Real Dragon: An Interview with George Jackson
An interview by Karen Wald (1971)
Soledad Brother: The Prison Letters of George Jackson
George Jackson: Black Revolutionary By Walter Rodney (1971)
"The Powell Memo" by Lewis Powell (1971)
Guerilla War in the United States, 1965-1970 (Map) Political Prisoners, Prisons, and Black Liberation by Angela Y. Davis
"It's In Your Hands" by Fannie Lou Hamer (1971)
The Social Functions of the Prisons in the United States by Bettina Aptheker (1971)
Abortion on Demand: A Woman's Right by Caroline Lund and Cindy Jaquith (1971)
Looking back: Radical Criminology and Social Movements by Gregory Shank ☉
The Tyranny Of Structurelessness by Joreen (1972)
Socialist Feminism: A Strategy for the Women's Movement by The Hyde Park Chapter, Chicago Women's Liberation Union (1972)
A Fundamental Necessity of the Revolution by Samora Machel (1973)
Three chapters from Victor: An Unfinished Song by Joan Jara (1973)
Street Speech by Walter Rodney
A Selection From Walter Rodney Speaks: The Making of an African Intellectual by Walter Rodney
"I Believe in the Laws of Nature" by Anna Mae Aquash (1975)
A Bicentennial Without a Puerto Rican Colony by Piri Thomas (1975)
The Chicago Boys in Chile: Economic Freedom's Awful Toll by Orlando Letelier (1976)
Of Woman Born by Adrienne Rich (1977)
Open Letter From a Writer to the Military Junta by Rodolfo Walsh (1977)
Harvey Milk's Hope Speech (1977)
The Combahee River Collective Statement (1977)
Women in Prison: How It Is With Us by Assata Shakur (1978)
Where Myths Lead to Murder by Philip Agee (1978)
Researching Undercover CIA Agents by Louis Wolf (1978)
Douglas Fraser's Resignation letter from the Labor-Management Group
The Low Road by Marge Piercy
The Struggle Goes On by Walter Rodney (1979)
The Master's Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master's House by Audre Lorde (1979)
Behind the Death Squads: An exclusive report on the US role in El Salvador's official terror
by Allan Nairn (1984) ☉ (with "You Learn How To Torture ...")
An Open Letter to Mary Daly by Audre Lorde (1979)
Twenty-One Ways to "Scalp" an Indian by Jerry Gambill (1979)
Testimony of Ismael Guadalupe Ortiz on Vieques, Puerto Rico (1979)

The 1980s

To the Soldiers of El Salvador by Lillian Jiménez (translated 1988)
We Are Power by John Trudell (1980)
The Bridge Poem by Donna Kate Rushin (1981)
A Left-Handed Commencement by Ursula K. Le Guin (1983)
Commencement Address at Milton Academy by Marian Wright Edelman (1983)
Address to the Commonwealth Club of California by Cesar Chavez (1984)
Pioneering In The Nuclear Age: An Essay on Israel and the Palestinians by Eqbal Ahmad (1984)
An Excerpt of Fabio Ernesto Carrasco's Testimony (1990)
Map of Local Military Connections to the U.S. War in Central America (And The Pledge of Resistance) (1986)
Black History by Gil Scott-Heron
Local P-9 Strikers and Supporters on the 1985-1986 Meatpacking Strike against the Hormel Company in Austin, Minnesota (1991)
Why We Fight by Vito Russo (1988)
The Movement Action Plan: A Strategic Framework Describing the Eight Stages of Successful Social Movements by Bill Moyer
People Have The Power by Patti Smith
The Seven Deadly Sins Fact Sheet by David Wojnarowicz (1989)
Selections from Close to the Knives by David Wojnarowicz (1980s/1991)

The 1990s to Today

The Queer Nation Manifesto (1990)
Nelson Mandela's statement at his trial and his speech given at his release (1964, 1990)
Riot Grrrl Manifesto (1991)
June Jordan Speaks Out Against The 1991 Gulf War
The Cold War from the Standpoints of Its Victims
by Eqbal Ahmad (1991) ☉
"The Feminization of Earth First! by Judi Bari(1992)
Imperialism 101 by Michael Parenti (1995) ☉ "Action Will Be Taken": Left Anti-intellectualism and Its Discontents by Liza Featherstone, Doug Henwood, and Christian Parenti
What Should White People Do? by Linda Martin Alcoff
What Legacy from the Radical Internationalism of 1968? by Max Elbaum
Strategizing For A Living Revolution by George Lakey
From Understanding Power by Noam Chomsky
Prison Labor, Slavery & Capitalism in Historical Perspective by Stephen Hartnett ☉ The War on the People: An Interview with Christian Parenti by Suzi Weissman ☉
Social Insecurity: The Transformation of American Criminal Justice, 1965-2000 by Anthony Platt ☉
Race, Prison, and Poverty ☉ by Paul Street
Empire Abroad, Prisons At Home: Dark Connections by Paul Street ☉
The Challenge of Prison Abolition: A Conversation Angela Y. Davis and Dylan Rodriguez ☉
Opening Up Borderland Studies: A Review of U.S.-Mexico Border Militarization Discourse by Jose Palafox ☉
Masked Racism: Reflections on the Prison Industrial Complex by Angela Y. Davis ☉
The A16 email
Slavery and Prison — Understanding the Connections by Kim Gilmore ☉
Lockdown America in 22 Minutes [Audio] by Christian Parenti ☉ "Our Armies Are Rising and We Are Getting Stronger" Sylvia Rivera's Talk at the LGMNY (2001)
Surviving the Storm: Lessons from Nature by Julia Butterfly Hill (2001)
Organizing in Our Communities Post-September 11th by Monami Maulik (2001)
Letter from Palestine by Rachel Corrie (2003)
"You Who are the Bureaucrats of Empire, Remember Who We Are" by Don Mitchell (2004)
Crime As Social Control by Christian Parenti ☉
Prison Nation by Sasha Abramsky ☉
The New Pentagon Papers by Karen Kwiatkowski
New US Military Bases:
Side Effects Or Causes Of War? by Zoltan Grossman
Tarek Mehanna's Sentencing Statement (2012)
A Sampling of U.S. Foreign Policy (Map)
Declaration of the Occupation of New York City by the New York City General Assembly (2011)

The Future Is All We Have

Pedagogy of the Oppressed by Paulo Freire (1968)
How to Master Secret Work by the Communist Party of South Africa (c. 1980s)
Strategic Monkeywrenching by Dave Forman (1985)
Affinity Groups & Support by Nancy Alach and ACT-UP
Locking Down with Lockboxes From Crimethinc.'s Recipes for Disaster
What Radicalized You? (2020)

History Is A Weapon: A Sitemap

Please Scroll to the right ⇨ ☉ = Secondary Source