BROADUS MITCHELL PAPERS, #4141, 1900-1982
Correspondence, writings, and other papers of Mitchell, economist, historian, liberal
thinker, and teacher at Johns Hopkins, Rutgers, and Hofstra Universities. While at Johns
Hopkins, Mitchell developed a strong commitment to socialism, racial justice, and workers'
education. Correspondence includes a request from H. L. Mencken to see Mitchell's 1931 report
on lynching in Maryland (1932); Franklin Roosevelt's discussion of the problems of
sharecroppers (1935); several letters that show Mitchell's involvement in the controversy to
admit a black student to the graduate program at Johns Hopkins (1938); and letters from the
Southerners for Civil Rights organization (1947-1958). The collection also contains several
of Mitchell's manuscripts, including a 1931 report on lynchings in Salisbury, Maryland, and a
pamphlet entitled Black Justice, published by the ACLU, to which Mitchell
contributed (1931).
