Opposing Jim Crow: African Americans and the Soviet Indictment of U.S. Racism, 1928-1937

Before the Nazis came to power in Germany, Soviet officials labeled the United States the most racist country in the world. Photographs, children’s stories, films, newspaper articles, political education campaigns, and court proceedings exposed the hypocrisy of America’s racial democracy. In contrast, the Soviets represented the USSR itself as a superior society where racism was absent and identified African Americans as valued allies in resisting an imminent imperialist war against the fir...