Mar 31, 2016 - Sale 2408

Sale 2408 - Lot 247

Price Realized: $ 4,750
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 4,000 - $ 6,000
(CIVIL RIGHTS.) SULLIVAN LEON. "The Sullivan Principles" (supplied title). Large collection of printed and manuscript material including letters, printed and manuscript speeches, sermons, flyers, photographs, correspondence to and from (with retained copies). should be seen. Vp, 1970-2000

Additional Details

a rich archive of the papers of leon sullivan, businessman, baptist minister, civil rights activist and founder of the "sullivan principles." Leon Sullivan (1922-2001), a truly remarkable man, overcame extreme poverty and the paralyzing grip of racial prejudice to become a member of the board of General Motors, an ordained Baptist minister and powerful activist for racial equality both here and in South Africa. There, the scourge of institutionalized prejudice, known as "Apartheid," or separateness had kept millions of people in virtual bondage for nearly a century. "Nowhere else in the world is found such [a] flagrant practice of man's inhumanity to man. . . . Ten years ago, I decided with the help of almighty God that I would try to do something about the problem . . . these efforts became what are now known as the Sullivan Principles. . . " Sullivan's nine-page manuscript speech with edits and corrections lays out his "principals" for South Africa. Sullivan conceived of a domestic plan for communities here in America called the 10-36 plan, taken from the parable of the loaves and fishes, and the community-based "Progress Plaza," plan for a black owned shopping center. Because of his unique position in the business world, Sullivan was able to reach out to American business and urge them to withdraw economic support for the South African regime. Leon Sullivan built what the Philadelphia Enquirer referred to as a business" Empire." It was through his holdings and connections that Sullivan was able to exert influence on the larger American business world, to provide job opportunities here as well. It was Sullivan's belief that education and jobs were at the core of lifting up the African-American population as well as the African, and that this could only be done through building and owning one's "community." There is a great deal of material here relative to Sullivan's business as well as his work in the African-American community, with correspondence from an array of people in business, government and the Civil Rights organizations.