Lessons From the Daughters of the Civil Rights Movement
In November of 2017, Stacy Lynch, daughter of Bill Lynch, famed democratic political strategist and the mastermind behind New York City’s first black mayor David Dinkins, convened the first gathering of the Daughters of the Movement. It was for selfish reasons that she made those initial calls for a dinner, Stacy said; “I needed a sisterhood.”
The sisterhood that formed was, to put it lightly, one of a kind. The dozen or so women who came together were civil rights royalty, raised by the men and women we have to thank for the progress of the 20th century. They included: Gina Belafonte, daughter of Harry Belafonte; Suzanne Kay, daughter of Diahann Carroll; Hasna Muhammad, daughter of Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee; Dominique Sharpton, daughter of Rev. Al Sharpton; and Keisha Sutton-James, granddaughter of Percy Sutton. “Our lived experience is not normal,” Sutton-James told ELLE.com. “We grew up at the knees of the most brilliant minds.”