Scope and Content Note
The papers of Roger W. Wilkins (1932-2017) span the years 1861-2012, with the bulk of the material dating from 1962 to 2007. The papers pertain to Wilkins's career in education, government service, journalism, and law; civil rights and social activism; and childhood and family. Included are correspondence, memoranda, speeches, writings, notebooks, teaching material, family papers, newspaper clippings, printed matter, photographs, digital files, and other papers. The papers are in English and are organized into the following series: Family Papers, Professional File, Speeches and Writings File, Miscellany, Digital Files, and Classified.
The Professional File consists of the bulk of the papers and contains material relating to the full range of Wilkins's career from 1958 to 2007 as an assistant attorney general of the United States, journalist, lawyer, professor, publisher, radio commentator, senior fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies, and special assistant to the administrator of the United States Agency for International Development. Prominent in the series are papers relating to the Community Relations Service, established under the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The series documents Wilkins's efforts at the Community Relations Service, as director and assistant attorney general, to help communities resolve racial conflicts and tensions through conciliation and mediation. Additionally, as one of the first African-American editorial board members of the Washington Post and New York Times, Wilkins's work in journalism is reflected in the papers. Correspondence and memoranda in this series chronicle Wilkins's professional activities and include personal letters. Topics include affirmative action, African-American youth, civil rights, education, poverty, racial tension in the United States, race riots, and social activism. Correspondents include David E. Bell, Benjamin C. Bradlee, Ramsey Clark, Helen Jackson Claytor, LeRoy Collins, Marian Wright Edelman, Edward M. Kennedy, Thurgood Marshall, Colin L. Powell, Roy Wilkins, and Arthur Hays Sulzberger.
Other series provide additional documentation on Wilkins's personal and professional activities. The Family Papers relate to Wilkins's childhood, family history, and the life and accomplishments of Helen Jackson Claytor (mother), Marvel Jackson Cooke (aunt), Earl Wilkins (father), Roy Wilkins (uncle), and other family members. The Writings and Speeches File contains handwritten, printed, and typed drafts of published and unpublished writings and speeches. Also included are correspondence and supporting material. Topics on which Wilkins wrote include apartheid in South Africa, Brown v. Board of Education, civil rights, crime, Jesse Jackson's presidential campaigns, Martin Luther King, Jr., race relations in the United States, segregation, voting rights, and the Watergate Affair. Wilkins's involvement in Jesse Jackson's presidential campaigns of 1984 and 1988 and role as national coordinator of Nelson Mandela's 1990 trip to the United States are featured in the Miscellany series. Also included in the series is material relating to the documentary Throwaway People, which was commentated by Wilkins.
The Digital Files consist of sixty-nine audio and video files orginally received on two DVDs. In 1993, Wilkins was a commentator on the segment "Out of the Ashes" for CBS News Sunday Morning, and he discussed the Kerner Commission's twenty-fifth anniversary. In 2004, Wilkins was interviewed about Brown v. Board of Education by Nadjia Varney for George Mason University Television's show School Talk. The digital files pertain to both television events.