Galloway, N.J. — Newark Mayor Ras Baraka will be the featured speaker at the 22nd annual Fannie Lou Hamer Human and Civil Rights Symposium at 2:30 p.m., Oct. 7, in the Stockton University Performing Arts Center. 

This year’s theme will be “Good Trouble: The Fight to Preserve our History and Democracy.”

Baraka is the 40th mayor of Newark and is currently in his third term. Earlier this year, he was a candidate in the Democratic primary for governor of New Jersey.

A native of Newark whose family has lived in the city for more than 80 years, Baraka’s progressive approach to governing has reduced crime to its lowest levels in five decades, addressed affordability while maintaining steady growth, lowered unemployment, returned local control of schools after more than two decades, and replaced all 23,000 known lead service lines in less than three years at no cost to residents.

While serving as the Mayor of Newark, he also presides as the President of NJ Urban Mayors Association; Executive Board Member for NJ League of Municipalities; Co-Chair, National League of Cities Reimagining Public Safety Task Force; U.S. Conference of Mayors- Vice Chair for Ports, Transportation and Communications Committee; and Member, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Local Government Advisory Committee.

Fannie Lou Hamer was among the most significant participants in the struggle launched in the latter half of the 20th century to achieve freedom and social justice for African Americans.

Hamer’s historic presence in Atlantic City at the 1964 Democratic National Convention brought national prominence with her electrifying testimony before the convention’s credentials committee. She sought to prevent the seating of the all-white Mississippi delegation. While this effort failed, the Democratic Party agreed that in the future no delegation would be seated from a state where anyone was illegally denied the vote. Roughly a year later, the 1965 Voting Rights Act was passed. 

Stockton honors Fannie Lou Hamer by inviting influential keynote speakers annually to inspire and inform students. Past speakers include Ndaba Mandela (2024), Shirley N. Webber (2023), Keisha N. Blain (2022), Bettina L. Love (2021), Zoe Spencer (2020), W. Paul Coates (2019) and Lt. Governor Sheila Y. Oliver (2018).

The symposium is sponsored by the Africana Studies Program, Unified Black Students Society, the Office of the Provost, the Council of Black Faculty and Staff, the Office of the President, the Office of Diversity and Inclusion and the Office of Student Development.