The Civil Rights Lobby

“Gelbman offers an in-depth scholarly account of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, deftly tracing how this surprisingly fragile coalition was pieced together and the role it played in advancing some of the most important pieces of legislation in the twentieth century. In addition to offering a fascinating examination of an overlooked element of the modern civil rights movement, The Civil Rights Lobby is an important contribution to interest group theory. It shows the value of broad-based coalition building not only as a way of aggregating and coordinating grassroots support but also as a means of sending robust policy signals to other political actors. As today’s social movements wax and wane, The Civil Rights Lobby offers an informative account of the role that lobbying and coalition building can play in harming or helping a movement’s political goals.”
—Kimberley Johnson, Professor of Social and Cultural Analysis and Associated Professor of Wilf Family Department of Politics at New York University, and author of Reforming Jim Crow: Southern Politics and State in the Age before Brown

“Through a careful and original case study of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, Shamira Gelbman offers a fresh, compelling, and illuminating lens onto a set of crucial and enduring questions about coalitional efforts to bring about social and political change. Bringing a remarkable amount of archival evidence to bear on questions central to the study of interest groups, race and politics, and American political development, The Civil Rights Lobby challenges much of the received wisdom about the relationship between ‘outsider’ movements and ‘insider lobbies’ while also providing a long-overdue and detailed history of one of the most important civil rights organizations in the United States.”
—Dara Z. Strolovitch, Professor of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, American Studies, and Political Science at Yale University, and author of Affirmative Advocacy: Race, Class, and Gender in Interest Group Politics

"The Civil Rights Lobby offers a detailed examination of one of the most influential lobbying coalitions of the civil rights era, The Leadership Conference on Civil Rights. Delving deeply into the advocacy efforts of the Leadership Conference, the book suggests an important tension between coalition diversity and constraints on its ability to build consensus. Gelbman’s work provides insight into the extent to which, and circumstances under which, this tension can be mitigated by concerted organizational efforts."
—Interest Groups & Advocacy

"The Civil Rights Lobby makes a convincing case for focusing on organizational structure and coordination capacity in the study of interest group coalitions. It also offers valuable contributions for scholars of racial politics in the United States.... (T)he book offers a detailed case study of how marginalized groups can exercise power in quasi-democratic political institutions."
—Journal of Race, Ethnicity, and Politics

"The Civil Rights Lobby is an exemplary case study of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights and represents an important contribution to the study of coalitional advocacy, interest groups, and the politics of the Second Reconstruction. Among its many strengths, it will enrich readers’ appreciation of the difficult organizational work of coordination—a form of success unto itself, but one rarely recognized as such."—Mobilization