(African instrumental music) - My name is Harold Rogers.

- My name is Joan Gerig.

- My name is Prexy Nesbitt, from Chicago, Illinois, from the west side.

- I'm Mike Siviwe Elliott.

- I am Dr. Iva Carruthers.

- My name is Carol Moseley Braun.

I grew up on the south side of Chicago.

- [Mike] There was a time when I filmed Nelson Mandela, it's called "Labor welcomes Mandela to Chicago."

- Viva Mandela!

Viva Mandela!

Viva Mandela!

- [Joan] I first heard about apartheid when I was in Nigeria.

- And so I learned about South Africa as a child really.

- [Protesters] Free South Africa!

- Comrades, I bring you the greetings of the African National Congress.

- There was no question, we had to bring him to Chicago.

Because in 1990, he hadn't come to Chicago.

So in '93, recognizing that absence, he made this trip.

It was very important.

- This is a great day for our city.

- Our job is partially done, but it isn't finished yet.

- And he gave this incredible speech.

- Y'all have been the source of strength.

- He was like a teacher, and we were all like in his classroom.

(African instrumental music) - I first became aware of this concept of apartheid really being trained as a sociologist, working on a doctorate at Northwestern University.

- I first learned about apartheid doing a paper in sixth grade for the sixth grade class at Francis Parker School.

- I first became involved with the ANC in 1968 when I was living in Tanzania.

- I first heard about apartheid when I was in Nigeria teaching in 1970.

And that's when it started to become real.

- My grandfather was a follower of Marcus Garvey.

And he believed that black folks should learn all the skills they could and take it back to develop Africa.

Because he says, "We will never get any respect here."

- I had no idea at the time that this struggle against apartheid in South Africa and the struggle for civil rights here in the States were on such parallel tracks.

- Three critical constructs that we studied was race, class, and power.

And in that context, whenever you wanted to globalize that conversation, there was always a comparison made to apartheid in South Africa, segregation in the United States and the caste system in India.

- Black South Africans in South Africa looked very highly on black Americans because of the civil rights movement.

- With the rise of Black Power in the United States, we were talking about black consciousness.

It was important to get the black communities to be aware of themselves, and to refuse to accept the second-rate status as citizens of this country.

Ultimately we got arrested for that.

- Remember, we came out of South Africa and there were such censorship.

Remember, we were not supposed to sing the national anthem because they perceived it as song that was instigating something.

The people here knew it, they knew our heroes, they knew more of our heroes than we did.

(upbeat music) - [Narrator] The connection between black Americans and black South Africans goes back to the 1800s.

- There were African-Americans in South Africa as early as 1819.

And they were there as sailors.

A major part of the Commercial Trading Sailor Network was African-American.

That early group of people were treated differently than black South Africans.

But they still recognized what was going on in terms of the way that black South Africans were treated.

- [Narrator] The enslaved sailor on the left traveled to South Africa on this confederate ship called the Alabama.

There's even a South African song dedicated to the ship.

♪ The Alabama come over the sea ♪ - [Narrator] Sailor Yankee wood was a ship steward before settling in South Africa after the Civil War.

Wood made money during Johannesburg's gold rush in the 1880s and purchases hotels.

In 1890, musician Orpheus McAdoo and Virginia's Hampton University Jubilee singers, spent five years in South Africa performing show tunes and spirituals.

♪ Coming forth to carry me home ♪ ♪ If you get there before I do ♪ ♪ Coming forth to carry me home ♪ - [Narrator] By the early 1900s, Black Baptist and African Methodist Episcopal churches sent missionaries to live with South Africans to teach the Bible and care for orphans.

- The AME church began to be banned inside South Africa because South African state began to see them as encouraging opposition to the way that black South Africans were being treated.

- [Narrator] And black newspapers and magazines such as the Indianapolis Freeman, The Colored American, and Marcus Garvey's "Negro World" circulated in Johannesburg espousing a message of black liberation.

- There were some Garveyites inside of South Africa, even though it too was a banned organization.

- [Narrator] Given these historical connections, it's not surprising that when the offspring of enslaved African-Americans moved north to Chicago, as part of the great migration, they strongly identified with the black South Africans who were forced to live under a strict system of racial separation and inequality called apartheid.

- It's a horrible system that defines people, as superior or inferior on the basis of how they look.

So you don't care about the content of the people.

And because we are inferior, everything for us is to be inferior.

(upbeat music) - [Narrator] Fast forward to the 1970s when black South Africans started coming to Chicago regularly.

- I made a list the other day of the some 78 different South Africans who stayed in my house on the west side of Chicago.

- In 1973, there was a conference held here at Dunbar High School.

It was a founding of an organization called the National Anti-Imperialist Movement in solidarity with African Liberation.

One of the speakers was Oliver Tambo.

That was an electrifying experience.

- [Narrator] Oliver Tambo proceeded Nelson Mandela as president of the African National Congress while living in exile for three decades.

It was only after Nelson Mandela was released from a life sentence for plotting to overthrow the white racist government, that Tambo was able to return to South Africa.

- And it was a learning experience to actually speak to people who had actually been on the ground in South Africa.

And who had experienced pretty much some of the same things that I had experienced growing up in the south.

- And there were so many public forums and educational activity and a constant thrust of keeping the eye on this brutal regime of a minority European-descended population in control of a majority-black country that just seemed outlandish in the minds of everyday people.

- Here in the Chicago area, we have 21, 22 different anti-apartheid organizations.

- We had a committed grouping of people who were very versed in the relationship and how it all came together with the struggle in this country and the struggle in southern Africa.

- When I'm talking to people about southern Africa, it's to make the connections between what's going on in Chicago and what's going on in southern Africa.

- We in Chicago have always had a diversity of movement building in relationship to the injustices that the black people have had to fight.

You had the center of the Nation of Islam here.

You had the center of the National Baptist Convention here.

You couldn't have had more opposites, right?

- But it is the people, how they dedicated themselves to our struggle as if they were experiencing the pain and the hurt of the people of South Africa.

Of course, I suppose in some way it was easier for them since they were not so free after all.

- We would say, "Freeing South Africa, is freeing ourselves."

- Northern style white supremacists allowed for black people here not to ever forget who they were in relationship to the system of white supremacy.

And it's the rawness of Chicago, it was the clear separation.

You could literally, as a sociologist, look at the ethnic communities and you could literally cross the street and know you were in a different zone.

And you could feel it, you could smell it, you could experience it.

So it was up south for real.

- The "Free South Africa" signs were an idea of trans-Africa and it was an idea to sell these signs.

To put in front of churches and other places partially as a fundraiser, but mostly as an educational tool.

People would ride past and say, "Free South Africa?

"Free South Africa from what?"

- A child is dying in Soweto and still our policy of constructive engagement does not vary one bit.

A child is dying in Chicago and we gone right on, get behind selling clothes, buying clothing in doves and wondering, "What's wrong with these children?"

- Trinity United Church of Christ in 1980, put up the first in Illinois, if not in the nation, "Free South Africa sign."

- It only cost $100.

Bought the sign, put it up.

- He blatantly had this big sign right out in front of the church.

That made a real political statement.

- And my disappointment and frustration, and I mailed 3000 postcards asking them to join me.

I just asked a storefront, "You don't have to stick it in the ground, "you put it in the window."

I got zero responses in terms of, "Okay, we'll do it."

A child is dying in Angola and some of us don't know where that is.

A child is dying in Mozambique and most of us don't care where that is.

- What you do here today, is taking just one little step but it's a great step for all of us in our fight against apartheid.

- [Narrator] But other fundraisers were more successful.

- My wife came up with the brilliant idea, we could have a barbecue at home.

We would charge people for the barbecue.

They pay to come in to the barbecue.

Then the money from the barbecue, we would then turn around, put it in an envelope and give it to the ANC speaker, whoever the keynote speaker was, for them to take back to South Africa or back to ANC, consulate, wherever.

- [Protesters] Free South Africa!

Free South Africa!

- Today, we had 265 walkers in this effort.

(audience applauding) And they raised a total of $14,086.

(audience applauding) And 86 in pledges, as well as more help from other people from Chicago who took a bus down to Washington.

Because, you see, Soweto Day, is being commemorated in many cities throughout this land.

And if it's going to happen, it's gonna be people like us here who make it happen.

(African drum music) - [Narrator] Northwestern University professor, Dennis Brutus, called on students and faculty to rally against apartheid.

- Between the fall of '80 and the summer of 1981, there had been a campaign to support Dennis.

He was in exile from South Africa.

And he had been in Robben Island for seven years with Mandela.

And he had been very, very active in the sports boycott.

- [Alice] In fact, there was a move to try to send him back.

- [Edward] Yeah.

- [Alice] And that galvanized us as well.

We marshaled around Dennis because we knew if he were returned, he would be killed.

- We knew that Dennis Brutus was on campus, and we went and met with him when I became coordinator.

And he was somewhat disappointed in FMO's involvement with the South African movement.

And I vowed at that time to get more involved because I thought it was important at the time.

There was only so much we could do.

- [Narrator] In the fall of 1981, South Africa's famous Springbok Rugby team arrives in Chicago, facing opposition.

- [Protesters] We drove the springboks out!

We drove the Springboks out!

- [Reporter] The team manager and local sponsor said in spite of American protest over South African racial policies, the game will go on.

- We represent the South African Rugby Board here, not exactly the South African government.

- [Protesters] Down with white supremacy!

Ban the Springboks!

- Adding in, the Ben's Deli in New York, was contacting us saying wherever they're going on their tour where we have chapter, we need to shut it down.

- [Narrator] But the games did not go on.

In fact, the Chicago City Council banned the Springbok from playing in the city.

Instead, the team tried to play outside the city limits.

- Our group was multi-racial and we had some college students, and so we sent about three or four cute, young white women to the bar.

We found out where they were hanging out.

And they came back with this folder.

All the team members had been given these folders, kind of a welcome packet to Chicago.

In here, they had a little hand-drawn map of kind of the downtown area and a little key.

And they had Cabrini-Green projects on this map.

And in the key it said, "Humans not welcome."

- Here, these white guys coming to Chicago to play rugby representing this apartheid nation, "No, you're not gonna play in Chicago."

- [Narrator] Activists eventually learn the rugby team was headed to Racine, Wisconsin.

- This park that they played in was in a black community.

- They had to cancel it and go up to Racine, Wisconsin.

And the spirit of the ancestors was working.

It just so happened to be in a neighborhood where they were gonna play the game that had a lot of black people.

And the black people along with some white people, went out on the field and disrupted the game.

(crowd cheering) - I tell you, one of us rise all of us will rise.

Justice is a way out.

Peace is a way out.

When I raise it at the convention that our kinship with South Africa is a moral disgrace.

Our nation was held partnership with South Africa, that's a moral disgrace.

It's a moral disgrace.

It's a moral disgrace.

Things were happening in great roar.

I mean just how sensitive people were to it.

But no candidate had ever said that before.

♪ They'll be singing in that land ♪ ♪ They'll be singing in that land ♪ ♪ They'll be singing in that land where I'm bound ♪ ♪ They'll be singing in that land ♪ ♪ They'll be singing in that land ♪ - [Narrator] Despite success in consciousness-raising, activist groups such as the Coalition for Illinois Divestment in South Africa, also known as CIDSA, had growing pains.

- One of the major tensions was race.

And many black folk just did not want to work with any white people working on Africa issues.

- Y'all know that the South African Consulate is up above here, right?

- [Protesters] Yes!

- And that spilled over to the question of working on issues here in this country as well.

- There were some groups that wouldn't work with CIDSA because of us white people who were a part of it.

I felt it was important because I knew that in South Africa there were white people working to dismantle apartheid and we had to work at it together.

(crowd chanting) - [Narrator] What happens when a white South African family moves to black Chicago?

- We left South Africa to move to Chicago in 1989.

- [Rob] We had been awarded Fulbright scholarships and I was going to do a PhD at the University of Chicago.

- I was the only white student in my class that year.

And the first year was really tough because I was so different.

And I had to get an American accent, like stat.

I had to learn how to ...

I think I asked for like ...

I didn't know any of the slang, anything.

I had to lose my South African accent, get an American accent.

I learned to rap and hip-hop very quickly.

It was pretty hard particularly because the teachers ... Obviously I was a white South African coming to a really strong African-American school.

In the early 90s that was not a good thing.

And so they didn't know about our history and my parents' political history.

And so I was ostracized.

It was only later when they found out, that I was suddenly the hero of the school.

- I was shocked, I was not prepared for the level of hostility that I would encounter by African-American people towards us.

And this wasn't only, for example, if we went to the cinema and ordered popcorn, they'd say "Where you from?"

And we'd say, "South Africa."

And then they'd pull out, popcorn on the floor.

- And I ended up selling health insurance to self-employed people and small business owners, and we used to get these leads.

And I could go into the car wash in Woodlawn and chat to the owner there.

And as soon as we'd engage, I'd tell him I was from South Africa and then we'd start talking about Mandela.

And we had a great connection.

And I'd go into some of the white businesses in the suburb and I heard this at least three times, where the guy would engage me and we'd start talking, "Where are you from?

"From South Africa.

"South Africa!"

He said, "Man, you guys know how "to treat your niggers there."

And I said, "Oh, no, actually I'm an ANC supporter."

And I was shocked actually at that kind of assumption and open racism that I encountered.

- The African National Congress took the position that it had to be a multi-racial movement.

Not only in its ends and goals, but also in its process.

One of the things that CIDSA took as a commitment, was to make a multi-racial CIDSA.

And that meant trying to bridge the gap between black nationalists, some of whom in the city of Chicago felt that white people should not be involved, and between others, like most of us in CIDSA, who felt that that was a narrow, ineffective way.

Although CIDSA still did believe that there needed to be black leadership.

Because many times one of the biggest criticisms of many of the activities, even of the civil rights movement, were that there wasn't black leadership.

- [Narrator] Besides being multiracial, CIDSA strived for gender parity.

Placing men and women in co-leadership roles, but it wasn't always easy.

- There was no doubt and is no doubt that the role of male patriarchy was evident in the movement within the context of black community.

- I wouldn't say that the men in the organization sort of took over, but it was almost sort of ...

I don't wanna use the word natural because the women noticed this, right?

But that it was sort of the standard way of doing things, is that the men were sort of the front.

And I think we fought against that.

Women, we also had to step up and say that we're willing to be spokespeople.

That we wanna do this.

- If we can show there's a real movement, many people who are concerned, that makes a difference.

- The question for black women became, "Does that therefore mean you have a closer ally "in a white woman, than you do the black men?"

When you're up to your behinds in alligators, do you worry about a mosquito?

- [Protesters] Free South Africa!

Down with apartheid!

Down with apartheid!

Free South Africa!

- There had to be 700 to a 1000 of us that were on that.

That was one of the coldest days that I remember in Chicago.

- [Protesters] Down with apartheid!

Down with apartheid.

- And so, it's December 6, 1984, we met there, we started marching, we were singing all kinds of things.

♪ See I'm blessed ♪ ♪ Apartheid no ♪ - By now, all of the South African Consulates and the embassy were on watch.

And so they weren't letting any black people in the door.

So, we knew we had to get somebody white to get them to open the door.

So Ora Schub, who is a lawyer, who had been involved in CIDSA, was still involved in CIDSA and was a member of the National Lawyers Guild, said she'd be willing to go up.

- What I was supposed to do was, at close to the noon hour, actually at noon, is make sure that the front door was open so people who were sitting in could get in.

I went upstairs, I buzzed the thing, the door, and just waited.

I wasn't sure what was gonna happen.

And they let me in.

And it was under the pretext of I wanted to go to South Africa as a visitor, do a tour.

So they're saying, okay, it's about time for me to leave.

So they were taking me to another door, the back door.

And I said, "Where are you taking me?"

And they said, "We're taking you out."

I said, "Well, I came in that door."

- And she knew if she went out the back door that it'll blew the whole plan.

- I finally convinced them that they had to let me out the front door.

They opened the front door, and all these people who were there, they rushed in, I went out.

And the demonstration happened.

- Well, they arrested them, but they didn't charge them.

And so we said, "Okay, we gotta up it.

"We gotta step up on this."

- Finally, January 15, some people bum rush the door and they got in.

There were six of them, I think.

And then again in early February, another two, so there were eight altogether.

So these are the people who were charged with trespassing and who went to have the first trial.

- The reason I got involved in the struggle was my experience in southern Africa, and then my experience in Chicago.

I was a pastor in East Garfield Park.

And I thought this is a direct connection because the structural problems are very, very similar.

Racism of violence, of poverty, and so on.

It was like a no brainer that when I heard about the opportunity to participate in this protest at the consulate, to be arrested, it was like, "If you don't go, there's something wrong."

So, I went.

- When you're very active, and you have a record of always on the firing line against the odds, especially with the authorities, because those cops weren't too friendly with us.

And the little bit I could do along with people like me, I wasn't the only one.

Let's go down there, the least we can do.

We got to be arrested of being attempted to get arrested.

And I went.

- It ain't cold in South Africa.

(dramatic music) - [Narrator] Ultimately, eight people were selected for a trial.

Their acquittal put Chicago on the map.

- So after we were all arrested, the next morning, when we got out of jail, I immediately went over to city hall.

I need to see the mayor right away.

When I went in and told him, "Harold had just got arrested."

He said, "Oh, boss, we can kill that right away."

I said, "No, no, no, no, you don't understand.

"We want this to go to trial.

"In Harold exact word.

"Oh, you mean some friendly prosecution?"

- Chicago had the first trial that tested what came to be known as the necessity defense.

- For example, if you saw somebody getting assaulted across the street, and there was a red light, and you were jaywalking, you could be forgiven because it was the law.

- The law of necessity.

- I'm looking through the code, and lo and behold, I see necessity (laughs).

And so, we decided that that was like the perfect piece of you.

We didn't claim that we didn't commit the trespass, but the reason that we committed the trespass was to prevent a greater harm.

It's one of the most incredible trials I've ever been a part of.

And I've been part of a few.

We might even had Allan Streeter testify about efforts to pass laws in the city council.

- And I just spoke from my heart.

How I felt about Mandela, what he went through all those years in prison, 27 years.

His lieutenants were tortured and killed, he didn't repute that.

- I was the only one in our group who had lived in South Africa.

And so, I could speak directly.

People in South Africa told us personally to go back and struggle against those forces that support apartheid from the US.

- Now, the Illinois Labor Network was formed about a year ago.

Made up of many unions in the Chicago area, in the state of Illinois, that came together to fight against the apartheid government in South Africa.

- Catalytic converter for a car is very important, but they were made in South Africa for Ford, all right?

So there was a natural relationship between the unions here and the unions there, okay, in South Africa.

- Then in 1986, then that's struggle for our release got hotter.

And when I won the case, then I visited the States, the UAW, fresh from prison.

If it was not for UAW, and the IMF, the International Metalworkers' Federation, fighting side by side with the unions in South Africa, with our union, we wouldn't be speaking here today, we wouldn't be here still pushing for change in South Africa.

- [Narrator] Chicago's Anti-apartheid Movement began to have the desired effect, legislation.

- I actually introduced the disinvestment ordinance in the city council that would divest the city of Chicago from doing business with entities that were doing business with the apartheid government of South Africa.

- [Narrator] Divestment legislation also passed at the state government level in 1987.

- The fact of the matter is that I have a record of having cafés with the voters, and I'm now running to become the first African-American female elected to the United States Senate from Illinois.

There are people around the country who were talking about disinvestment in South Africa.

Why were our US dollars going to support this horrible apartheid regime?

And so I filed a bill in the state house to divest state of Illinois money from South Africa.

I can remember the guy who was at the time the President of the Senate saying to me ...

He was against the bill.

But he said to me, "Oh, I don't know why you so upset."

"It's no different than we have here in the United States."

And I said, "That's the point."

- [Narrator] Local universities also came under fire for not divesting.

Northwestern, for example, did not divest.

And instead argued a financial pull out would have minimal impact and would cripple the South African economy and the 80% black workforce.

- One of the things I remember about Northwestern specifically is that, when it came to us demanding that Northwestern divest, their response was we're a private university.

We don't have the structures that we would have from the federal government, if we were public university.

And the message to us was, you're just clients of this organization.

And our response was, we study here, we work here, we are the organization as much as you guys who are leading.

- [Reporter] There's Mr. Mandela.

Mr. Nelson Mandela, a free man taking his first steps into a new South Africa.

- I sat and watch TV.

I saw him when he came out.

I was sitting alone because I was getting ready to go to work.

I cried.

- When I think about it, it was like the feeling of joy that you had when Muhammad Ali just crushed his last opponent, representing all of the power (laughs) that one could muster representing the entire African world.

But for him to come out of prison, to walk besides winning, was a victory like none other.

- [Narrator] While the world was celebrating, so was Chicago.

(crowd celebrating) - Trying to end apartheid as you know, has gone a long way.

We owe it to ourselves to help celebrate the release of Nelson Mandela.

Because we understand that the man was released, and then parties, the ANC and other groups working for liberation in South Africa, in effect, unbanned themselves.

- He helped put South Africa on the map, and our struggle.

I'll always emphasize what he emphasized that he was not the only one.

There were people to undergird him.

- [Narrator] Mandela is also known as Madiba.

After he was released, his fellow prisoners visited Chicago's Trinity United Church of Christ, the church on the south side with a sign.

- I can stand today, and say with no chains on me, that until the Israelis stop financing the racist South African governments, don't say, "squat," to me about Israel and their illegal occupation of the Palestinian country.

If I don't preach about the sin of American support of South Africa, and Israel support of the evil of apartheid, may my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth.

This one guy raised his hand.

As he started talking, Jeffrey started playing Nkosi Sikelel', and that's why I've come.

He said, I was on Robben Island, for 10 of the years that Madiba was on Robben Island.

I was in a cell next to Madiba.

All of us on Robben Island at that time, had no idea whether we would ever get off the Island.

But we heard of a church in Chicago, on the south side, had had a sign "Free South Africa."

And we made a pact that if any of us ever got off that island, and could get to the States, we will come here to America, we will come to Chicago and thank you.

- I told them about how much we learned, and how much we were inspired by the struggles they were waging here.

But that even for me was a fresh experience to know just how much was specifically focused on inspiring South Africans never to stop and never to give up.

- "So, on behalf of ..." He started counting the brothers who had died on the Island.

And after every name he said, "Siyabonga."

(choir singing) Whoever think that that little sign was heard about by guys who were up there.

- The question of Chicago came up, but precisely because of the Daley administration, we thought, "No, let's not deal with the politics "of Chicago at the time."

- [Prexy] The committee was very concerned that Richard Daley would not provide protection for Mandela at the level that we wanted to have him protected.

- That was one of the major concerns, was his safety.

We didn't want something to happen to this man in Chicago.

- So Chicago was left out.

(choir singing) Instead, he went to Detroit.

- How do I even begin to thank you the wonderful people of Detroit?

- [Prexy] Those of us here, we organized buses.

I think we took 10 or 12 buses, I can't remember how many, to Detroit.

- Right now, I wish I could climb down the stage and join you in the stands, and embrace you one and all.

(audience cheering) - [Narrator] But three years later ... - It was exhilarating to know that he was going to come to Chicago to say thank you, to let us touch and feel and experience the moment of victory in ways that I don't know when we'll have again.

(crowd applauding) - Here come Mandela.

Well, here come Tutu.

Everybody photo up in there.

That made me sick to my stomach.

Some of the same Negroes I was begging, "Please put the sign up," told me, "No."

(crowd laughing) - Help us interpret the importance of this visit to the United States and or to Chicago by Mr. Mandela.

- Mr. Mandela stands for a lot of issues.

He stands for freedom, and this appeals to a lot of people.

Not only black people, all over the world.

A few times we were consulted, when it was clear that we didn't have money.

Our voices were not that heavy, money talks.

- When Mandela came, his visit was sort of you start by the celebrities that wanted, the politicians that wanted, to have their faces with him on camera.

And that was a little disappointing.

(crowd applauding) Nobody thought that this was Mandela's choice, necessarily, but he was a celebrity and so people were gonna come out for that.

- [Reporter] City hall rolled out the red carpet for Nelson Mandela, and several 100 people cheered his arrival.

- He begged them, in all these religious leaders, and all that kind of stuff, right?

Pulling out, writing down all the cheques, announced from the podium.

And Jesse's doing the announcing.

- If he could give 27 years of blood and why can we not give ... some money-- - "Reverend blahdy blah, here's $1,000 for ANC."

I would say half bounced.

It was just a show.

It was just a show.

(crowd cheering) It's hard to describe somebody who was in the slammer for 27 years.

A very thoughtful person.

- I will go back to my country, full of strength like a battery that has been charged.

- Very much reflective on what you are saying.

He wouldn't interrupt you.

He let you finish whatever you were saying.

And I remember one person was telling Mandela what Mandela should do to raise money, and how he could facilitate the contact.

Mandela looked at him and thanked him very much.

But he said, "No, we'll do this our way."

And thanked him.

It was done so humbly.

- Nelson Mandela had that sense of inclusiveness.

It wasn't like, he was here and you was there.

It was like, us.

- He was very, very gracious and very open.

And it was, for me, a real eye opener to have a conversation with him.

Because he and the other black and colored South Africans, were able to have a discussion about race that was so much more candid than any of the discussions I've had here at home.

(people applauding) - [Reporter] Tonight, the issues and the controversy, 1000 people have gathered at the City College of New York for a town meeting with Nelson Mandela.

- [Harry] Later, he did an interview with Ted Koppel of Nightline, when asked about what South Africa thought about the treatment of the black people here who have their own problems.

- Mr. Mandela, you've come to the United States of America, other than South Africa, probably the most racially divided country in the world.

Do you think that this country, given its racial record and current history, can assume the real credible and moral leadership in the fight against apartheid?

- Anywhere you go on the planet, the black man is at the bottom, where he is in evidence.

"But we had our own concerns," he said.

- I am primarily concerned with what the people of the USA and it's organs of government are doing to promote the struggle against apartheid in our country.

- And he chose not to be involved with the internal affairs of a foreign country.

- It would not be proper for me to delve into the controversial issues which are tearing the society of this country apart.

- [Henry] And I thought of that sauce for the goose that should be sauce for the gander.

And I wish to the extent that I could take that time back, that I would have devoted all of that time to the domestic issues in black America.

We got problems on the south side of Chicago, where we're from, the west side of Chicago.

I hate it when people who are black are suffering anywhere.

But that said, my first duty was to home.

Charity begins at home.

(dramatic music) - We started out as a small group of individuals, residents of Chicago, who were able to create, first of all, legislative changes.

We really were able to get our governments, local and state governments, to divest money from South Africa.

That doesn't mean that they weren't down moments.

That there weren't moments where it was sort of a grind.

That there isn't some disappointment in what's happening in South Africa and how some of their problems are so magnified now.

That they are having such difficulty.

So it doesn't mean that they don't have hope, that they can continue to develop into a more egalitarian and safe society.

But I want that here too, right?

There are studies that show that African-Americans still suffer from the effects of slavery and discrimination.

And we are more than 200 years past that.

South Africa's been at it for 24 years.

It's been a terrible disappointment to all of us that whites still own so much of the land, that they still control so much in the economy.

Not just because they're white, but because it's oppressive, unjust and unfair.

And because it makes for an economy that still oppresses Africans.

Victory continues in South Africa, the struggle is still certain.

Because some of the major changes that needed to be made have just not yet happened.

Black South Africans, in many ways, in terms of the conditions of their lives, haven't experienced a lot of change.

But what they have now, that they didn't have before, is the opportunity for that to happen.

- We wanted to show our children that the world was bigger than the west side of Chicago.

We felt that was so important, so that they could have a concept of the world 'cause we never know where our children will be or what they can achieve.

- Each new generation contributes to the ongoing kaleidoscope of victory.

Each loss contributes ultimately to victory.

It's a process that continues all the way, and it's one that we can be utterly proud of.

- It is all credit to the work of many decades that people had done.

Under such inclement weather as Chicago has with the hawk, and people were still going out canvassing in support of our struggle.

The work that was done in the states is just so monumental, it needs it's own history.

- I am speaking from audience of a state and of a city.

Who can boast of having organized and produced one of the most powerful anti-apartheid movement in this country, if not in the world.

(audience applauding) (African instrumental music)