Paul Robeson was a moral giant in his time, and is an inspiration in ours

There are times in history (though all too few) when an individual dares stand in opposition to the prevailing orthodoxy, and in return is visited with public persecution at the hands of society’s self-appointed moral guardians.

Such an individual was Paul Robeson, who died at age 77 on 23 January 1976, and yet who still today looms imperious as the epitome of unshakeable principle, fidelity and defiance of a status quo mired in hypocrisy and nourished by injustice.

In his case, in the process, he succeeded in breaking free of the limitations imposed by a purely racial and national consciousness. He instead embraced a politics rooted in the universal struggles and plight of the working class of all lands and all races under capitalism.

Robeson’s refusal to buckle during one of the most censorious and neuralgic periods in US history — the years of McCarthyism and the anti-communist witch hunts — placed him on a higher moral plane than most who went before and who have come after.

Further still, the manner in which he was willing to sacrifice a lucrative career in showbusiness, and the worldwide acclaim it brought from the rich and connected, arguably elevates the man to the status of a martyr for free speech, free association, peace and racial…