Since its founding in 1962, Freedom, Inc., has been instrumental in raising the visibility of issues impacting Kansas City’s black community and helping to elect African-Americans to political office. In a discussion of his book Freedom, Inc. and Black Political Empowerment, civil libertarian Micah W. Kubic details the history of the organization and its crucial role in the rise of leaders such as Alan Wheat, the first black congressman to represent a majority-white district in the Kansas City metropolitan area, and Emanuel Cleaver, the city’s first black mayor.

Kubic, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Kansas since January 2015, has worked for more than 15 years in the areas of civil liberties, civil rights, and racial justice.