; Whereas early Blues musicians, who were also often gospel performers, created the foundation for jazz, R&B, hip-hop, and other forms of music that are continuing to develop; Whereas Phillis Wheatley, an educated and enslaved poet, published Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral in 1773 , the first volume of poetry by an African American published in the modern era; Whereas David Walker, a free Black man, wrote for the Freedom’s Journal, an antislavery weekly, as well as wrote and circulated abolitionist literature in the 1820s; Whereas one such piece of literature was Walker’s Appeal, in Four Articles; Together with a Preamble, to the Colored Citizens of the World, but in Particular, and Very Expressly, to Those of the United States of America , a widely circulated abolitionist pamphlet which called for the enslaved to rebel against their enslavers; Whereas Maria Stewart, an abolitionist and women’s rights advocate, contributed to the literary world by being the first Black American woman to write and publish a political manifesto; Whereas Edmonia Lewis created the sculpture The Death of Cleopatra in 1876, challenging contemporary society’s norms on death in art by depicting the moment after the snake’s venom had taken its toll instead of the more traditional depiction of her contemplating suicide; Whereas Henry Ossawa Tanner painted The Banjo Lesson in 1893 shedding light on the poverty in which so many African Americans of the time lived while still maintaining their dignity and grace; Whereas the Black Renaissance and New Negro Movement gained momentum in the 1920s and 1930s, bringing the Black arts to the international stage; Whereas the novel The Fire in the Flint was a powerful view of 20th century racial oppression written by Walter White in 1924 and translated into French, spreading to the Black population in France and French-speaking colonies in Africa and the Caribbean