The Jewish Book Council honors the winners of the 2019 Nation­al Jew­ish Book Awards, now in its six­ty-ninth year. Among this year’s winners is author David E. Lowe, award the second annual Biography Award in memory of Sara Berenson Stone for his newest book, Touched with Fire: Morris B. Abram and the Battle against Racial and Religious Discrimination (Potomac Books, 2019).

In Touched with Fire Lowe chronicles the professional and personal life of Morris B. Abram, from his Southern Georgia home town to his work as one of the leading civil rights lawyers in the U.S. during the 1950s. Abram carried out a successful fourteen-year battle to end the discriminatory voting system in his home state, which had entrenched racial segregation. The result was the historic “one man, one vote” ruling of the U.S. Supreme Court in 1963.

At the time of his selection—the youngest person ever chosen to head the American Jewish Committee—Abram became a leading international advocate for the Jewish state of Israel. He was also a champion of international human rights, from his leadership in the struggle to liberate Soviet Jewry to his service as permanent representative to the United Nations in Geneva.

Encompassing many of the contentious issues we still face today—such as legislative apportionment, affirmative action, campus unrest, and the enforcement of international human rights—Abram’s varied career sheds light on our own troubled times.

The National Jewish Book Awards is the longest-running Jewish book awards program in North America and is recognized as the most prestigious. The awards, presented by cat­e­go­ry, are designed to give recognition to outstanding books, to stimulate writers to further literary creativity, and to encourage the reading of worthwhile titles. Jewish books are critical to our survival as an educated Jewish people.

For more information about the National Jewish Book Awards, visit the Jewish Book Council website.