Charlotta Amanda Spears Bass (February 14, 1874 – April 12, 1969) was an American educator, newspaper publisher-editor, and civil rights activist.

[1] Bass is believed to be the first African-American woman to own and operate a newspaper in the United States; she published the California Eagle from 1912 until 1951.

The newspaper served as a source of both information and inspiration for the black community, which was often ignored or negatively portrayed by the predominant white press.

In her weekly column "On the Sidewalk", begun in 1927, she drew attention to unjust social and political conditions for all Los Angeles minority communities and campaigned vigorously for reform.

The Eagle is credited as pioneering multi-ethnic politics, advocating Asian-American and Mexican-American civil rights in the 1940s, especially during World War II.

Most Japanese Americans were relocated from the West Coast to interior detention camps after the attack on Pearl Harbor and fears about security.

The California Eagle, along with other African-American presses, were under investigation by the Office of the Secretary of War, who viewed it as a threat to national security.

[4]: 102  The Department of Justice interrogated Bass in 1942 over claims that the paper was funded by Japan and Germany, fearing that criticism of the US was motivated by enemy alliances.

Bass and her husband combated such issues as the derogatory images of African Americans in D. W. Griffith's film, The Birth of a Nation (released in 1915); Los Angeles' discriminatory hiring practices; the revival of the Ku Klux Klan; police brutality; and restrictive housing covenants.

[4]: 98 The Basses championed the black soldiers of the Twenty-Fourth Infantry who were unjustly convicted and sentenced in the 1917 Houston race riot.

During this time period the California Eagle, along with other African-American presses, were under investigation by the Office of the Secretary of War, who viewed it as a threat to national security.

They were suspicious of the Communist Party's attempts to build an alliance with African Americans by supporting their activism in civil rights.

[4]: 102 Following US entry into World War II after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the Department of Justice interrogated Bass in 1942 over claims that the paper was funded by the Axis nations of Japan and Germany.

[4][12] During the 1920s, Bass became co-president of the Los Angeles chapter of the Universal Negro Improvement Association, founded by Marcus Garvey.

As editor and publisher of the California Eagle, the oldest black newspaper on the West Coast, Bass fought against restrictive covenants in housing[15] and segregated schools in Los Angeles.

Bass also ran for the Los Angeles City Council in the 1940s using the song-title slogan “Don't Fence Me In” to highlight her condemnation of housing discrimination.

[10] Bass served in 1952 as the National Chairman of the Sojourners for Truth and Justice, an organization of black women set up to protest racial violence in the South.

She began the campaign on her own as Hallinan served out a six-month contempt of court sentence arising from his legal defense of union leader Harry Bridges.

[10] Bass worked on issues that also attracted Luisa Moreno, who was active in Afro-Chicano politics in Los Angeles during the 1930s-1950.

No record shows that the two women ever met, but in 1943 both served on the Sleepy Lagoon Defense Committee, a multiracial group that fought for the release of several Chicanos convicted of murder by an all-white jury making Bass and Moreno part of the same "constellation" of struggle.

[24] Both Bass and Moreno shared a "mutual struggle" and were active in fighting for civil rights through organizations together and through their own pursuits.

[24] Even when Bass was faced with her own struggles with United States officials she used it as opportunities to further the influence of her paper.

[24] This can be seen after her detainment by United States officials caused her to miss her flight to China for a conference, where afterwards she continued to work on the next issue of the paper.

[25] Charlotta Bass was able to promote the creation of "spatial entitlement" by bringing communities together through her work with organizations and the newspaper.

[26] She was the first African American woman to be a jury member in the Los Angeles County Court and to run for Vice President of the United States.