The American writer and political activist Thomas Emmet Hayden (born 1939) was one of the few radical leaders of the 1960s to outlast the movement. He was admired for remaining alive politically without sacrifice of his principles.

Tom Hayden was born Dec. 11, 1939, in Royal Oak, Michigan, into a middle class family and attended the University of Michigan, graduating with an A.B. in 1960. During his college years he joined the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, participating in its dangerous work for civil rights in the South. During a voter registration campaign he was beaten and jailed in McComb, Mississippi. Hayden was a co-founder of the Economic Research and Action Project (ERAP), which attempted to mobilize poor people in their own behalf. Hayden led the ERAP program in Newark, New Jersey, until the riots of 1967 put an end to it. He also co-founded the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) and...