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The race-baiting, divisive people behind the National Organization for Marriage and the Family Research Council take note. The NAACP is not having your wedge strategy. Today the national NAACP held a press conference; here are the remarks.
Remarks by Roslyn M. Brock, Chairman of the NAACP Board of Directors
May 21, 2012
As you now know, on Saturday, May 19th, our Board passed a resolution in support of marriage equality.
The NAACP is an historic organization which 103 years ago set on a path to ensure the political, educational, social and economic equality of all people. As Board members, we take the responsibility to guide this organization seriously. One of the crucial roles we play is to ensure that our mission which helped define America in the last century continues to be implemented in this our Association’s second century.
When people ask why the NAACP stands firmly for marriage equality, we say that we have always stood against laws which demean, dehumanize, or discriminate against any person in this great country. That is our legacy. For over 103 years we have stood against such laws, and while the nature of the struggle may change, our bedrock commitment to equality of all people under the law never will.
One of the NAACP’s greatest leaders, Ella Baker, described this when she said and I quote: “Remember, we are not fighting for the freedom of the Negro alone, but for the freedom of the human spirit a larger freedom that encompasses all mankind.” End quote.
We live in a democracy. And in our democracy we have the benefit of a Constitution which defines the equal rights which we all share and to which we as a nation aspire. Because the text of our Constitution is so beautiful, let me share just a few simple clear words of the Fourteenth Amendment which says in part that no state “shall deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” Marriage Equality is just that, the right to be treated equally in the eyes of the government.
The NAACP did not issue its support of marriage equality from a personal, moral, or religious perspective. Rather, we deeply respect differences of personal conscience on the religious definition of marriage, and we strongly affirm the religious freedoms of all as protected by the First Amendment.
As the nation’s leading civil rights organization, it is not our role or intent to express how any place of worship should act in its own house. We have not done so in the past and will not do so In the future. This history and commitment to separation of church and state continues as we stand for equality — marriage equality – under the law.
Thank you.
***
Remarks by Benjamin Todd Jealous, President and CEO of the NAACP
May 21, 2012
As some of you may know, the NAACP has opposed proposed anti-marriage equality laws on a number of occasions. This effort has been led by State Conferences in places like North Carolina and California. Indeed, I would like to highlight the leadership that State Conference Presidents like Rev. William Barber in North Carolina and Alice Huffman in California – both states where the NAACP opposed Ballot Initiatives meant to prohibit marriage equality. As a national Association we also opposed the Defense of Marriage Act as far back as the mid-1990s.
So what has really changed and why this statement now?
What has changed is that this is the first time that we have made a full statement on marriage equality that goes beyond the circumstances of any one proposed law or any one state. We feel it is important that everyone understand our commitment to equality under the Constitution and to marriage equality specifically.
Marriage equality for the NAACP goes at least as far back as the Supreme Court case of Loving v. Virginia in 1967. In the year before she died, Mildred Loving, who successfully sued to end legally sanctioned marriage inequality based on race, wrote a powerful piece which ended – and I quote:
I am proud that Richard’s and my name is on a court case that can help reinforce the love, the commitment, the fairness, and the family that so many people, black or white, young or old, gay or straight seek in life. I support the freedom to marry for all. That’s what Loving, and loving, are all about.
We make this statement today because it is the legacy and responsibility of the NAACP to speak up on the civil rights issues of our times. We are both proud of our history and challenged by it — Challenged to never allow threats to equality for all people under the law to go uncontested.
As marriage equality has expanded to an ever increasing number of states, other states have taken to once again enshrining discrimination in their Constitutions. At the same time, Members of Congress have taken again to using budget votes and other tricks to restrict marriage equality.
We want to be on record that the NAACP now firmly opposes all efforts to restrict marriage equality. We will oppose threats to the Fourteenth Amendment guarantee of equal rights under the law in any state where this issue is raised.
And we will follow our historic mission to ensure the political, educational, social and economic equality of all persons. This means that we will oppose all efforts by Members of Congress or any Administration to enshrine discrimination in the laws of our great country.
Finally, let me say that this is one of the key civil rights struggles of our time. We at the NAACP understand that with all such struggles, there are conversations that happen at dinner tables, among families, and across our communities. These conversations are between good people who are looking to their own hearts to figure out what to believe and how to act. We respect that this is how change is ultimately made. Indeed it is the context in which the NAACP has fought for civil rights throughout our history.
Civil marriage, like all civil rights provided by the government, must be provided equally to all Americans. The NAACP has been making the case for equality for 103 years, and we will continue to do so throughout our Association’s second century.
***
Also, today in Durham, North Carolina, the state NAACP held its own presser, featuring the tremendous leadership of Rev. Dr. William Barber, who helped bring together the black faith community in the Amendment One fight. Equality NC was there to praise the work of the organization. That release is below the fold.
From the ENC press release:
Equality North Carolina joined the North Carolina State Conference of the NAACP today for a news conference to discuss the NAACP National Board of Directors recent decision to endorse marriage equality.
At a weekend meeting of the 103-year old civil rights group’s board of directors, the organization voted to support marriage equality as a continuation of its historic commitment to equal protection under the law. “The mission of the NAACP has always been to ensure the political, social and economic equality of all people,” said Roslyn M. Brock, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the NAACP. “We have and will oppose efforts to codify discrimination into law.”
Three members of the National Board are from North Carolina: Rev. Dr. William J. Barber, II, President of the North Carolina NAACP and chair of the Political Action Committee for the National Board; Ms. Carolyn Q. Coleman, 1st Vice President of the North Carolina NAACP and Assistant Secretary of the National Board; Mr. Lenny Springs, Assistant Treasurer of the National Board.
During the Monday morning press conference, North Carolina NAACP President Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II announced that the state’s leading civil rights group, a major coalition partner in the recent campaign to defeat Amendment One, supported the resolution of the NAACP National Board of Directors endorsing same-sex marriage and opposing any efforts “to codify discrimination or hatred into the law.”
Rev. Dr. Barber told reporters same-sex marriage is a matter of civil rights, and the nation’s most prominent civil rights organization will support it.
In response, Equality NC’s Executive Director Stuart Campbell released a statement praising the North Carolina State Conference of the NAACP’s decision to endorse marriage equality:
“I am proud to stand with Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II and the North Carolina State Conference NAACP in supporting the National NAACP’s decision to endorse marriage equality. The NAACP is the nation’s oldest and largest civil rights organization, and with its endorsement of marriage equality and the momentum that endorsement brings, we continue to see that supporters of marriage equality are on the right side of history. The NAACP has long stood on the side of political, social and economic equality for all citizens in the United States, regardless of sexual orientation,” said Campbell.
9 Comments
This casts NOM’s disgrace — and particularly, Princeton University Professor Robert George’s personal disgrace — in seeking to drive wedges between, and to fan hostility between minorities into especially high relief.
NOM is beneath contempt, is on the same side of marriage equality as neo-Nazis, and has supporters calling for gay Americans to be placed in concentration camps with electrified fences around them.
I read somewhere that there are over 60 members on the board. If I could, I’d give all but two of them a big hug. The two who voted against equality? Them I’d like to sit down and give a big talking-to.
Anyhow, thanks, NAACP!
NAACP better start speaking up about the fascist tactics being employed against protesters by Chicago P.D. These same tactics where utilized against freedom marchers, the same intimidation violence used by Police against civil right activist. Should they remain silent they are no better than the silent German. Advancing the rights of all people, today is the same battle……..
Can’t say how happy this makes me! But I must also add that while the alleged divide between gays and black people has been made out to be one of race, and to be bigger than it is, it has other sides. There is considerable racism among some groups of gay people, as I discovered while living in San Francisco in the 1980s. (Being gay by itself doesn’t make one any more progressive than being black, although it certainly can breed compassion for others.) And it is very much a matter of the capture of poor black people by right-wing Christian ideology, especially here in the south, where Obama and Clinton acquiescence to the expansion of welfare service caregiving to churches has abetted its growth. In communities where black peoples’ very survival sometimes feels like it is in question (one in three black men doing time for drug crimes, etc., obscenely high black infant mortality rate where I live in N. FL) the call to close ranks and exclude “aberrant” behavior can have dangerous appeal. In the end, I remain incredibly hopeful about acceptance of gay behavior, but we must all be more forthright in renouncing all forms of fundamentalism, which share much in common.
The NAACP is late to the party but certainly welcome.
Well the Center for Constitutional Rights hasn’t been waiting around. Amazing panel going on now including Vince Warren touching on a community level of this conversation: how can you be a person of color, GLBT, etc. and conduct your life without violence when the violence is directed at you via institutions and supposed civil servants? I have no idea why I can’t post it to Twitter as they are calling for audience participation via social media right now but this should roll over to archive if you miss it:
NAACP is not only late, but is also no longer relevant to most African-Americans, particularly the younger ones.
NAACP has become nothing more than another mouthpiece for the DNC.
I second the notion that the NAACP is no longer relevant for most black Americans. This move just solidifies that in the eyes of many black folks such as myself.
The NAACP had no business wading into this. Black Americans would have been better served by having them stay out of this. Its not our issue. For the NAACP to be supporting a community that openly hates black America makes this even more insulting.
We as African Americans have bigger issues to deal with. If the rich white boys want to run off and get married, that’s their business. Leave us out of it.