2006 has been an invigorating year for the NAACP. A new CEO brought new ideas to this venerable organization and challenged us to do the old things better. We struggled—as we have since our founding—to find the money to meet the needs of our constituency and to protect their rights against the depredations of a government hostile to civil rights.
There were significant victories too. We were among the many groups responsible for renewal of the Voting Rights Act. Our youth membership experienced sizeable increases despite protestations from the usual suspects that our membership was almost as old as the organization itself. And after years of staying away, President Bush came to an NAACP Convention and was politely received. The 2006 elections repudiated his war and an anti-civil rights Congress and elected one we hope will be more inclined to support justice and fair play.
We faced the continuing challenge in 2006 to be something other than the NAACP. For years, a sizeable portion of Americans—of all races and walks of life—has been dissatisfied with what we do. Even in the darkest days of segregation, there were those who said we needed to forget about American apartheid and focus instead on helping our people to be accepted by those who rejected them. Instead of fighting against racial barriers, they've said, we ought to work on solving the problems those barriers have created. While others looked to government to right the wrongs government and private parties had wrought, we ought to look elsewhere for salvation. We ought to provide social service and forget about social justice.
This great tutorial instinct has been with us for a long time, but it seems especially prominent right now. It is true that many—even among our strongest supporters—have become "integration-weary." Some are long past being tired of asking for justice and fair play. Some have even said if we can't have equality, let us make our separation equal – forgetting that it never was when even the nation's highest courts endorsed it.
But as we overcame legal segregation yesterday, we'll overcome this present mood too. However, we'll only do it by remaining true to the dreams of our founders, adopting their optimism and spirit as our own.
We have so much more to fight with than they did—but we certainly have no less to fight for.
NAACP National Headquarters
4805 Mt. Hope Drive
Baltimore MD 21215
Toll Free:
(877) NAACP-98
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