NAACP Interim President & CEO Dennis C. Hayes
July 14, 2008
Good Morning! Thank you Chairman Bond. Greetings to: Chairman Bond, Presiding Officer Shayla King, officers, directors and trustees, to the national staff, special guests, members and friends.
I am truly inspired by your presence here today and this week; encouraged by your energy to continue in the fight for social justice; and proud of the support you continue to show and give to our beloved organization, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. I remember the popular song sung by StanleyAdams, “What a Difference a Day Makes”, and it calls me to also think: WHAT A DIFFERENCE A YEAR MAKES!
This time last year, we in the NAACP were faced with layoffs, office closings, red ink, and dwindling bank funds. Stringent conditions demanded that we consolidate our efforts in order to maximize every dollar entrusted to us by our supporters. Some said we wouldn’t make it but thankfully they were wrong. Today the NAACP is writing its financial reports using a black ink pen and at the national, state, and local levels, still, we are preparing the way for victory because we collectively understand that it’s not the size of the dog in the fight, rather it’s the size of the fight in the dog that matters.
Chief Financial Officer, Junior Linloy Cox will report to the board of directors on this Thursday that “The Association continues to pay its bills on time using funds received during the normal course of business. Both employees and vendors have been paid timely and all bills are current. As of June 27, 2008, the Association had approximately $1.12 million of unrestricted funds on deposit to pay payroll and other expenses incurred during normal operations.
The Association, he will further report, will register a record number of delegates to this convention in Cincinnati.
YES, WE ARE PREPARING THE WAY FOR VICTORY! Victory, for us in the NAACP, is nothing short of an America that is ONE; that means a single society; one house standing united and built without color lines, glass ceilings, racial or ethnic barriers, or double standards of justice. We well know there might be battles won along the way, or incremental victories, but the ultimate victory in our struggle, before we close our doors as an organization, is the realization of one society in America
While at last year’s convention in Detroit, six (6) teenagers remained incarcerated in Jena, Louisiana. Although the work of civil rights activists and organizations, including our Louisiana State Conference, have effectuated their freedom today, we must realize that freeing the Jena Six was a singular victory, and not ultimate victory for our cause.
Similarly, this time last year James Johnson had been wrongfully jailed for a crime he didn’t commit, and it was only the visionary work of our North Carolina State Conference that won his liberation so that today he is able to prepare a way for life as a free man. Our friends in North Carolina know, however, that their victory is but temporary, that the whole battle is not won because the struggle continues.
In the past year our NAACP family has struggled; yes, admittedly we have. We have wrestled with issues ranging from finances, to organizational structure, to the departure of a CEO to, now, the selection of a new CEO. What we have accomplished together, whether this year or in past years, has not come about because we all think, act, and behave the same way. (You know that wouldn’t be family like.) Just as you have a lot of different kinds of folk that make up your family, the NAACP family is also made up of a whole lot of different kinds of people and just as sure as blood links us together as kindred in our families, we are bound together in the NAACP, as family, by a common mission.
A popular story that we all know puts our internal differences into context and reminds us how we are not called upon to be perfect people but that we are called to a perfect mission. The story cautions us that in the end we all need each other in order to succeed as a family, to succeed in our mission.
In the story, Joseph had been sold into slavery by his brothers, his own flesh and blood, and things had not worked out well for the family afterwards. Famine had now devastated the land. The brothers traveled to Egypt and waited in line on this particular day to purchase grain so that they could make bread to eat; so that they could feed their livestock and feed their families. Quite frankly, they needed the grain for their very survival. They were in the unrelenting grip of a famine that had reduced a proud and self sufficient people to virtual scavengers, who were catching as catch can. They lamented their fate and questioned whether their dire circumstances were the result of their betrayal of Joseph many years before.
Fortunately there was a place, an oasis, which held an ample supply of grain where the people could go so that they did not starve to death. They were thankful for the portion that was afforded them and comforted by the knowledge that there was an abundant supply there that would accommodate them on return trips. They were thankful. They were fed and they returned home.
To their surprise and fear, they soon learned that the author and administrator of this inexplicably brilliant plan of conservation and abundance, that the true innovator of the place that saved their lives from starvation, that their benefactor was in fact a former vanquished foe. But the plot thickens. Not only had these desperate men resolved that they would never see this adversary again but this adversary, they would learn, was also their brother; that same brother they had hated, despised, cheated and sold into slavery.
Now, as we in this room well know, the NAACP, this nation’s oldest and largest civil rights civil rights organization, has been a good parent of the social justice movement; it has produced civil rights victories by the bushel, you might say; it is very accomplished in what it has done and continues to do. And, it is just as true as with civil rights and liberties that, as the saying goes, “When America gets a cold, black America gets pneumonia.” When America is confronted with tough economic times, the symptoms of the sickness, i.e., loss of jobs and health care, the inability to save or invest or qualify for loans to create a better quality of life, are elevated exponentially in the black community. Likewise, when America is confronted with tough socially conservative times, the symptoms of the sickness, i.e., more black people put in jails than sent to college, encroachments on our civil liberties, and warrant less searches, are elevated exponentially in the black community.
In the wake of an eerily prophetic prediction by Senator Robert F. Kennedy in 1968, that the United States could see a black man running for the office of President in forty years, we find that our triumphs are simultaneously tempered when forty years after Martin, black students have to ask for permission to sit under a tree in the schoolyard. In the spirit of words by Charles Dickens, “It is the best of times and the worst of times.”
Make no mistake, while many enjoy abundance in America’s land of plenty, most are still suffering through famine. These are our brothers, our sisters, mothers and fathers, our family. In this famine, the NAACP has to accept the challenge of devising a brilliant plan that can deliver abundant justice and equality for those who have been denied it.
In the midst of an ideological fight with opponents who are successfully assaulting civil rights and liberties, the Association has always been up to the task of delivering even in the midst of famine.
Announced and filed during last year’s convention in Detroit, the NAACP filed federal suits against 17 financial institutions for their predatory lending practices which discriminated against African American borrowers seeking home mortgages. The sub prime loans these borrowers ended up with have robbed them of their homes and the family wealth they will need in order to send their children to college or to buy needed food and medicine to stay alive. On July 2nd, 22 NAACP branches held Day of Action protests in 22 cities across America to protest the evil, greedy, and discriminatory practice of sub prime lenders; twenty two (22) branches that, courageously, provided for many an oasis for justice. By our actions, some of these lenders have seen the light and want to right their wrongs. Rest assured the NAACP will lead this fight and work to restore justice to our families.
At this moment, 36 African American youths from HBCU’s are interning at over 20 major Wall Street financial investment firms through the NAACP’s Gateway to Leadership program; today, right now, six (6) black youths representing six distinguished American law schools, sit here with us this morning, thanks to the NAACP/Kellog Law Fellows Program, and six (6) college students from distinguished American universities sit here with us today as interns in our Youth & College Division because of the NAACP/AT& T partnership. These programs provide our young people an oasis of hope and opportunity.
For our community, and indeed America itself, we built and continue to maintain an oasis for dignity and self respect at the burial site for the “N” word, which we laid to rest last year in ceremonies around the country.
As a family, we are evolving to meet the needs of the members who are represented by branches of the Association. You have heard the promise of Chairman Bond that the board of directors will begin a study of ways to enhance revenues for our branches and conferences. In order to better understand your views about NAACP priorities and activities, please be on the lookout for a convention delegate survey we are conducting through the Boston Consulting Group. The survey will elicit your views on important questions around priorities for the Association as we move forward to our Centennial. I encourage you all to participate with this online survey. We want your frank and honest opinion; therefore all answers will be kept anonymous. Made available only to Convention delegates, the survey can be accessed via the NAACP’s home page between July 14th and the 25th.
Also, a data integration project is on course for completion by the end of the year. This solution will provide tools to help increase membership and support Units. Unit leaders will have the ability to login and securely view a list of Unit members, update some information on behalf of their members, and send email to members based on their “system of record” email address and contact information. NAACP members will be able to login to their account to update profile information, indicate interests and preferences, and review messages and other announcements in the “online community”.
Delegates, you should also pay attention to our Convention presentation, this week, on resuming the operation of our Fair Share Program. We are gearing up for it because we believe it to be an excellent tool through which our units can help provide jobs in their community and nurture much needed partnering relationships with companies that are committed to diversity and equal opportunity. Here with us today are Hilton Smith and Richard McEachern of Turner Construction, Inc representing the company’s President and CEO Peter Davoren. Turner Construction is the largest construction company in America, employing over 5,000 in 48 cities, and with offices in Dubai and Germany and throughout the Caribbean. With the assistance of board member Scott Esdaile, also president to the ConnecticutState Conference, Turner is itching to become the first signatory to a resumed national program. We need to do this at the national, state, and local level because members of your community will express their joy that you have provided a place, an oasis, which holds an ample supply of grain where our families can go, so that they do not starve to death. They will be thankful for any portion afforded them and comforted by the knowledge that there is an abundant supply there that can accommodate their families on return trips.
In a similar vein, please be mindful that on February 17, 2009, all television broadcasts will become solely digital. After this date, people who still use the old “analog” systems or those who continue to receive their television symbols through rabbit ears or by roof top antenna, will need either televisions equipped with digital tuners or add a “digital to analog” converter device to their TV sets. To reduce the cost of conversion to affected consumers, the federal government is issuing $40 coupons for converter boxes, for up to two televisions per household. If you contact the Washington Bureau through our website, at NAACP.Org, the Bureau will email you a brochure of information. Or you can call the Bureau at 202 463 2940 or the Dept. of Commerce at 1-888- DTV-2009.
My friends, in these uncertain times, and recognizing that dissent can be healthy, we must be careful that while looking inward in an attempt to inject the right dose of medicine to better ourselves, we must be careful not to poison our organizational self. When Joseph’s starving brothers were forced to face the sins of their past they were deathly afraid of the possibility of retribution on the part of their brother.
In an effort to assuage any plans of retaliation, they swore to serve the brother that they had once despised. To their delight, the brother who held their lives in his hands assured them that revenge was not his aim and they need not worry about retribution.
This Association has survived for almost 100 years because, despite the tough work it must do, in cajoling, confronting, and even disciplining others to do right, not just by black people but by the Constitution of the United States, it is not vengeful; rather we seek to win friends through persuasion and understanding because in the end respect and understanding bring about true transformation, which is a change that is lasting.
About six (6) years ago, the NAACP had differences with Cracker Barrel Stores, and sued them. We settled our differences but continued to talk. By talking, we found out that we both support the same things, a strong business environment for America that embraces diversity so that all families can prosper along with the business. This year, for the first time, Cracker Barrel is a financial supporter of the NAACP and supports its mission along with all our other allies.
For four years in a row, Target didn’t participate in our ERI report card project and we expressed our concern. You, NAACP, challenged their non participation with letters and an on-line petition. We have continued to talk with them and through our discussions we both learned that our respective organizations embrace equal opportunity, diversity, and social justice. NAACP’ers, Target has told us that they will be participating in next year’s report card survey and we are happy to have them back with us.
In the last several years the NAACP expressed its concern about what it was hearing that Wal-Mart was not paying fair wages or providing adequate health care insurance for its workers. While they continue to do the things they must do to become more perfect and pleasing to all, we believe that sharing our views with them have resulted in changes whereby they now offer affordable health care plans to all employees, part time and temporary workers alike (perhaps not the case eight years ago), that cost from $23 and include co-pays of $3 and $4 generic prescriptions. Wal-Mart has two (2) African Americans on its 15 member board of directors and their Chief of Diversity, Ester Silver-Parker now serves on our SCR Board of Trustees. It has been the power of organizations like the NAACP that have helped move that business today to comparable pay ranges and competitive market salaries for its employees. For most of us, there are more bridges to cross, and then always one more corner to turn, but let’s be clear about one thing:
Understanding brings about lasting change and we look forward as an Association to helping these new allies become better corporate citizens.
As we work with others who want to work with us, we will continue to fight those who resist our righteous call for justice; we will continue to fight that which is disrespectful and injurious to us as a people. Therefore, the Association must turn its attention to the State of South Carolina where the confederate flag flies on the State House’s plaza grounds in the face of our children. No less than the noose itself, whose message we get as a people, the confederate flag is a racially divisive symbol whose message of racial hatred, segregation, slavery, and second class citizenship we equally reject and must continue to do with direct action, including a continued tourism boycott.
The confederate flag dishonors the black and white United States soldiers who sacrificed their lives in defeating that flag and the vanquished confederacy it represents. The NAACP must return to South Carolina, return to our starving brothers who would sell us back into slavery hoping never to see us again. We must tell them, “A’int gonna let nobody turn us around”, turn us around, turn us around, ain’t gonna let nobody turn us around, we gonna keep on walking, keep up talking, moving up the King’s highway; we must remind them, that “before I’ll be a slave, I’ll be buried in my grave, go home to my Lord and be free.” The National staff and the South CarolinaState Conference of Branches invite your participation in our future direct action activities in the state of South Carolina. Stay tuned for more information.
Back to Joseph, this brother who had been sold into slavery, falsely accused, falsely imprisoned, forgotten by his friends and forsaken by his family, Joseph declared that all of this was necessary so that their nation of people, his family, could survive and he reminded them that if he were to exact revenge, that it would deliver only temporary pleasure, for his people as a nation would cease to exist. And so it is for all of the decisions we face both internally and externally as an organization. Some decisions are necessary to our organization, necessary to building the strength it needs to withstand the future challenges it must surely face. As these exercises in resistance help us to build muscle, as they make us stronger, we are assured that whatever future challenges we must face as an organization, they won’t be too heavy for us to handle them, to overcome them, to be victorious over them.
Joseph was indeed wronged by his brothers but he recognized that the survival of his people outweighed his personal satisfaction. We must not let personal feelings get in the way of the larger objective, the greater good, the ultimate purpose because, in the words of a very popular song, “It’s not about you, it’s not about me.” As true, selfless advocates for civil rights, we must understand that the NAACP does not exist to make a big deal out of us. We exist, freedom fighters, to make a big deal about the NAACP.
At the end of the day we must do what is best for a nation of oppressed people, of disenfranchised voters, and of people who are blinded by a myth called white supremacy & black inferiority. This great organization, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, an organization that believes colored people come in all colors, is a legacy left to us to enhance not infect; to build up not tear down, to be used to empower and not to impress.
I am reminded of Osceola McCarty who was never able to attend college but she cleaned houses and ironed clothes and left most of her $250,000 life savings to a college so that someone else could attend one. As we labor in this great organization we must consider what we will leave to those who follow. What will our legacy be? Can we create an oasis in the midst of a famine? Let’s stand behind Benjamin Jealous. As new member to our family, he is entrusted to our love and care. Can we all share in that oasis, made more abundant by all our toil, and share it with even those with whom we’ve differed? I believe we can. I know the NAACP will. For after all, we are brothers and sisters.
Thank you, God bless you, and the NAACP; and thank you for the opportunity to serve in the capacity of interim president& CEO of one of the most important organizations in the United States, the NAACP.
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