The NAACP's official organ, The Crisis Magazine, carried information on young people and encouraged formation of youth units for a number of years before any action was taken to form a division in the Association devoted to youth activities. In 1935, during the St. Louis Convention, a fiery address was made by one of the youth delegates, Miss Juanita Jackson, to create a department for youth.
Subsequently, on September 15, 1935, Miss Jackson joined the Association's staff and became the first Youth Secretary. The NAACP National Board of Directors passed a resolution formally creating the Youth and College Division in March of 1936. Under the guidance of Ms. Jackson, a National Youth Program was created for youth members of the NAACP. This program provided national activities for youth that were supported by monthly meetings discussing local needs of the community. The major national youth activities were demonstrations against lynching and seminars and group discussions on the inequalities in public education.
At the historical first youth meeting in Baltimore, Maryland, June 29 - July 4, 1936, 217 youth delegates held a national conference simultaneously with adult members. Delegates outlined a national program that addressed four major areas: equal educational opportunities, equal economic opportunities, civil liberties, and physical security against lynching.
The new plan called for the scrapping of what was then known as the junior branch with the old age limits of 14 - 21 years old for youth members. This was replaced by junior youth councils, ages 12 -15, youth councils, ages 16 - 25, including college youth and college units, and the creation of a youth program similar to that of the adults.
This spirit of solidarity among black youths was sparked by years of racial discrimination, segregation, and mob violence. "Flesh and blood and the breath of life must be added to the skeleton we have constructed," declared youth member, Edward A. Lawrence in an article in the September, 1936 edition of The Crisis. The year was marked by an increasingly aggressive and efficient level of activity within youth units, indicating not only intelligent leadership and loyalty on the part of the members; but a laudable spirit of cooperation among the young people.
Under the guidance of Miss Jackson, a national youth program evolved. This program, built around the major objectives of the Association, provided for national periodic youth activities that were supported through monthly youth programs addressing local needs. The major national youth activities were mass meetings against inequalities in public education and demonstrations against lynching was evidenced in December, 1934 when Howard University Students organized and picketed a national Conference in Washington, DC when leaders refused to discuss lynching as a national crime. This demonstration led to congress enacting the Federal Anti-lynching Bill.
From 1935 to the late 40's, new NAACP youth units were organized, and in the 1950's and 1960's, NAACP youth units became entrenched in the fight for equality and justice.
In 1950, the Virginia State NAACP College Chapter was recognized for its leadership in the sit-ins in the city of St. Petersburg. The College Chapters of Indiana and Wilberforce succeeded in getting several local restaurants to serve Negro patrons while the NAACP College Chapter at Florida A&M was financially contributing to the Tallahassee bus protest.
In 1955, the Division sponsored the second annual National Youth Legislative Conference, which met for three days in February in Washington, DC to discuss the role that young people could play in helping to break down racial discrimination and segregation.
In 1956, the Division took an active role in encouraging letters of protest in the treatment of black student, Autherine Lucy, at Alabama University. As a result of this pressure, student officers in the university passed a resolution calling upon the administration to admit Miss Lucy and urging students not to participate in further demonstrations against her.
In 1958, division units in Wichita, Kansas and Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, set the tone for the civil rights movement of the sixties by launching the first of many sit-in demonstrations at lunch counters and other public places to protest their second class citizenship. That same year the NAACP awarded its coveted Spingarn Medal to nine black teenagers who dared to break the color line at their local high school in Little Rock, Arkansas.
During the 1960's, heightened activity by division units challenged all facets of discrimination. Division units conducted sit-ins, stand-ins, drive-ins, wade-ins, read-ins, mass demonstrations, protest marches, picket lines and selective buying campaigns in the South, Midwest and in virtually every other section of the country. They attended conferences, workshop sessions and rallies; they helped line up students to apply for transfers to integrated schools; and they assisted in voter registration drives.
The year 1961 saw Division units reach an all-time high in civil rights action. During the year, units led the first sit-ins to take place in the state of Mississippi at Jackson (March 9); integrated 42 new places of public accommodations in Oklahoma City including the John A. Brown Department Store; shifted the emphasis of sit-ins from public accommodations to the area of jobs; led a successful "selective buying" campaign in Durham, North Carolina, where more than 100 new job opportunities were made available to Negro wage earners; ended discrimination in off-campus housing against Negro students at Rutgers University; established active chapters at the following predominantly white institutions of higher learning in the south: Duke University, University of North Carolina and the University of Oklahoma marking the first time since 1948 that the Association has been able to organize and gain formal recognition at such institutions in the south.
In the summer of 1961, under the leadership of Floyd B. McKissick, Sr., North Carolina State Youth Advisor, and others, a group of NAACP youth was organized called the "Youth Commandos". Mr. John W. Edwards served as Chairman of the Commandos. The group was instrumental in civil rights gains by organizing Division units in sit-in demonstrations. This valiant group carried their civil rights work to the state of Virginia where the group conducted a selective buying campaign in Richmond, Virginia and picketed City Hall protesting the lack of jobs for blacks in city government.
For black Americans, especially for members of the "New Generation", 1969 was a year of unparalleled civil rights activity. Young people shouted and demonstrated for an end to inequality for Negroes and other oppressed people, particularly in economics, education, politics and cultural survival. The members of the Division, under the direction of James Brown, Jr., were in the midst of such activities. In many communities, they provided the catalyst that stimulated the uncovering and correction of many wrongs. The division pursued with vigor four basic objectives: (1) to inform youth of the problems affecting Negro and other minority groups; (2) to advance the economic, educational, social and political status of Negro people and other minority groups; (3) to stimulate an appreciation of the Negro's contribution to civilization; and (4) to develop an intelligent and militant youth leadership through devising, working out and pursuing local programs.
Priority for the Division in the 80's was voter registration and mobilization. Registration efforts in the northeast were intense. Division units conducted registration drives in shopping centers, subway stations, cheese lines and other public places. Voter registration walk-a-thons were conducted by the New York and New Jersey State conferences; Stamford and Waterbury, Connecticut Youth Councils; and Boston, Massachusetts units. The Over-ground railroad was a three-phase project whose major goal was to stamp out voter apathy and encourage voter participation. This project was one that included youth and adults who walked from northern to southern California, throughout the Midwest, in the south and on the east coast.
Since it was founded in 1909, the NAACP has provided and trained more leaders for the black community than any other single organization. Virtually every black American leader, public and private, local and national, learned the spirit of public service and the techniques of leadership through the NAACP. Roy Wilkins, Vernon Jordan, Julian Bond, Andrew Young, Patricia Harris, Thurgood Marshall, Ralph Bunche, and many others served their apprenticeships in the Association's Youth Councils and College Chapters.
Today there are over 400 NAACP Youth Councils, High School Chapters and College Chapters actively involved in social justice advocacy by addressing local issues as well as a national agenda made up of issues including: Education, Economic Empowerment, Health, Juvenile Justice, and Voter Empowerment. The NAACP is the only major civil rights organization, which encourages young people to participate fully in all aspects of its structure, including membership on the National Board of Directors.
Today, the Youth & College Division continues to provide one of the strongest and most capable elements in the NAACP's national volunteer network as well as the major training instrument for motivated young people committed to justice and equality for all people of color.
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