The National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) is an athletic association that organizes college and university-level athletic programs. Membership in the NAIA consists of smaller colleges and universities across the United States. The NAIA allows colleges and universities outside the USA as members. The NAIA has four members in Canada and at one point had one in the Bahamas, which made it the only international intercollegiate athletic association in North America until 2009. For the 2010-11 academic year, the NAIA has 290 member institutions.^[3] Currently, the headquarters are located in Kansas City, Missouri.^[4] The NAIA sponsors 23 national championships. The CBS College Sports Network, formerly called CSTV, serves as the national media for the NAIA.^[5]

History[link]

NAIA headquarters near the Power and Light District and Sprint Center in Downtown Kansas City.

In 1937, Dr. James Naismith and local leaders staged the first National College Basketball Tournament at Municipal Auditorium in Kansas City, Missouri. The goal of the tournament was to establish a forum for small colleges and universities to determine a national basketball champion. The original eight-team tournament expanded to 32 teams in 1938. On March 10, 1940, the National Association for Intercollegiate Basketball (NAIB) was formed in Kansas City, Missouri.

In 1952, the NAIB was transformed into the NAIA, and with that came the sponsorship of additional sports such as men's golf, tennis and outdoor track and field.^[6] Football in the NAIA was split into two divisions in 1970, based on enrollment (Div. I & Div. II); it was consolidated back into a single division in 1997.

African-American participation[link]

In 1948, the NAIB became the first national organization to open their intercollegiate postseason to black student-athletes. That same year, Indiana State coach John Wooden brought the first African-American student athlete to play at the national tournament.

The association furthered its commitment to African-American athletes, when in 1953, it became the first collegiate association to invite historically black colleges and universities into its membership. In 1957, Tennessee State became the first historically black institution to win a collegiate basketball national championship.

Female participation[link]

The NAIA began sponsoring intercollegiate championships for women in 1980, the first coed national athletics association to do so, offering collegiate athletics championships to women in basketball, cross country, gymnastics, indoor and outdoor track and field, softball, swimming and diving, tennis and volleyball.

In 1997, Liz Heaston became the first female college athlete to play and score in a college football game when she kicked two extra points.^[7]

Champions of Character[link]

Launched in 2000 by the NAIA, the Champions of Character program capitalizes on the NAIA's reputation for top flight athletics, superior academics and outstanding personal integrity of its athletes to promote character and sportmanship through athletics. The Champions of Character conducts clinics and has developed a online training course to educate athletes, coaches, and athletic administrators with the skills necessary to promote character development in the context of sport.

Championship sports[link]

The NAIA sponsors 13 sports in which it conducts 23 annual championships (12 for men, 11 for women). The association conducts, or has conducted in the past, championship tournaments in the following sports (year established)^[8]:

• Basketball
  • Men's
    • Division I (1937)
    • Division II (1992)
  • Women's
    • Division I (1981)
    • Division II (1992)

The NAIA basketball championship is the longest-running collegiate National Championship of any sport in the United States. The tournament is the brainchild of Dr. James Naismith, founder of the game of basketball; Emil Liston, athletic director at Baker University; and Frank Cramer, founder of Cramer Athletic Products. It began in 1937 with the inaugural tournament at Municipal Auditorium in Kansas City, MO. The 2011 tournament is the 74th edition of what has been tabbed as College Basketball’s Toughest Tournament. Basketball is the only NAIA sport that competes in divisions.

Emerging sports[link]

• Men's Lacrosse
• Women's Lacrosse
• Cheer and Dance
• Men's Volleyball
• Men's Bowling^[10]
• Women's Bowling^[10]

Conferences[link]

The NAIA has 23 member conferences, including 11 that sponsor football, and an association of independent institutions.

Multi-sport conferences[link]

Football-only conferences[link]

• Central States Football League (CSFL)
• Dakota Athletic Conference (DAC)
• Mid-States Football Association (MSFA)

Awards and honors[link]

Al Ortolani Scholarship (ATA) The $500 undergraduate scholarship is awarded to an outstanding student trainer who is at least a junior and has maintained a GPA of 3.00.

Athletic Trainer of the Year Presented to the NAIA-ATA member Athletic Trainer who has provided substantial service to student-athletes, the association or the member institution.

Charles Morris Award The award was initiated in memory and honor of past Associate Executive Director Charles Morris. The award is presented annually to recognize Conference, Region and a National Administrator of the Year.

The recipient should exemplify the loyalty and enthusiasm Charles Morris had for the NAIA. Nominees must be active as an administrator at a member institution or in conference/regional committee organizations.

Clarence "Ike" Pearson (SIDA) Given annually to a member of the NAIA-Sports Information Directors Association to honor outstanding contributions to the profession. The award is named for the former statistical crew chief of the NAIA men's basketball national tournament in Kansas City, Missouri.

Coach of Character Award The NAIA Coach of Character Award is an annual award given to a head coach of an NAIA institution. The nominee must be employed by the institution a minimum of 5 years and must be clearly outstanding in embracing the five core values of the NAIA Champions of Character initiative, methods of teaching character through sport, and community leadership through volunteering, service or other means.

A.O. Duer Award Named in honor of the NAIA's former executive secretary for his 26 years of service to the Association. The A.O. Duer Award emphasizes our policy of scholarship in athletic programs. The award is presented annually to a junior men's and women's student-athlete in any sport who has excelled academically as well as athletically.

To be eligible, a student-athlete must have an overall grade point average of at least 3.75 (on a 4.00 scale) and be in her/his junior year academically.

Emil S. Liston Award The founder of the NAIB and the first executive secretary of the NAIA, Mr. Liston was a prime mover behind the men's basketball tournament. The award is annually presented to a junior men's and women's basketball player who has shown athletic and scholastic achievement.

To be eligible, a student-athlete must have an overall grade point average of at least 3.50 (on a 4.00 scale) and be in her/his junior year academically. Each award consists of a $1,000 scholarship presented to the recipient’s institution to be used for tuition and approved expenses and an appropriate award is presented to the honoree.

Hall Of Fame The NAIA Hall of Fame Award is the highest honor presented by the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics. Nominees must be persons of outstanding quality, high moral character, fine leadership ability and must be held in high esteem by their colleagues, former coaches and former athletes.

Larry Lady Officiating Award The NAIA Larry Lady Officiating Award is presented annually to an official of any sport recognized by the NAIA. It is named in honor of Larry Lady, current NAIA Supervisor of Officials for basketball, football and baseball. Nominees must be persons of outstanding quality, high moral character, fine officiating ability and be held in high esteem by their colleagues, administrators and athletes.

The recipient will receive an award of $500 to be used by recipient, a member of the recipient’s family or family friend who attends an NAIA institution.

NAIA-CTSA "All That's Right in Sport" Award The Citizenship through Sports Alliance (CTSA) and the NAIA have partnered to annually honor one NAIA institution, team or individual for actions that have clear connections to sportsmanship, and bring with them outstanding stories that motivate and inspire. All Buffalo Funds Five Star Champions of Character Team Award Winners, as well as institutional nominations, are eligible for this special recognition. The recipient (up to 2 team/institutional representatives) will be provided round-trip transportation to the awards ceremony held in conjunction with the annual CTSA Awards Banquet.

Dr. Leroy Walker Character Award This award was created to honor Dr. LeRoy Walker a former president of the NAIA and President emeritus of the United States Olympic Committee.

The nominee must be a representative of an NAIA institution as a student-athlete. The nominee must be at least a junior academic status at the nominating institution at the time of nomination, and must be “outstanding” in academic achievement (3.0 G.P.A or higher), campus leadership, community leadership, embracing the five core character values of the NAIA Champions of Character initiative, athletic achievement and future ambition.

The recipient will receive a $1,000 cash award to the institution scholarship fund of recipient’s choice. The recipient also receives a specially engraved plaque/revere bowl as a permanent memento of the award.

Wally Schwartz Award The Faculty Athletic Representative Association has initiated this award to honor past Vice-President of Legislative Services, Wally Schwartz. The Award will annually recognize Conference, Independent and a National FAR of the Year. The recipient should exemplify the loyalty, enthusiasm, and honesty that Wally Schwartz had, and still has, shown on behalf of the NAIA.

Athletic Director of the Year Presented annually to the top athletic director who excels in the areas of budget development, facility development, promotion of student-athlete academic achievement, involvement in the Champions of Character initiative, athletic success, and service to the NAIA or community.

Pattison Champions of Character Scholarships Sponsored by Dr. Phil and Mary Pattison, longtime NAIA supporters, awarded $2,000 scholarships to five NAIA student-athletes that participate in the NAIA DI Men's basketball tournament, and display the five core values of the Champions of Character program-respect, responsibility, integrity, servant leadership and sportsmanship.

See also[link]

• List of NAIA conferences
• List of NAIA institutions
• List of NAIA regions
• List of college athletic programs by U.S. state
• NACDA Directors' Cup

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official website
• History of the NAIA
• The NAIA Eligibility Center

College athletics are played around the world. They range from the highly-professionalised system in the USA, to completely amateur systems.

World University games[link]

The first World University Games were held in 1923. There were originally called the Union Nationale des Étudiants Français .^[1] In 1957, following several previous renames, they became known as the World University Games.^[1]

Individual countries[link]

Australia[link]

University sport has received little academic attention in Australia.^[2]

In 1863, rugby union was first played in Australia at the University of Sydney when several clubs affiliated with the university were established.^[2]

One of Australia's earliest cricket teams was founded at the University of Sydney in 1854. This university affiliated team is one of the only teams from that period that still exists.^[2]

Canada[link]

University sports are viewed as having a positive social impact in Canada.^[3]

The Federal government is involved with university sport.^[4]

Wrestling is a university sport in Canada, with the system helping to provide future and current members of the Canadian national wrestling team.^[4]

China[link]

University sport was established in China by the 1930s. One of these programs was at the Catholic University of Peking. In 1936, members of the team traveled to Japan as members of a team to participate in a basketball and association football competition.^[5] During the early stages of World War II in the region, most universities suspended their sport programmes. The exceptions were Fu Ren University and Yanjing University which kept these programmes open until 1942 before shutting them down.^[5]

Chinese universities organised boat races before the cultural revolution. These races were modeled after the boat races in England.^[6]

England[link]

There were undergraduate boat races in Victorian England.^[6]

During the 1990s, ultimate Frisbee became a popular sport in England with events organised on many university campuses. This university participation would help lead to the establishment of a national sport federation for ultimate Frisbee.^[7]

Japan[link]

University sport was established in Japan by the 1930s.^[5]

By 1977, ultimate Frisbee had been established as a university sport. National championships were held that year with Aichi Gakuin University winning the inaugural event.^[7]

Mexico[link]

Universities are affiliated with soccer teams that are professional. One such team is the Universidad Autonoma Pumas^[8][9]

New Zealand[link]

New Zealand universities's sports teams normally compete in local sports leagues against non-university teams. There is an annual national event which covers a large number of sports and competitive cultural activities (such as debating). The event is typically held over Easter, rotating around university centers.^{[citation needed]}

South Africa[link]

During the 1970s, the National Union of South African Students worked to create a university sport programme where race was not considered in team and competition arrangements. The organisation faced some governmental hurdles. At the time, inter-racial sport was only allowed to be played on private grounds, which meant games and competitions could not be played on public university grounds. They had models from the University of Witwatersrand and the University of Cape Town which had already held such events.^[10]

United States of America[link]

Wales[link]

Universities in Wales support national development of athletics. One example of this is at University of Wales College, Swansea which along with the local government and university constructed a pool for high level development of swimming in Wales.^[11]

References[link]

See also[link]

sport portal

• Universiade

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, usually abbreviated as NAACP, is an African-American civil rights organization in the United States, formed in 1909.^[3] Its mission is "to ensure the political, educational, social, and economic equality of rights of all persons and to eliminate racial hatred and racial discrimination".^[4] Its name, retained in accordance with tradition, uses the once common term colored people.

The NAACP bestows the annual Image Awards for achievement in the arts and entertainment, and the annual Spingarn Medals for outstanding positive achievement of any kind, on deserving African Americans. It has its headquarters in Baltimore, Maryland.^[5]

Organization[link]

The NAACP's headquarters are in Baltimore, Maryland, with additional regional offices in California, New York, Michigan, Colorado, Georgia, Texas and Maryland.^[6] Each regional office is responsible for coordinating the efforts of state conferences in the states included in that region. Local, youth, and college chapters organize activities for individual members.

The NAACP is run nationally by a 64-member board led by a chair. The board elects one person as the President and one as chief executive officer for the organization; Benjamin Jealous is its most recent (and youngest) President, selected to replace Bruce S. Gordon, who resigned in March 2007. Civil Rights Movement activist and former Georgia State Senator Julian Bond was chairman until replaced in February 2010 by health-care administrator Roslyn M. Brock.^[7]

Departments within the NAACP govern areas of action. Local chapters are supported by the Branch and Field Services department and the Youth and College department. The Legal Department focuses on court cases of broad application to minorities, such as systematic discrimination in employment, government, or education. The Washington, D.C., bureau is responsible for lobbying the U.S. government, and the Education Department works to improve public education at the local, state and federal levels. The goal of the Health Division is to advance health care for minorities through public policy initiatives and education.

As of 2007, the NAACP had approximately 425,000 paying and non-paying members.^[8]

Pre-History: The Niagara Movement[link]

In 1905, a group of 32 prominent, outspoken African Americans met to discuss the challenges facing "people of color" (a term used to describe people who were not white) and possible strategies and solutions. Among the issues they were concerned about was the disfranchisement of blacks in the South starting in 1890 to 1908, when Southern legislatures ratified new constitutions creating barriers to voter registration and more complex election rules. Voter registration and turnout dropped markedly in the South as a result. Men who had been voting for 30 years were told they did not "qualify" to register.

Because hotels in the U.S. were segregated, the men convened under the leadership of Harvard scholar W. E. B. Du Bois at a hotel (Fort Erie Hotel) on the Canadian side of Niagara Falls in Fort Erie, Ontario. As a result, the group came to be known as the Niagara Movement. A year later, three whites joined the group: journalist William E. Walling, social worker Mary White Ovington, and social worker Henry Moskowitz, then Associate Leader of the New York Society for Ethical Culture.

The fledgling group struggled for a time with limited resources and internal conflict and disbanded in 1910.^[9] Many members of the Niagara Movement then went on to join the NAACP. Although both organizations shared membership and overlapped in their existence, the Niagara Movement was a separate organization and is historically thought of as having a more radical platform than the NAACP. The Niagara Movement was formed exclusively by African Americans, while the meeting which birthed the idea of the NAACP was with three white people.

History[link]

This section may need to be rewritten entirely to comply with Wikipedia's quality standards. You can help. The discussion page may contain suggestions. (January 2012)

The Birth of the NAACP[link]

The Race Riot of 1908 in Abraham Lincoln's hometown of Springfield, Illinois had highlighted the urgent need for an effective civil rights organization in the U.S. This event is often cited as the catalyst for the formation of the NAACP. Mary White Ovington, journalist William English Walling and Henry Moskowitz met in New York City in January 1909 and the NAACP was born.^[10] Solicitations for support went out to more than 60 prominent Americans, and a meeting date was set for February 12, 1909. This was intended to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the birth of President Abraham Lincoln, who emancipated enslaved African Americans. While the meeting did not take place until three months later, this date is often cited as the founding date of the organization.

The NAACP was founded on February 12, 1909 by a diverse group composed of W.E.B. Du Bois, Ida B. Wells, Archibald Grimké, Henry Moscowitz, Mary White Ovington, Oswald Garrison Villard, William English Walling (the last son of a former slave-holding family),^[10][11] Florence Kelley, a social reformer and friend of Du Bois,^[12] and Charles Edward Russell, a renowned muckraker and close friend of Walling who helped plan the NAACP and served as acting chairman of the National Negro Committee (1909), a forerunner to the NAACP.^[13]

On May 30, 1909, the Niagara Movement conference took place at New York City's Henry Street Settlement House, from which an organization of more than 40 individuals emerged, calling itself the National Negro Committee. Du Bois played a key role in organizing the event and presided over the proceedings. Also in attendance was African-American journalist and anti-lynching crusader Ida B. Wells-Barnett. At its second conference on May 30, 1910, members chose as the organization's name the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and elected its first officers, who were:^[14]

• National President, Moorfield Storey, Boston
• Chairman of the Executive Committee, William English Walling
• Treasurer, John E. Milholland (a Lincoln Republican and Presbyterian from New York City and Lewis, NY)
• Disbursing Treasurer, Oswald Garrison Villard
• Executive Secretary, Frances Blascoer
• Director of Publicity and Research, Dr. W.E.B. Du Bois.

The NAACP was incorporated a year later in 1911. The association's charter delineated its mission:

To promote equality of rights and to eradicate caste or race prejudice among the citizens of the United States; to advance the interest of colored citizens; to secure for them impartial suffrage; and to increase their opportunities for securing justice in the courts, education for the children, employment according to their ability and complete equality before law.

The conference resulted in a more influential and diverse organization, where the leadership was predominantly white and heavily Jewish American. In fact, at its founding, the NAACP had only one African American on its executive board, Du Bois himself. It did not elect a black president until 1975, although executive directors had been African American. The Jewish community contributed greatly to the NAACP's founding and continued financing. Jewish historian Howard Sachar writes in his book A History of Jews in America of how, "In 1914, Professor Emeritus Joel Spingarn of Columbia University became chairman of the NAACP and recruited for its board such Jewish leaders as Jacob Schiff, Jacob Billikopf, and Rabbi Stephen Wise."^[15] Early Jewish-American co-founders included Julius Rosenwald, Lillian Wald, Rabbi Emil G. Hirsch and Wise.

According to Pbs.org "Over the years Jews have also expressed empathy (capability to share and understand another's emotion and feelings) with the plight of Blacks. In the early 20th century, Jewish newspapers drew parallels between the Black movement out of the South and the Jews' escape from Egypt, pointing out that both Blacks and Jews lived in ghettos, and calling anti-Black riots in the South "pogroms". Stressing the similarities rather than the differences between the Jewish and Black experience in America, Jewish leaders emphasized the idea that both groups would benefit the more America moved toward a society of merit, free of religious, ethnic and racial restrictions."^[16] Pbs.org further states, "The American Jewish Committee, the American Jewish Congress, and the Anti-Defamation League were central to the campaign against racial prejudice. Jews made substantial financial contributions to many civil rights organizations, including the NAACP, the Urban League, the Congress of Racial Equality, and the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee. About 50 percent of the civil rights attorneys in the South during the 1960s were Jews, as were over 50 percent of the Whites who went to Mississippi in 1964 to challenge Jim Crow Laws."^[16]

As a member of the Princeton chapter of the NAACP, Albert Einstein corresponded with Du Bois, and in 1946 Einstein called racism "America's worst disease".^[17][18] Du Bois continued to play a pivotal role in the organization and served as editor of the association's magazine, The Crisis, which had a circulation of over 30,000.

Moorfield Storey, who was white, was the president of the NAACP from its founding to 1915. Storey was a long-time classical liberal and Grover Cleveland Democrat who advocated laissez-faire free markets, the gold standard, and anti-imperialism. Storey consistently and aggressively championed civil rights, not only for blacks but also for Native Americans and immigrants (he opposed immigration restrictions).

Fighting Jim Crow and disfranchisement[link]

In its early years, the NAACP concentrated on using the courts to overturn the Jim Crow statutes that legalized racial segregation. In 1913, the NAACP organized opposition to President Woodrow Wilson's introduction of racial segregation into federal government policy, offices, and hiring.

By 1914, the group had 6,000 members and 50 branches. It was influential in winning the right of African Americans to serve as officers in World War I. Six hundred African-American officers were commissioned and 700,000 men registered for the draft. The following year, the NAACP organized a nationwide protest, with marches in numerous cities, against D.W. Griffith's silent movie Birth of a Nation, a film that glamorized the Ku Klux Klan. As a result, several cities refused to allow the film to open.

The NAACP began to lead lawsuits targeting disfranchisement and racial segregation early in its history. It played a significant part in the challenge of Guinn v. United States (1915) to Oklahoma's discriminatory grandfather clause that disfranchised most black citizens while exempting many whites from certain voter registration requirements. It persuaded the Supreme Court of the United States to rule in Buchanan v. Warley in 1917 that state and local governments cannot officially segregate African Americans into separate residential districts. The Court's opinion reflected the jurisprudence of property rights and freedom of contract as embodied in the earlier precedent it established in Lochner v. New York.

In 1916, when the NAACP was just seven years old, chairman Joel Spingarn invited James Weldon Johnson to serve as field secretary. Johnson was a former U.S. consul to Venezuela and a noted scholar and columnist. Within four years, Johnson was instrumental in increasing the NAACP's membership from 9,000 to almost 90,000. In 1920, Johnson was elected head of the organization. Over the next ten years, the NAACP escalated its lobbying and litigation efforts, becoming internationally known for its advocacy of equal rights and equal protection for the "American Negro".

The NAACP devoted much of its energy during the interwar years to fighting the lynching of blacks throughout the United States by working for legislation, lobbying and educating the public. The organization sent its field secretary Walter F. White to Phillips County, Arkansas, in October 1919, to investigate the Elaine Race Riot. More than 200 black tenant farmers were killed by roving white vigilantes and federal troops after a deputy sheriff's attack on a union meeting of sharecroppers left one white man dead. White published his report on the riot in the Chicago Daily News.^[19] The NAACP organized the appeals for twelve black men sentenced to death a month later based on the fact that testimony used in their convictions was obtained by beatings and electric shocks. It gained a groundbreaking Supreme Court decision in Moore v. Dempsey 261 U.S. 86 (1923) that significantly expanded the Federal courts' oversight of the states' criminal justice systems in the years to come. White investigated eight race riots and 41 lynchings for the NAACP and directed its study Thirty Years of Lynching in the United States.^[20]

The NAACP also spent more than a decade seeking federal legislation against lynching, but Southern white Democrats voted as a block against it or used the filibuster in the Senate to block passage. Because of disfranchisement, there were no black representatives from the South in Congress. The NAACP regularly displayed a black flag stating "A Man Was Lynched Yesterday" from the window of its offices in New York to mark each lynching.

In alliance with the American Federation of Labor, the NAACP led the successful fight to prevent the nomination of John Johnston Parker to the Supreme Court, based on his support for denying the vote to blacks and his anti-labor rulings. It organized support for the Scottsboro Boys. The NAACP lost most of the internecine battles with the Communist Party and International Labor Defense over the control of those cases and the strategy to be pursued in that case.

The organization also brought litigation to challenge the "white primary" system in the South. Southern states had created white-only primaries as another way of barring blacks from the political process. Since southern states were dominated by the Democrats, the primaries were the only competitive contests. In 1944 in Smith v. Allwright, the Supreme Court ruled against the white primary. Although states had to retract legislation related to the white primaries, the legislatures soon came up with new methods to limit the franchise for blacks.

Legal Defense Fund[link]

The board of directors of the NAACP created the Legal Defense Fund in 1939 specifically for tax purposes. It functioned as the NAACP legal department. Intimidated by the Department of the Treasury and the Internal Revenue Service, the Legal and Educational Defense Fund, Inc., became a separate legal entity in 1957, although it was clear that it was to operate in accordance with NAACP policy. After 1961 serious disputes emerged between the two organizations, creating considerable confusion in the eyes and minds of the public.^[21]

Desegregation[link]

This unreferenced section requires citations to ensure verifiability.

Locals viewing the bomb-damaged home of Arthur Shores, NAACP attorney, Birmingham, Alabama, on September 5, 1963. The bomb exploded on September 4th, the previous day, injuring Shores' wife.

With the rise of private corporate litigators like the NAACP to bear the expense, civil suits became the pattern in modern civil rights litigation. The NAACP's Legal department, headed by Charles Hamilton Houston and Thurgood Marshall, undertook a campaign spanning several decades to bring about the reversal of the "separate but equal" doctrine announced by the Supreme Court's decision in Plessy v. Ferguson.

The NAACP's Baltimore chapter, under president Lillie Mae Carroll Jackson, challenged segregation in Maryland state professional schools by supporting the 1935 Murray v. Pearson case argued by Marshall. Houston's victory in Missouri ex rel. Gaines v. Canada (1938) led to the formation of the NAACP Legal Defense fund in 1940.

The campaign for desegregation culminated in a unanimous 1954 Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education that held state-sponsored segregation of elementary schools was unconstitutional. Bolstered by that victory, the NAACP pushed for full desegregation throughout the South. Starting on December 5, 1955, NAACP activists, including E.D. Nixon, its local president, and Rosa Parks, who had served as the chapter's Secretary, helped organize a bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama. This was designed to protest segregation on the city's buses, two-thirds of whose riders were black. The boycott lasted 381 days.

The State of Alabama responded by effectively barring the NAACP from operating within its borders because of its refusal to divulge a list of its members. The NAACP feared members could be fired or face violent retaliation for their activities. Although the Supreme Court eventually overturned the state's action in NAACP v. Alabama, 357 U.S. 449 (1958), the NAACP lost its leadership role in the Civil Rights Movement while it was barred from Alabama.

New organizations such as the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) rose up with different approaches to activism. These newer groups relied on direct action and mass mobilization to advance the rights of African Americans, rather than litigation and legislation. Roy Wilkins, NAACP's executive director, clashed repeatedly with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and other civil rights leaders over questions of strategy and leadership within the movement.

The NAACP continued to use the Supreme Court's decision in Brown to press for desegregation of schools and public facilities throughout the country. Daisy Bates, president of its Arkansas state chapter, spearheaded the campaign by the Little Rock Nine to integrate the public schools in Little Rock, Arkansas.

By the mid-1960s, the NAACP had regained some of its preeminence in the Civil Rights Movement by pressing for civil rights legislation. The March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom took place on August 28, 1963. That fall President John F. Kennedy sent a civil rights bill to Congress before he was assassinated.

President Lyndon B. Johnson worked hard to persuade Congress to pass a civil rights bill aimed at ending racial discrimination in employment, education and public accommodations, and succeeded in gaining passage in July 1964. He followed that with passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which provided for protection of the franchise, with a role for federal oversight and administrators in places where voter turnout was historically low.

After Kivie Kaplan died in 1975, scientist W. Montague Cobb became President of the NAACP and served until 1982. Benjamin Hooks, a lawyer and clergyman, was elected as the NAACP's executive director in 1977, after the retirement of Roy Wilkins.

The NAACP in the 1990s[link]

In the 1990s, the NAACP ran into debt. The dismissal of two leading officials further added to the picture of an organization in deep crisis.

In 1993 the NAACP's Board of Directors narrowly selected Reverend Benjamin Chavis over Reverend Jesse Jackson to fill the position of Executive Director. A controversial figure, Chavis was ousted eighteen months later by the same board that had hired him. They accused him of using NAACP funds for an out-of-court settlement in a sexual harassment lawsuit.^[22] Following the dismissal of Chavis, Myrlie Evers-Williams narrowly defeated NAACP chairperson William Gibson for president in 1995, after Gibson was accused of overspending and mismanagement of the organization's funds.

In 1996 Congressman Kweisi Mfume, a Democratic Congressman from Maryland and former head of the Congressional Black Caucus, was named the organization's president. Three years later strained finances forced the organization to drastically cut its staff, from 250 in 1992 to just fifty.

In the second half of the 1990s, the organization restored its finances, permitting the NAACP National Voter Fund to launch a major get-out-the-vote offensive in the 2000 U.S. presidential elections. 10.5 million African Americans cast their ballots in the election. This was one million more than four years before,^[22] and the NAACP's effort was credited by observers as playing a significant role in Democrat Al Gore's winning several states where the election was close, such as Pennsylvania and Michigan.^[22]

Lee Alcorn controversy[link]

During the 2000 Presidential election, Lee Alcorn, president of the Dallas NAACP branch, criticized Al Gore's selection of Senator Joe Lieberman for his Vice-Presidential candidate because Lieberman was Jewish. On a gospel talk radio show on station KHVN, Alcorn stated, "If we get a Jew person, then what I'm wondering is, I mean, what is this movement for, you know? Does it have anything to do with the failed peace talks?" ... "So I think we need to be very suspicious of any kind of partnerships between the Jews at that kind of level because we know that their interest primarily has to do with money and these kind of things."^[23]

NAACP President Kweisi Mfume immediately suspended Alcorn and condemned his remarks. Mfume stated, "I strongly condemn those remarks. I find them to be repulsive, anti-Semitic, anti-NAACP and anti-American. Mr. Alcorn does not speak for the NAACP, its board, its staff or its membership. We are proud of our long-standing relationship with the Jewish community and I personally will not tolerate statements that run counter to the history and beliefs of the NAACP in that regard."^[23]

Alcorn, who had been suspended three times in the previous five years for misconduct, subsequently resigned from the NAACP and started his own organization called the Coalition for the Advancement of Civil Rights. Alcorn criticized the NAACP, saying, "I can't support the leadership of the NAACP. Large amounts of money are being given to them by large corporations that I have a problem with."^[23] Alcorn also said, "I cannot be bought. For this reason I gladly offer my resignation and my membership to the NAACP because I cannot work under these constraints."^[24]

Alcorn's remarks were also condemned by the Reverend Jesse Jackson, Jewish groups and George W. Bush's rival Republican presidential campaign. Jackson said he strongly supported Lieberman's addition to the Democratic ticket, saying, "When we live our faith, we live under the law. He [Lieberman] is a firewall of exemplary behavior."^[23] Al Sharpton, another prominent African-American leader, said, "The appointment of Mr. Lieberman was to be welcomed as a positive step."^[25] The leaders of the American Jewish Congress praised the NAACP for its quick response, stating that: "It will take more than one bigot like Alcorn to shake the sense of fellowship of American Jews with the NAACP and black America... Our common concerns are too urgent, our history too long, our connection too sturdy, to let anything like this disturb our relationship."^[26]

NAACP and George W. Bush[link]

In 2004, President George W. Bush (president from 2001–2009) declined an invitation to speak to its national convention.^[27] The White House originally said the president had a schedule conflict with the NAACP convention,^[28] slated for July 10–15, 2004. On July 10, 2004, however, Bush's spokesperson said that Bush had declined the invitation to speak to the NAACP because of harsh statements about him by its leaders.^[28] In an interview, Bush said, "I would describe my relationship with the current leadership as basically nonexistent. You've heard the rhetoric and the names they've called me."^[28] Bush also mentioned his admiration for some members of the NAACP and said he would seek to work with them "in other ways."^[28]

On July 20, 2006, Bush addressed the NAACP national convention. He made a bid for increasing support by African Americans for Republicans, in the midst of a midterm election.^[29][30]

NAACP and tax exempt status[link]

The Internal Revenue Service informed the NAACP in October 2004 that it was investigating its tax-exempt status based on Julian Bond's speech at its 2004 Convention in which he criticized President George W. Bush as well as other political figures.^[31][32] In general, the US Internal Revenue Code prohibits organizations granted tax-exempt status from "directly or indirectly participating in, or intervening in, any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for elective public office."^[33] The NAACP denounced the investigation as retaliation for its success in increasing the number of African Americans who vote.^[31][34] In August 2006, the IRS investigation concluded with the agency's finding "that the remarks did not violate the group's tax-exempt status."^[35]

NAACP and LGBT rights[link]

As the American LGBT rights movement gained steam after the Stonewall riots of 1969, the NAACP became increasingly affected by the movement to suppress or deny rights to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. Bond, while chairman of the NAACP, became an outspoken supporter of the rights of gays and lesbians, publicly stating his support for same-sex marriage. Most notably he boycotted the 2004 funeral services for Coretta Scott King on the grounds that the King children had chosen an anti-gay megachurch. This was in contradiction to their mother's longstanding support for the rights of gay and lesbian people.^[36] In a 2005 speech in Richmond, VA, Bond stated:

African Americans ... were the only Americans who were enslaved for two centuries, but we were far from the only Americans suffering discrimination then and now. ... Sexual disposition parallels race. I was born this way. I have no choice. I wouldn’t change it if I could. Sexuality is unchangeable.^[37]

In a 2007 speech on the Martin Luther King Day Celebration at Clayton State University in Morrow, GA, Bond said, "If you don't like gay marriage, don't get gay married." His positions have pitted elements of the NAACP against religious groups in the Black Civil Rights movement who oppose gay marriage mostly within the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) who was blamed partly for the success of the recent gay marriage ban amendment in California.^{[citation needed]} The NAACP became increasingly vocal in opposition against state-level constitutional amendments to ban same-sex marriage and other rights, with state NAACP leaders such as William J. Barber, II of North Carolina participating actively against (the ultimately-successful) North Carolina Amendment 1 in 2012.

On May 19, 2012, the NAACP's board of directors formally endorsed same-sex marriage as a civil right, voting 62-2 for the policy in a Miami, Florida quarterly meeting^[38][39]. Benjamin Jealous, the organization's president, said of the decision, "Civil marriage is a civil right and a matter of civil law...The NAACP’s support for marriage equality is deeply rooted in the 14th Amendment of the United States Constitution and equal protection of all people." Possibly significant in the NAACP's vote was its concern with the HIV/AIDS crisis in the black community; while AIDS support organizations recommend that people live a monogamous lifestyle, the government did not recognize same-sex relationships.^[40]

Current activities[link]

NAACP and youth[link]

This aspect of the NAACP came into existence in 1936 and now is made of over 600 groups and totaling over 30,000 individuals. The NAACP Youth & College Division is a branch of the NAACP in which youth are actively involved. The Youth Council is composed of hundreds of state, county, high school and college operations where youth (and college students) volunteer to share their voices or opinions with their peers and address issues that are local and national. Sometimes volunteer work expands to a more international scale. Committing to the Youth Council may reward young people with travel opportunities or scholarships.

In 2003, NAACP President and CEO, Kweisi Mfume, appointed Brandon Neal, the National Youth and College Division Director.^[41] Currently, Stefanie L. Brown serves as the NAACP's National Youth & College Division Director. A graduate and former Student Government President at Howard University, Stefanie previously served as the National Youth Council Coordinator of the NAACP.

Mission of the Youth & College Division[link]

"The mission of the NAACP Youth & College Division shall be to inform youth of the problems affecting African Americans and other racial and ethnic minorities; to advance the economic, education, social and political status of African Americans and other racial and ethnic minorities and their harmonious cooperation with other peoples; to stimulate an appreciation of the African Diaspora and other people of color’s contribution to civilization; and to develop an intelligent, militant effective youth leadership."

ACT-SO program[link]

Since 1978 the NAACP has sponsored the Afro-Academic, Cultural, Technological and Scientific Olympics (ACT-SO) program for high school youth around the United States. The program is designed to recognize and award African American youth who demonstrate accomplishment in academics, technology, and the arts. Local chapters sponsor competitions in various categories of achievement for young people in grades 9–12. Winners of the local competitions are eligible to proceed to the national event at a convention held each summer at locations around the United States. Winners at the national competition receive national recognition along with cash awards and various prizes.^[42]

See also[link]

African American portal

• Association for the Study of African American Life and History
• Black Rock Coalition
• NAACP Image Awards
• NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund
• NAACP Theatre Awards
• Niagara Movement
• Racial integration
• Resignation of Shirley Sherrod
• Spingarn Medal

References[link]

Sources[link]

• Richard Dalfiume, "The Forgotten Years of the Negro Revolution," Journal of American History 55 (June 1969): 99-100. fulltext in JSTOR
• Fleming, Cynthia Griggs. In the Shadow of Selma: The Continuing Struggle for Civil Rights in the Rural South Rowman and Littlefield, 2004. 349 pp.
• Goings, Kenneth W. The NAACP Comes of Age: The Defeat of Judge John J. Parker (1990). late 1920s
• Hughes, Langston. Fight for Freedom: The Story of the NAACP (1962)
• Janken, Kenneth Robert. White: The Biography of Walter White, Mr. NAACP. New Press, 2003.
• Jonas, Gilbert S. Freedom's Sword: The NAACP and the Struggle against Racism in America, 1909-1969. (Routledge, 2005). 240 pp.
• Lewis, David Levering. W.E.B. DuBois (2 vol, 1994, 2001); Pulitzer Prize
• Mosnier, L. Joseph. Crafting Law in the Second Reconstruction: Julius Chambers, the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, and Title VII. University of North Carolina, 2005. The NAACP Legal Defense Fund is an entirely separate organization despite its similar name
• Ross, Barbara Joyce. J. E. Spingarn and the Rise of the NAACP, 1911-1939 (1972)
• St. James, Warren D. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People: A Case Study in Pressure Groups (1958)
• Schneider, Mark Robert. We Return Fighting: The Civil Rights Movement in the Jazz Age (2001)
• Topping, Simon; "'Supporting Our Friends and Defeating Our Enemies': Militancy and Nonpartisanship in the NAACP, 1936-1948," Journal of African American History, Vol. 89, 2004 in JSTOR
• Verney, Kevern and Lee Sartain, eds. Long Is the Way and Hard: One Hundred Years of the NAACP (2009), 16 new essays by scholars
• Zangrando, Robert. The NAACP Crusade Against Lynching, 1909-1950 (1980)
• Events on the NAACP timeline (1939 - Present), naacp.org

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: NAACP

Wikisource has original text related to this article: Barack Obama's Remarks at NAACP centennial

• Official website
• Civil Rights Greensboro: National Association for the Advancement of Colored People
• Civil Rights Movement Veterans, crmvet.org
• Youth College Mission, naacp.org
• Article and Video, The NAACP 100 Years On, governingdynamo.com
• Annual ACT-SO Contest, naacp-Los Angeles.org
• Official site of the Brooklyn, New York Branch, brooklynnaacp.org
• NAACP in Georgia, georgiaencyclopedia.org
• The Wichita NAACP Blog, wichitanaacpblog.com
• George W. Bush addresses NAACP national convention for the first time July 20, 2006 (Video)
• President Obama NAACP Speech: "Your Destiny Is In Your Hands ... No Excuses" - video by The Huffington Post
• NAACP Turns 100: The History and Future of the Nation’s Oldest and Largest Civil Rights Organization, democracywow.org video
• Niagara Movement Du Bois Papers, Special Collections and University Archives, Umass Amherst
• FBI file on the NAACP

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