Naacp Executive Director

Allies of fired NAACP Executive Director Benjamin F. Chavis Jr. have launched bids to win control of the civil rights group's Baltimore and Chicago branches in elections this month.But, in an apparent move to block the Chavis faction, the NAACP national board has ruled that youth members are ineligible to vote unless they pay adult dues.Kobi Little, a 23-year-old former Johns Hopkins University NAACP leader, is challenging Rodney Orange, president of the Baltimore branch, in a Nov. 28 election.

THE DECISION by NAACP board Chairwoman Myrlie Evers-Williams not to seek re-election this month is disappointing but not surprising.She was reluctant to seek the post three years ago, knowing her husband Walter Edward Williams had terminal prostate cancer.But Mr. Williams, who has since died, persuaded his wife that she was the right person to lead the NAACP, just as he had convinced her to pursue the retrial that after 31 years led to a conviction and long prison term in the 1963 murder of her first husband, Mississippi civil rights leader Medgar Evers.

No one knew it then, but the end of the Rev. Benjamin F. Chavis Jr.'s stormy 16 1/2 months as NAACP executive director began June 30 with some shuffling of paper in the clerk's office of District of Columbia Superior Court.That day Mary E. Stansel, who worked so briefly at the civil rights group's Baltimore headquarters that few members of the NAACP board of directors even remember her, filed suit. Ms. Stansel, a 49-year-old lawyer whom Dr. Chavis fired in May 1993, charged him and the NAACP with breach of contract.

Walter W. Morrison, a former speech writer and policy adviser for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, died of complications of diabetes and kidney failure May 17 at Good Samaritan Hospital. The Northwest Baltimore resident was 59.Mr. Morrison framed many of the civil rights organization's responses to Reagan and Bush administration policies between 1986 and 1992, when he served as a top aide to the now-retired NAACP executive director, the Rev. Benjamin L. Hooks.

At a meeting to clear the air after the firing of NAACP Executive Director Benjamin F. Chavis Jr., the Baltimore NAACP branch announced last night that it was postponing its annual Unity Banquet partly because of fallout from the controversy.The meeting also featured a surprise appearance by Martha Rivera Chavis, the wife of the ousted NAACP national leader, who said she had been hurt by "misinformation" about her husband. Mrs. Chavis taped much of the meeting at the Baltimore Urban League's Orchard Street headquarters.

WASHINGTON -- Opposition to Clarence Thomas' nomination to succeed Justice Thurgood Marshall on the Supreme Court got a boost when the NAACP and AFL-CIO said they would fight the nomination.The board of directors of the NAACP, the nation's largest civil rights organization, voted 49-1 yesterday to urge senators to reject Thomas' nomination, saying that he approaches critical issues with a "reactionary" philosophy that would be harmful to blacks.Because the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People's move is expected to galvanize opposition to Thomas, it increases the possibility that he cannot be confirmed without a battle similar to the 1987 confrontation that defeated Robert Bork.

A spokeswoman for NAACP Executive Director Benjamin F. Chavis Jr. denied yesterday a report that he agreed to pay a fired aide up to $332,400 after she threatened to charge him with sexually harassing her while they had an "adulterous relationship.""Dr. Chavis is on record as saying he did not sexually harass Mary Stansel," said Terhea A. Washington, the spokeswoman, referring to the fired employee."He's also denying such a relationship. The relationship he has had with Mary Stansel has been a professional relationship," she said.

WASHINGTON -- Former NAACP Executive Director Benjamin F. Chavis Jr. testified yesterday that he "had no personal motivation whatsoever" in making a deal to pay a former female aide up to $332,400 in NAACP funds after she threatened a sexual-harassment claim.Chavis, who was fired nearly two years ago after the deal became public, was on the witness stand for the third day in the trial of Mary E. Stansel's civil suit against him and the NAACP. The controversy shook public confidence in the Baltimore-based civil rights group.

Last May, the Texas Civil Liberties Union asked Galveston lawyer Anthony Griffin if he would defend a Ku Klux Klan grand dragon's right to free speech. Mr. Griffin said "no problem." But there was one small problem: Neither the Texas Civil Liberties Union, nor the prospective client, Michael Lowe, grand dragon of the Knights of the KKK Realm of Texas in Waco, realized that Mr. Griffin is black -- and also general counsel of the Texas State Conference of NAACP Branches.Mr. Griffin says there's no contradiction in his defending Mr. Lowe's right to keep the Klan's membership list, financial records and other documents from the Texas attorney general.

THE DECISION by NAACP board Chairwoman Myrlie Evers-Williams not to seek re-election this month is disappointing but not surprising.She was reluctant to seek the post three years ago, knowing her husband Walter Edward Williams had terminal prostate cancer.But Mr. Williams, who has since died, persuaded his wife that she was the right person to lead the NAACP, just as he had convinced her to pursue the retrial that after 31 years led to a conviction and long prison term in the 1963 murder of her first husband, Mississippi civil rights leader Medgar Evers.

WASHINGTON -- Former NAACP Executive Director Benjamin F. Chavis Jr. testified yesterday that he "had no personal motivation whatsoever" in making a deal to pay a former female aide up to $332,400 in NAACP funds after she threatened a sexual-harassment claim.Chavis, who was fired nearly two years ago after the deal became public, was on the witness stand for the third day in the trial of Mary E. Stansel's civil suit against him and the NAACP. The controversy shook public confidence in the Baltimore-based civil rights group.

MINNEAPOLIS -- If the NAACP is like family, as its leaders often say, then yesterday was a family feud.A noisy protest by Detroit delegates shut down the legislative session of the group's 86th annual convention. The delegates had been denied voting credentials because of a financial dispute with NAACP headquarters in Baltimore.Chanting "No justice, no peace," the 21 delegates and supporters drowned out proceedings on the convention floor, forcing adjournment. The convention had been billed as a time of healing after a year of NAACP infighting.

THE MERE mention of the NAACP draws all types of responses from young African-Americans -- most of them negative.For many in the under-35 set, the NAACP is out of touch, out of time and, at least visibly, a non-factor. It's not as though too many members in the hip-hop generation are saying, "Go to a club or go to a NAACP meeting? What a dilemma!"I know, because I'm one of them. I've felt alienated by the older members of the civil rights movement, many of whom are holding on to the torch of freedom and equality so tightly their knuckles have turned white.

Washington. -- Myrlie Evers-Williams and a new team of NAACP leaders will save and build the NAACP. But for real redemption and respect to flower into power, we who love the NAACP must face with brutal honesty what brought this once-great civil-rights organization into poverty and disrepute.It was lust! A craven lust for power. An evil lust for money. And a morbid lust for sex.Disaster was rooted a decade ago when a little-known man of no national stature became chairman of the board. William F. Gibson immediately began a campaign to drive out then-Executive Director Benjamin Hooks, to pack the board with cronies, and to change the NAACP constitution and bylaws so he could rule with ruthless, dictatorial power.

In a victory for young NAACP insurgents, a Baltimore Circuit Court judge last night ordered the city branch of the civil rights group to allow youths to vote in its election of new officers.Judge Robert I. H. Hammerman ruled that the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People's constitution entitled young members ages 17-20 who have paid $3 annual dues to vote. The NAACP national board had interpreted the constitution to mean that only youths who paid adult dues of $10 could vote.

Allies of fired NAACP Executive Director Benjamin F. Chavis Jr. have launched bids to win control of the civil rights group's Baltimore and Chicago branches in elections this month.But, in an apparent move to block the Chavis faction, the NAACP national board has ruled that youth members are ineligible to vote unless they pay adult dues.Kobi Little, a 23-year-old former Johns Hopkins University NAACP leader, is challenging Rodney Orange, president of the Baltimore branch, in a Nov. 28 election.

Reports last week that NAACP Executive Director Benjamin F. Chavis had agreed, without notifying his board of directors, to pay up to $332,400 from the group's treasury to settle out of court a claim of gender discrimination and sexual harassment have thrown the venerable civil rights group into turmoil.Mr. Chavis has denied any wrongdoing, and board chairman William Gibson has defended him, insisting that Mr. Chavis had "complete, full executive authority" to commit NAACP funds toward resolving the matter without asking for the board's approval.

WASHINGTON -- The Rev. Benjamin L. Hooks Jr. denied yesterday any suggestion that he was forced out as executive director of the NAACP, saying his decision to leave the organization had nothing to do with the departure of several prominent members from the group's board."

One wonders what ousted NAACP Executive Director Benjamin F. Chavis was thinking of when he sued his former employer for some $300,000 remaining on his three-yearcontract.Last week Dr. Chavis dropped all claims against the NAACP and agreed to repay the $76,000 it lent him to make a down payment on his Ellicott City house. The group will also pay $7,400 to cover two mortgage payments on Dr. Chavis' home and extend his medical benefits through April.An NAACP source called it a ''total capitulation.

No one can take any satisfaction in what appears to be the final act of the messy drama that culminated earlier this year with the ouster of Dr. Benjamin F. Chavis as NAACP executive director. Last week Mr. Chavis dropped all claims against the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People for more than $300,000 in salary and benefits due on the balance of his three-year contract and agreed to pay back the $76,000 it lent him to make a down payment on his house.The out-of-court settlement appears to end what threatened to be a protracted embarrassment for the nation's oldest civil rights organization.