Naacp Executive

Black leaders vowed yesterday to rise above their philosophical differences to help their people, as a national summit opened under heavy security at NAACP headquarters in Northwest Baltimore."

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.

Rebounding from his first embarrassment as NAACP executive director, the Rev. Benjamin F. Chavis Jr. will try to put his stamp on the nation's oldest civil rights organization in Indianapolis this weekend at the group's annual convention.Since taking over the helm of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People three months ago from the Rev. Benjamin L. Hooks, Dr. Chavis, 45, has injected renewed vigor into an 84-year-old group sometimes criticized as ineffectual.Moving quickly to establish his leadership, Dr. Chavis stumbled into his first gaffe last week.

Black leaders vowed yesterday to rise above their philosophical differences to help their people, as a national summit opened under heavy security at NAACP headquarters in Northwest Baltimore."

WASHINGTON -- Mary E. Stansel, the woman whose lawsuit triggered former NAACP Executive Director Benjamin F. Chavis Jr.'s firing nearly two years ago, testified yesterday that Chavis' male inner circle "humiliated" her because she was a woman.Stansel said that at a May 1993 meeting called six weeks after she went to work as Chavis' executive assistant, Chavis' top advisers called her a "bitch" and falsely accused her of having an affair with Chavis.She said she was put on paid leave and later fired.

The Rev. Benjamin F. Chavis Jr., fired three months ago as NAACP executive director, re-emerged on the Baltimore scene last night with a plea for black unity at a State of the Race conference.But Louis Farrakhan, leader of the Nation of Islam, failed to appear as scheduled for a "town hall meeting" at the 5th Regiment Armory.Ron Daniels, organizer of the conference, told the crowd of about 1,000 that Minister Farrakhan was in Baltimore but that unspecified "security concerns" had prevented him from appearing.

As Van Evers squeezed beside the freshly unearthed casket for the six-hour ride, one thought consumed him: He was going to see his father.He never believed he'd have this chance. Three years old when his father, Medgar Evers, was killed, Van had only faint memories of a man leaving bubble gum cigars on his bunk bed. After the murder, he would pick up the phone and ask, "Have you seen my daddy?"Now, nearly 30 years later, the body was being brought to Albany, N.Y., from Arlington National Cemetery for an autopsy to bolster a case against the accused killer.

Residents' anger about the city's inability to curtail the spiraling rate of violent crime spewed out at last night's NAACP crime summit.But the raucous meeting in East Baltimore produced no consensus and often bordered on chaos, with audience members shouting down some speakers and heckling others, including Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke.There was also no real discussion of martial law, the imposition of which the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People had suggested to galvanize community outrage about the carnage that dominates the tenor of life in many poor neighborhoods.

CHICAGO -- A defiant Benjamin F. Chavis Jr. lashed out at critics yesterday and vowed to keep charting a new course for the NAACP as the group opened its 85th annual convention."

The Rev. Benjamin F. Chavis Jr. said last night that a three-day gathering of African-American leaders from around the nation will be held in Baltimore starting today despite his ouster as NAACP executive director.Instead of holding the second phase of the National African-American Leadership Summit at NAACP headquarters in Northwest Baltimore, daytime sessions will be held at Bethel AME Church in West Baltimore, and rallies will be held at West Baltimore's Enon Baptist Church this evening and at East Baltimore's Paul Laurence Dunbar High School, Dr. Chavis said.