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VOLUME 91 - NUMBER 35 DURHAM, NORTH CAROLINA - SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 8, 2012 TELEPHONE (919) 682-2913 PRICE: 30
NAACP to push GOP lawmakers on pre-kindergarten
MOVE-IN DAY-Interim NCCU Chancellor harles L. Becton, second from right, helps some students move
in to dormitories at North Carolina Central University. Michael Ruffin, also ships in. Becton has been named
interim chancellor while the school looks for a permanent replacement for Charlie Nelms who retired in Au
gust. (NCCU Photo by Lawson)
By Emery P. Dalesio
RALEIGH (AP) - The North Carolina NAACP will
launch a campaign targeting Republican legislators
who have resisted full funding for the state’s pre-kin
dergarten enrichment program, the civil rights organi
zation’s head said Aug. 31.
The NAACP plans to hold events statewide drawing
attention to GOP leaders’ plans to further challenge a
state appeals court ruling, the Rev. William Barber said.
A three-judge panel of the state Court of Appeals
ruled Aug. 21 that at-risk 4-year-olds must be enrolled
in the North Carolina Pre-Kindergarten Program if their
parents seek admission. That includes children at risk
of falling behind their peers due to chronic health prob
lems, or because their families are in financial hardship
or do not speak English at home. As many as 67,000
children may be eligible for the program previously
known as More at Four, which could cost taxpayers
up to $300 million a year, according to estimates from
Gov. Beverly Perdue’s administration.
But the judges stopped short of requiring a vast ex
pansion of the program to include every needy 4-year-
old.
House Speaker Thom Tillis, R-Mecklenburg, and
Senate leader Phil Berger, R-Rockingham, plan to ap
peal the decision to the state’s Supreme Court, spokes
men for the legislative leaders said last week. The high
court can decide whether to consider the case.
Barber scolded GOP leaders, recalling both the Bibli
cal admonishment that Christians should care for those
who have little and Martin Luther King’s hope for the
day when his children would be judged not by the color
of their skin but by the content of their character.
“The rulings of this house have in fact judged our
children by the color of their skin and by the amount of
money in their parents’ pocketbook, the content of their
bank account,” Barber said standing before the state
Legislative Building. “If we are going to lift this state,
and lift this nation, you have to lift it from the bottom.”
Continuing the court battle could delay expanding the
program, depriving thousands of 4-year-olds eligible
this year, Barber said. NC Pre-K enrolled about 24,000
Black Obama Critic Linked to
Right-wing Conservatives
By Freddie Allen
Washington Correspondent
WASHINGTON (NNPA) -
Rev. William Owens, a black
minister who has launched
a national campaign against
President Obama because of his
support of same-sex marriage,
portrays himself as head of an
independent grass-roots organi
zation when, in fact, he is being
bankrolled by right-wing groups
and maintains strong ties to Re
publican politicians, it has been
disclosed.
The Memphis-based Coali
tion of African American Pastors,
USA (CAAP) describes itself on
its Web site as “a grass-roots
movement of African-American
Christians who believe in tra
ditional family values such as
supporting the role of religion in
American public life, protecting
the lives of the unborn, and de
fending the sacred institution of
marriage.” It claims that it “is not
affiliated with any political party
or religious denomination.”
However, People for the
American Way, a liberal advo
cacy group, and USA Today has
disclosed several close ties be
tween Owens and conservatives.
Owens launched a national
campaign in May calling on Af
rican-Americans not to vote for
Obama because ofhis support of
gay marriage. The group claims
to have the support of 3,700
black ministers, a figure that has
not been verified.
Although Owens claims to
be acting independently, Frank
Cannon, head of the American
Principles Project, a conserva-
bve group opposed to same-sex
marriage, acknowledged to USA
Today that its political action
fund is paying Shirley &
Banister, a public relations firm,
to assist CAAP.
In addition, Owens’ group has
received loans from the conser
vative Family Research Council
and Mississippi Tea Party activ
ist Ed Holliday, according docu
ments filed with the IRS.
Rev. Timothy McDonald
III, senior pastor of the Atlan
ta-based First Iconium Baptist
Church and president of the Af
rican-American Ministers in Ac
tion of People for the American
Way, said Owens’ organizations
“no relevance, no constituency
and no credibility.”
Earlier this year, Owens was
named African-American liaison
for the National Organization for
Marriage (NOM), a group that
has endorsed Republican Mitt
Romney.
According to tax docu
ments, NOM donated more than
$35,733 to Education for All, a
nonprofit run by Deborah Ow
ens, the wife of William Owens.
The group, which claims to pro
mote education reforms in low-
income neighborhoods, also lists
Rev. Owens as a contact person
on press releases for the organi
zation in 2011.
The memo, titled “National
Strategy For Winning The Mar
riage Battle,” came to light after
NOM lost a lawsuit in Maine
over campaign donor violations
during the 2009 state elections.
A section of memo under the
heading, “Not a Civil Rights
Project,” stated: “The strategic
goal of this project is to drive a
wedge between gays and blacks
- two key Democratic constitu
encies. Find equip, energize
and connect African American
spokespeople for marriage; de
velop a media campaign around
their objections to gay marriage
as a civil right; provoke the gay
marriage base into responding
by denouncing these spokesmen
and women as bigots.”
The confidential internal
memo suggested “pushing a mar
riage amendment in Washington,
DC; find attractive young, black
Democrats to challenge White
gay marriage advocates elector-
ally.”
Civil rights leaders were
stunned.
“It’s one of the most cynical
things I’ve ever heard of or ever
seen spelled out in this way,” said
Julian Bond, chairman emeri
tus of NAACP on CNN. “The
idea that these people are just
pawns that can be played with.
The black people who oppose
gay marriage, the black people
who support gay marriage can
be moved around like pieces on
a chessboard. It’s scary.”
Benjamin Jealous, president
and CEO of the NAACP, said
in a statement: “This memo
only reveals the limits of a cyni
cal agenda. The truth is that no
group, no matter how well-fund
ed, can drive an artificial wedge
between our communities. Peo
ple of color understand what it is
like to be the target of discrimi
nation. No public relations strat
egy will make us forget that.”
In 2008, Owens endorsed
Republican contender Mike
Huckabee for president. He also
endorsed Ken blackwell, the Re
publican candidate for governor
in Ohio.
Despite strong criticism of
him, Owens has not backed away
from his anti-Obama campaign,
comparing President Obama at
one news conference to Judas,
(Contnued On Page 3)
Rev. William Owens
children in the just-completed school year, down from
about 35,000 in 2010 after lawmakers cut its funding
by 20 percent and imposed other restrictions.
Barber said lawmakers should act now with a spe
cial legislative session to approve more funding for the
program.
Spokesmen for the legislative leaders declined com
ment Aug. 31, citing ongoing litigation. Attorney Gen
eral Roy Cooper’s office has not yet decided whether to
follow through on the request by legislative leaders to
pursue the appeal, a spokeswoman said.
The NAACP and other groups this month finished a
series of events statewide seeking to draw attention to
the impact of poverty in North Carolina.
Alabama looks for way to
pardon Scottsboro Boys
By Phillip Rawls
MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) - Many years ago, public opinion deemed the black Scottsboro Boys in
nocent of raping two white women. Making that official is taking decades longer.
Only one of the nine Scottsboro Boys was formally pardoned by Alabama before dying. State officials
would like to clear the names of the other eight, but figuring out how to rewrite history after 81 years is
proving difficult.
Gov. Robert Bentley said he would issue a pardon if state law allowed him to do so, but it doesn't.
“We need to right any wrongs that have occurred in the past as best we can. This was a long time ago,
and we have moved so far in this state,” he said.
The state Board of Pardons and Paroles issued a pardon in 1976 to the only Scottsboro Boy who was
known to still be alive, Clarence Norris. But the board’s rules don’t allow posthumous pardons, and
changing those rules could take months.
Some legislators plan to propose a resolution declaring the eight cleared in the view of the state, but it
can’t be considered until the Legislature’s next meeting, scheduled for February.
"It shouldn’t be so hard,” said Sheila Washington, founder of the Scottsboro Boys Museum and Cul
tural Center in Scottsboro.
The museum chronicles how race and sex intersected in the segregated South on March 25, 1931,
when a sheriff’s posse stopped a train at Paint Rock, Ala. Nine black teenagers who were hoboing thought
they were being arrested for fighting with whites on the train. Instead, they were accused of gang-raping
two white women who were also riding the freight train.
The nine, from Georgia and Tennessee, went on trial in Scottsboro. All but the youngest received a
death sentence but later won new trials. One of the women recanted her story. Five of the Scottsboro Boys
eventually had the rape charges dropped, while four were convicted.
The case resulted in two significant U.S. Supreme Court decisions saying that criminal defendants are
entitled to effective counsel and that blacks can’t be systematically excluded from criminal juries.
When Norris obtained his pardon in 1976 with the support of then-Gov. George C. Wallace, there was
talk of trying to do something for Andy and Roy Wright, Haywood Patterson, Olen Montgomery, Charlie
Weems, Ozie Powell, William Roberson and Eugene Williams. Nothing happened, and then little was
said after Norris died in 1989.
Washington and other volunteers opened the Scottsboro Boys Museum in an old church in 2010 and
brought the case to the attention of tourists visiting civil rights attractions in the South. She recently
(Continued On Page 3)