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Executive
Decision
A
Message from the Editor, Victoria L. Valentine...
After
Kweisi Mfume announced on Nov. 4, 2004, that he was
stepping down as
president and CEO of the NAACP, a number of people
asked me who the new
leader of the group would be. Fellow journalists wanted
to know, so did my
sisters. One day at work a woman actually broached
the topic with me in the
restroom.
Of course I was
not privy to the search process, so I had no idea who
the
selection committee was considering. Most people I
know thought the NAACP
should pursue a female candidate or someone younger
than 50. The general
idea among these observers was that the organization
needed to make a
progressive choice: None of the major civil rights
organizations has ever
been led by a woman and a relatively young candidate
might make the NAACP
more attractive to a new generation.
Several people told me
what they had "heard" - senior members of
the NAACP
staff had applied for the post; Al Sharpton was interested;
so was Jesse
Jackson; Tavis Smiley's people had called to inquire.
Plenty of others
suggested to me who the NAACP should pursue. The list
was long and varied:
Colin Powell; Russell Simmons; Contance L. Rice, who
heads the Advancement
Project; professors Cornel West, Henry Louis Gates
Jr. and Lani Guinier;
corporate executive Ann M. Fudge; Elaine R. Jones,
who last year stepped
down as head of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational
Fund.
When Laura Murphy left
her position as legislative director of the American
Civil Liberties Union in March, I thought surely her
name was in the mix.
A journalist who is also a newspaper recruiter thought
a lot about the
vacancy and had decided that the perfect candidate
to head the NAACP was
Alexis Herman, who served as labor secretary in the
Clinton administration.
He said he was going to call Julian Bond, the chairman
of the NAACP Board of
Directors, and suggest her.
When the NAACP issued
a press release in early June stating that the final
candidate was a 59-year-old former corporate executive,
a journalist told me
she was certain that Franklin Raines, who had recently
stepped down as CEO
of Fannie Mae amid accounting irregularities, was the
choice. (Raines, as it
turns out, is 56.)
One of our feature stories
in this issue, "Advancing the Cause," asks
whether or not traditional civil rights organizations
have positioned
themselves to address issues vexing the next generation
of African
Americans. In the article, Ronald Walters, a professor
of government and
politics at the University of Maryland, says the NAACP "is
a little bit out
of the playing field right now because it doesn't have
leadership."
While it is true that the organization
has spent the past six months
conducting an extensive search for a new CEO, it has
not been without
quality leadership. The NAACP has been in the capable
hands of lawyer Dennis
Courtland Hayes, who has been serving as interim head
of the group. An
Indiana native, Hayes began his career in private practice
specializing in
civil rights litigation. He joined the NAACP in 1985
as a legal associate in
New York and has served as general counsel of the NAACP
since 1990. Hayes
also stepped in as interim leader of the NAACP in 1993
after the departure
of Benjamin Hooks.
Ultimately, the NAACP did not
select any of the people mentioned above.
On June 25, the NAACP board of directors voted to appoint
longtime corporate
executive Bruce S. Gordon president and CEO of the
nation's oldest and
largest civil rights organization. Pending contract
negotiations with the board, Gordon's selection will
be official in July. Gordon, who served as
president of retail markets at Verizon before retiring
in 2003, brings a
unique background to the position. He is not a civil
rights veteran, nor is
he a member of the clergy or a politician. But as our
brief interview with
Gordon on page 24 indicates, he brings plenty to the
table.
Letters
to the editor may be sent to
The Crisis
7600 Georgia Avenue, NW
Suite 405
Washington, DC 20012 or
thecrisiseditorial@naacpnet.org
* Letters may be edited for length or clarity.
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