NAACP celebrates centennial anniversary

As an IU freshman in 1945, all he heard was that same, grumbled refrain: “What more do they want?”

Despite complaints of prejudice, IU football legend George Taliaferro and other IU chapter members of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People bellowed one common cry.

“Equal rights,” the black college football hall-of-famer said. “That is all.”

Prospering from the efforts of 64-year-member Taliaferro and some 500,000 other members, the NAACP has aimed to ensure equality and eliminate racial discrimination for a century now. The organization commemorates its 100th anniversary today. 

The NAACP will have anniversary celebrations throughout the year at its national headquarters in Baltimore, culminating with its annual convention in 2010, according to the organization’s Web site.

The nation’s oldest civil rights organization was established on the centennial of Abraham Lincoln’s birthday in response to the 1908 race riot in Springfield, Ill., where Lincoln honed his oratory skills in the Illinois state legislature.

The correlation is meaningful, Taliaferro said.

“This was the rallying call that all people were created equal,” he said. “That is what we did – that is what we are hopefully doing.”

Striving toward this equality has been the mission of the Monroe County branch of the NAACP as well, President William Vance said. 

Vance, a deacon at the Second Baptist Church in Bloomington and a civil engineer for the U.S. Navy, succeeded 26-year branch president Clarence Gilliam in 1994. He described the branch’s legacy in two words: community involvement.

The branch launched the Monroe County Youth Council, maintained strong legal redress through a two-attorney team and has obtained a position on Bloomington’s
Board of Public Safety to establish minorities socially, economically and politically.

With the organization’s centennial comes a time for reflection, but also for continued defiance toward existing inequality, Taliaferro and Vance said.

“We must continue to put our reputation on the line,” Taliaferro said. “We will henceforth and forevermore fight for equal rights.”

After a two-year absence, the IU chapter of the NAACP is set for reinstatement this month. The organization was absent from campus after no election was held following the 2005-06 school year.

The student organization will strive for increased student diversity and communication between races and hopes to create events focused around President Barack Obama’s notions that “color does not matter,” said Byron Warren, one of the primary persons responsible for reinstatement.

“It does not need to stop here,” he said.

Vance agreed.

“The challenge is not to take a step back, not to digress back into bad habits,” he said. “We need to get behind our president and look at his abilities, what he is able to accomplish. Not his color.” 

Warren said he was president of the Elkhart NAACP Youth Council as a high school sophomore, president of the state-wide Indiana NAACP Youth Council as a junior and was named Mr. NAACP for Indiana in 2007. Given his credentials, he said restarting the IU branch seemed only natural.

“I have been training for leadership, you could say,” Warren said.

Organized change – specifically NAACP presence on Bloomington’s campus – is important, Taliaferro said.

“It is about individual obligation,” Taliaferro said. “It is easy for African-American students to accept changes that have been made. They have become non-vigilant because of these minor changes.”

Warren, an Elkhart, Ind., native and IU sophomore, has been involved with the NAACP since he was seven years old, due in large part to Cora Breckenridge, the first black member of the IU board of trustees. She is also the membership chairman of the Indiana NAACP, secretary of the Elkhart County Branch and first lady at Warren’s home church.

The church dynamic helped Warren find comfort in the organization.  
“It is kind of like a big family,” he said.

Looking forward, Taliaferro said he believes civic engagement tied to unchanging principles will bring positive change. 

“We must keep the organization and its goals in front of the public,” Taliaferro said. “It is the only way you are going to enhance the ideas of how we can do things better.”