HOW OFTEN DO POLICE SHOOT UNARMED BLACK MEN?

Post by Maple Heights African American Gazette.

NAACP SAYS "NO" TO COUNCILMAN REED'S STOP, QUESTION, AND FRISK PROPOSAL

Post by Maple Heights African American Gazette.

FREDERICK DOUGLASS: JULY 5, 1852, WHAT TO THE SLAVE IS THE FOURTH OF JULY?

Post by NAACP Legal Defense Fund.

SEE ALSO: “What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?”

BLACK HISTORY FACT: MEDGAR EVERS, CIVIL RIGHTS LEADER, BORN ON THIS DATE IN 1925

Post by Joe Madison - "The Black Eagle".

AFRICAN AMERICAN LEADERSHIP SERIES - JULY: WALTER FRANCIS WHITE, ACTIVIST

Post by Maple Heights African American Gazette.

STAND BEHIND THE OHIO VOTERS' BILL OF RIGHTS AND SIGN THE LETTER

From: "Rep. Diane Russell"

Of the 31 states that have recently restricted access to voting, Ohio is the very worst. Ohio Secretary of State Husted just handed down orders to slash early voting on all Sundays (Souls to the Polls), the Monday before Election Day and all evening hours -- a direct attack designed to disenfranchise low-income, African-American, elderly and student voters. I'm partnering with PowerPAC+ to help protect these important voting rights.

Every Ohioan should have the right to vote. Help us stop Husted in his tracks by taking action now. 

Husted's blatant voter suppression actions are not new. The right-wing knows it cannot win the presidency without winning Ohio. Dirty tricks at the polls date back to the 2004 presidential election when the unequal distribution of voting equipment in urban areas led to long waits in heavily African-American districts. In 2012, hoping for a GOP victory as in 2004, Republicans tried to drastically cut early voting. But in 2012 a national outcry forced the GOP-led legislature to reverse their efforts. History is on our side, and together we can stop Husted and protect Ohioans' access to the ballot. 

We cannot let Husted and his actions stand. Help defend voter rights in Ohio once again by signing our letter of support.

Right now, the NAACP, The A. Phillip Randolph Institute, and communities across Ohio are gathering signatures to put a state constitutional amendment on the November ballot. It is called the Ohio Voters' Bill of Rights, created to ensure that every voter has equal and uniform access to the polls, regardless of the political party in charge. 

Your support is crucial. In a little over a month, amendment sponsor Ohio State Representative Alicia Reece will present our signed letter of support, along with qualifying signatures to put the measure on the ballot. 

Right now, stand behind the Ohio Voters' Bill of Rights and sign the letter.

We must win this battle in Ohio. In the wake of the recent Supreme Court decision that struck down a key provision in the Federal Voting Rights Act, the voting rights fight is now at the state level. 

Today's Tweet
@OhioSOSHusted is stripping important voting rights. Sign the proposed #OHBillofRights for Voting! http://bit.ly/OHBillofRights 

Our victory could inspire similar constitutional amendments to push back against the flurry of laws passed in states such as Texas and North Carolina that disenfranchise voters. 

Join us in the fight. Thanks for all you do! 

Onward,
~Diane Russell 

State Representative 
Portland, Maine

NEWSLETTER: CHILDREN'S DEFENSE FUND: ELLA BAKER: MY CIVIL RIGHTS GENERATION'S "FUNDI"

Until the killing of Black men, Black mothers’ sons, becomes as important to the rest of the country as the killing of a White mother’s son—we who believe in freedom cannot rest until this happens.
--Ella Baker

 

 

 

 

 

During this last week of Women’s History Month I wanted you to learn about Ella Baker, a transforming but too little known woman and overpowering justice warrior for my generation of civil rights activists. The quote above is from Ella Baker 50 years ago, and like so much about this visionary civil rights leader it is still just as relevant today. She was talking about the murders of civil rights movement workers James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner, who disappeared together in Mississippi in June 1964, and reacting to the fact that searchers sent to comb local rivers and swamps to find the bodies of Chaney, who was Black, and Goodman and Schwerner, who were White, also found the bodies of other missing Black men for whom authorities had not bothered to search. Ella Baker was an outspoken warrior against injustice and inequality her entire life, and always, always unwilling to rest. Her words continue to be a rallying cry for all of us who believe our nation still does not see and value Black and White children’s lives the same way.

 

 

Sweet Honey in the Rock’s Bernice Johnson Reagon featured these words in the stirring “Ella’s Song.” She was one of hundreds of young people Ella Baker mentored during the civil rights movement. I was one of them who first met Mrs. Baker during my senior year at Spelman College in Atlanta. She was a staff member of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and was often a powerful behind-the-scenes advisor to close colleagues like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Ella Baker believed in servant leadership and shared leadership rather than charismatic leadership and encouraged young people like me to find and lift our own voices and join them with others. She was instrumental in founding the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and fought to make sure we retained our own independent organization as students rather than simply becoming the youth arm of the Dr. King-led SCLC. Julian Bond, Diane Nash, Bob Moses, and many other fellow student activists and young activists were all influenced by her example, counsel and convening and share a special debt of reverence and gratitude. Ella Baker was tough and disciplined and demanded the best of the young and older adults around her. She understood that movement building was about more than protests and meetings and speeches—it was hard, daily, persistent, and sacrificial behind-the-scenes work. She was an institution builder and stressed the importance of strong institutions that could last over time rather than reliance on a single strong leader.

 

 

Ella Baker was born in 1903 in Norfolk, Virginia. She had a strict mother, a warm and caring father, and a large extended family of grandparents, uncles, and aunts who shared what they had with the poor. She was a fighter and as a child beat up White children who called her names. Since there was no schooling for Black children beyond elementary years in her area, she went off to boarding school at Shaw University in Raleigh, North Carolina, and was valedictorian of her high school and college graduating classes. She moved to Harlem, got caught up in its excitement, and went everywhere to hear lectures and speeches and read in libraries to learn everything she could. After working as a domestic and as a waitress, she got a job with the Negro National News published by George Schuyler who later recommended her for a job at the NAACP. She rapidly rose through NAACP ranks. “Wherever she went,” her biographer and friend Joanne Grant wrote in Ella Baker: Freedom Bound, “she created a whirlwind, leaving a scatter of papers, notes, leaflets, church programs, and phone numbers in her wake. . . She never let up her struggle to increase the role of the rank and file.”

 

 

Ella Baker pushed for organizational structure and rules in the NAACP just as she did later at SCLC and SNCC. Ella Baker was the one who sat down with Bayard Rustin and Stanley Levinson to discuss how to create a continuing movement out of the Montgomery bus boycott, which led to SCLC’s formation. As the first staff member hired for SCLC, it was Ella Baker who tried to put the new organization in operating order so that Dr. King was not just a leader who reacted to and jumped from one event to the next. She worked to give SCLC the capacity to plan and implement action. And Ella Baker convinced Dr. King to bring me and about 200 other Black college students who had been arrested for engaging in sit-in protests to open up lunch counters around the South to a meeting at her alma mater, Shaw University. My first plane ride ever was from Atlanta to Raleigh for that meeting. SNCC was the meeting’s result.

 

     

Ella Baker was fully aware of but unintimidated by the men she worked with who devalued the advice of women and sometimes resented her forcefulness, prodding, and “mothering.” She made no special effort to be ingratiating. She labored at SCLC as she had at the NAACP to raise money, conduct voter registration drives, speak to citizens groups (sometimes ten times a day), and travel to community after community to help people help themselves. She warned against SCLC becoming “a cult of personality” for Dr. King rather than a means of empowering others, and she eventually left SCLC after deciding that movement building was more important than the specific organization and personalities involved—another of her lessons that is so relevant today.

 

 

At a gathering celebrating Ella Baker’s seventy-fifth birthday, Bob Moses called her the “Fundi,” the person in the community who masters a craft with the help of the community and teaches it to other people. Fundi became the title of a film on her extraordinary life and work. Ella Baker died in 1986 on her 83rd birthday. I remember her counsel as I think about sustaining and strengthening the Children's Defense Fund’s mission today and future tomorrow for the long haul struggle to create and maintain a level playing field for every child. I learned from her the crucial importance of training a successor generation of young servant-leaders which has been a strong priority of CDF’s since its inception. Policies are no better than the people who are implementing them and their commitment to just treatment of children and the poor. I am so proud that over 13,000 college students have gone through training at CDF’s Ella Baker Child Policy Institute at the former Alex Haley Farm, that more than 113,000 children have gone through the CDF Freedom Schools® program with a sense of commitment to something beyond themselves, and that many CDF alumni are doing wonderful public service across the country. This is one way CDF honors her legacy along with other great unsung women justice warriors like Fannie Lou Hamer, Unita Blackwell, and Septima Clark who too few ever hear of but we all owe a great debt of gratitude.

 

 

We also all honor Ella Baker by keeping her belief in freedom and equality alive until it becomes reality for every mother’s child. In a nation where Black children are more than three times as likely to be poor as White children; where Black babies are more than twice as likely as White babies to die before their first birthdays and Black children are twice as likely to die before their 18th birthdays as White children; where more than 80 percent of fourth and eighth grade Black public school students cannot read or compute at grade level and Black children are more than twice as likely to drop out as White children; where gun violence is the leading cause of death among Black children ages 1-19 and Black children and teens are nearly five times more likely to die from gun violence than White children and teens; and where Black mothers’ sons can be seen and treated as lethal threats for wearing hoodies in the rain or refusing to turn their car radios down, we who believe in freedom still cannot rest.

 

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Click here to share your comments and find out what others are saying.

 

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Marian Wright Edelman is President of the Children's Defense Fund whose Leave No Child Behind^® mission is to ensure every child a Healthy Start, a Head Start, a Fair Start, a Safe Start and a Moral Start in life and successful passage to adulthood with the help of caring families and communities. For more information go to www.childrensdefense.org.

 

Mrs. Edelman's Child Watch Column also appears each week on The Huffington Post.

BLACK TWITTER - A FORCE TO BE RECKONED WITH

EXCERPT:

 

 

"WASHINGTON (AP) —




The hashtag gave it away.

 

When a Florida jury convicted Michael Dunn of attempted murder, but not actual murder, in the shooting death of black teenager Jordan Davis, the hashtag #dangerousblackkids popped up on Twitter. Users posted photos of black babies and toddlers, spoofing the fear that Dunn testified he felt before opening fire on a car full of teens at a convenience store.

 

 

That hashtag was the calling card of Black Twitter, a small corner of the social media giant where an unabashedly black spin on life gets served up in 140-character installments.

 

 

Black Twitter holds court on pretty much everything from President Barack Obama to the latest TV reality show antics. But Black Twitter can also turn activist quickly. When it does, things happen — like the cancellation of a book deal for a juror in the George Zimmerman trial, or the demise of Zimmerman's subsequent attempt to star at celebrity boxing.

 

 

Catchy hashtags are a hallmark and give clues that the tweeting in question is a Black Twitter thing."

CONTINUED

NAACP TO HOST MEMBERSHIP RECRUITMENT RECEPTION, SEPTEMBER 26, 2013

The Cleveland NAACP Membership Committee is hosting a Membership Recruitment Reception. The reception will take place at 6:30pm on Thursday, September 26, 2013 at Minority Business Solutions, 16400 Miles Avenue Cleveland, Ohio 44128. If you are not a member, or have friends or family who are not members, we encourage you all to come out to hear what the NAACP is doing in the community as well as upcoming initiatives.

THE CRIMINAL JUSTICE COMMITTEE OF THE CLEVELAND NAACP WILL HOLD PUBLIC FORUM ON USE OF EXCESSIVE FORCE

The Criminal Justice Committee of the Cleveland Branch NAACP will be conducting an excessive use of force public forum. When: Thursday September 19th at 5:30 pm Where: CMHA Headquarters 8120 Kinsman Road Cleveland Ohio 44104 The forum is to raise much needed awareness around policing tactics and community relationship building as well as to discuss alleged incidents of excessive use of force by the Cleveland Police Department. (Residents from other cities feel free to attend.) The NAACP has asked the US Justice Department to come and document citizen's accounts as part of an ongoing investigation into the Cleveland Police Department. Moderator will be Harry Boomer

NEWSLETTER: NAACP ON VOTING RIGHTS ACT

Friends -- On February 27, 2013, the United States Supreme Court heard the case of Shelby County, Alabama v. Holder, which challenged the constitutionality of the “preclearance” provisions of the VRA.  The NAACP submitted an Amicus Brief on behalf of Attorney General Holder and the Voting Rights Act.  Last Tuesday, June 25, 2013, the Supreme Court issued its decision in which the Court did not invalidate the principle that preclearance can be required. But much more importantly, it held that Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act, which sets out the formula that is used to determine which state and local jurisdictions must comply under Section 5’s preapproval requirement, is unconstitutional and can no longer be used. Thus, although Section 5 survives, it will have no actual effect unless and until Congress can enact a new statute to determine who should be covered by it.  This means that there is no longer a mechanism in place to prevent states with a history of voter disenfranchisement from enacting such laws.     Thus it is now up to Congress and the President to pass a new law to determine which jurisdictions should need to be “precleared” before making any changes to their voting laws or procedures.  Over the next few months, the NAACP will work with Members of Congress and the Administration, to craft a bipartisan, bicameral bill that can and will get signed into law and which will stand future scrutiny of the U.S. Supreme Court which protects the voting rights of every American, regardless of his or her race or ethnicity. For more information on the Voting Rights Act, the Supreme Court's decision, what the NAACP is doing, and most importantly what you can do, please review the attached Issue Alert. Thank you, Hilary

CLEVELAND NAACP TO HOLD 54TH ANNUAL FUNDRAISING DINNER JUNE 14, 2013

DATE/DAY:      FRIDAY, JUNE 14, 2013

TIME:               6:30PM

PLACE:           CLEVELAND RENAISSANCE HOTEL, 24 PUBLIC SQUARE, CLEVELAND, OH


Guest Speaker:  William Pickard, former director of the Cleveland NAACP and now Detroit entrepreneur

Awards will be given for work in fostering the principles of the civil rights organization.
     Arnold Pinkney
     Rev. Ken Chalker
     Shayla King
     Devon White
     U.S. Rep Marcia Fudge

Scholarship Awards will be given to students recognized for academic achievement

Contact (for tix and info): NAACP  216.231.6260

SUPREME COURT TO HEAR SHELBY COUNTY ARGUMENT AGAINST VOTING RIGHTS ACT

 

NAACP warns Supreme Court: Thwart assault on Voting Rights Act or risk return to ‘old poison’

 

 

 

"Debo Adegbile to go before supreme court to defend Voting Rights Act and argue key provision should not be struck down"

 

 

"The lawyer who will  ..." [Wednesday, February 27, 2013] "go before the US supreme court to defend the Voting Rights Act has warned that if a key provision of the law that prevents discrimination at the polling booth largely in southern states is struck down, it would “set the hands of the clock winding backwards” for millions of minority voters.

 

 

Debo Adegbile, special counsel for the NAACP, the country’s largest civil rights organisation, will have the momentous task on Wednesday of defending one of the mainstays of America’s prolonged struggle against racial discrimination.

 

 

Lined up against him will be an array of conservative lawyers and legislators, many based in the south, where the sting of the legislation is felt most keenly.

 

 

Wednesday’s hearing, in which the nine supreme court justices will hear oral argument before delivering a ruling expected in June, is being seen as the greatest threat to the Voting Rights Act since it was enacted in 1965. The focus of the debate will be Section 5, a provision under which 16 states – mainly though not exclusively in the south – are subject to stringent federal monitoring designed to prevent them discriminating against African American and other minority voters."

 

 

Follow rest of article HERE

 

 

Related articles, etc:

 

 

VOTING RIGHTS ACT

 

 
 

 

SECTION 5 of Voting Rights Act: "Section 5 currently applies to nine states in their entirety: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia. It also applies to identified parts of a further seven states: California, Florida, Michigan, New Hampshire, New York, North Carolina and South Dakota."

 

 

SHELBYCOUNTY V HOLDER TARGET THE HEART OF AMERICAN DEMOCRACY

 

 

RACIAL ENTITLEMENT- Term used by JUSTICE SCALIA:    "Scalia has generally voted to strike down laws which make distinctions by race, gender, or sexual orientation .... "   "To pursue the concept of racial entitlement – even for the most admirable and benign of purposes – is to reinforce and preserve for future mischief the way of thinking that produced race slavery, race privilege and race hatred. In the eyes of government, we are just one race here. It is American.^{[74] "[WIKIPEDIA]}

 

 

 

 

MAPLE HEIGHTS - DENIAL OF VOTE FOR DISTRICT 5

 

 

 

 

THINK THE VOTING RIGHTS ACT IS OUTDATED? COME TO SOUTH CAROLINA





WHY THE VOTING RIGHTS ACT IS AS IMPORTANT TODAY AS IT WAS IN 1965







SOTOMAYOR LEADS LIBERAL JUSTICES IN DEFENDING THE VOTING RIGHTS ACT
 

 

 

 

INTERESTED IN FORMING BROAD COALITIONS WITH AFRICAN AMERICAN AND HISPANIC ORGANIZATIONS

We're going to be reaching out to other African American organizations as well as Hispanic organizations in order to form coalitions for economic and political empowerment.
 

 

If you are a legitimate African American or Hispanic organization that is interested in forming a broad coalition for the above purposes, please contact the Maple Heights African American Gazette (see "Welcome" on right side of the page for contact information.)


If you feel threatened or coerced or intimidated, or harassed by any Maple Heights public employee (includes politicians, legal department), please call the Cleveland Call and Post or email mhaagazette@gmail.com or Cleveland NAACP  216 231 6260.

Update 2/18/2013:
Not sure how it was done, however, a note showed up today on the Maple Heights African American Gazette calendar that was inserted in the January 26, 2013 slot.  The note (which appeared bogus) said they were somewhere near or in Libya and needed help.  Again, not sure how the calendar was hacked, but we won't tolerate this.  The note has been removed.

We feel there have been attempts to discredit this blog and people who post on this blog, or are associated with people who post on this blog.  This also will not be tolerated.

 

 

TAKE ACTION TO STOP VOTER SUPPRESSION

"In a time when numerous states are considering or have already enacted legislation to restrict or suppress voter participation, Congressman John Lewis (GA) and 165 of his colleagues in the U.S. House of Representatives have introduced H.R. 12, the Voter Empowerment Act. Senator Kristen Gillibrand (NY) has introduced a companion bill in the Senate (S. 123). This important legislation would expand and protect voters’ access to the polls and would increase accountability and integrity among election officials and poll workers. It also would expand eligibility to allow all ex-offenders who have been released from prison (even those who may still be on probation or parole) to register and vote in federal elections.

 

For more information on this legislation, or how you can advocate for it with your federally elected officials, please review the attached Action Alert."

 

Sincerely,

 

Hilary

Hilary Shelton
Director, NAACP Washington Bureau &
Senior VP for Advocacy and Policy
(202) 463-2940

 

 

CLICK HERE TO SEE THE ACTION ONE NEEDS TO TAKE

 

 

S"pecifically, the Voter Empowerment Act would:

• Guarantee early voting – require that every state establish early voting sites that are open at least 15 days prior to a general election day;
• Require automatic registration – the bill would use modern technology to automatically and permanently register all eligible voters;
• Allow same-day registration throughout the country – H.R. 12 / S. 123 would ensure allow voters to register to vote on election day at their polling place;
• Ensure on-line voter registration – the Voter Empowerment Act would ensure that on-line voter registration is a viable option nationally;
• Outlaw “voter caging” – makes illegal a practice by which mail is sent to a registered voter's address and, if the mail is returned as "undeliverable" or if it is delivered and the voter does not respond, his or her registration is challenged;
• Clarify and strengthen the use of provisional ballots – ensures that provisional ballots are counted;
• Make voter intimidation and deception punishable by law – with strong and tough penalties so that people who commit these crimes suffer more than just a slap on the wrist, and establish a process for reaching out to misinformed voters with accurate information so they can cast their votes in time;
• Re-enfranchise ex-offenders – H.R. 12 / S. 123 incorporates the provisions of the NAACP–supported “Democracy Restoration Act” by allowing ex-offenders, once they are out of prison, the opportunity to register and vote in federal elections without challenges or complication;
• Encourage youth voters – the Voter Empowerment Act requires colleges and universities to offer and encourage voter registration to all students;
• Assure voting by overseas residents – H.R. 12 / S. 123 increases assurances that Americans who may be living overseas, especially those serving our country in the armed services, can cast a valid vote and be assured that their vote was counted."

 

 

REGINA BRETT ON EQUALITY FOR ALL, AND THE ROAD AHEAD

Love this article
Obama's inauguration underscores equality for all: Regina Brett


By Regina Brett, The Plain DealerThe Plain Dealer
on January 22, 2013 at 6:00 PM


"America the beautiful.

Yes, it was. 
 

From James Taylor singing, "Oh, beautiful, for spacious skies," to Beyonce belting out the National Anthem." 

 

 

REGINA BRETT ARTICLE CONT'D HERE

NATIONAL FOLK UNITY DANCE OF AFRICAN AMERICANS EVENT

On January 27,2013 Mr.Frank R Ross will call (lead) participants in the NAACP sanctioned National Folk-Unity Dance of African Americans at 7p.m.-Slovenian Hall 20713 Lindbergh/Recher ave.(Off 200th st) Euclid,0hio-44119.

Please feel free to wear African attire etc.

There will also be a celebration of black history with a "Market Street" open to all entrepreneurs. For reservations call Mrs. Andrea Perry at 216-2970846 or send your request to ppballdancers2@yahoo.com