National Association for the Advancement of Colored People

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A brief overview of your interest group (be sure to put its name in bold in the first sentence) and the scope of the article goes here.

The following list of sections should serve as a loose guideline for developing the body of your article. The works cited in references 2-5 are all fake; their purpose is to serve as a formatting model for your own citations.

History

This section should describe the interest group's founding and development. It would probably be a good idea to divide it into chronological subsections, for example:

Founding

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People was founded February 12, 1909 on the heels of the Springfield Race Riot of 1908. The riot was predicated on an incident that took place in August of that year. Two black men had been arrested as they had been accused of commiting violent crimes against whites in Springfield, Illinois. Because of media coverage detailing their location, a mob gathered demanding they be allowed to punish the men. A local business man named Harry Loper secretly drove the criminals to Bloomington's prison to protect them. When the mob found out, they started a riot and destroyed property of many local African Americans in Springfield killing at least six people. While there were 107 indictments, only one man was convicted of any crime -- stealing a sword from a member of the military. The murderers of the local blacks were not prosecuted.

Shortly after this event, a group formed that included liberal whites that had been descended from abolitionists. They sent out a call to action and gathered approximately 60 people (7 African Americans) to discuss the racial issues of the time and the inequality in the justice system.

Early members of the NAACP included: Mary White Ovington, W.E.B. Du Bois, Charles Edward Russell, George Henry White, Jane Addams, Oswald Garrison Villard, George Henry White, Josephine Ruffin, Fanny Garrison Villard, Ida B. Wells-Barnett, Joel and Arthur Spingarn, John Haynes Holmes, Lillian Weld, Mary Church Terrell, Mary Mcleod Bethune, Mary Talbert, Lincoln Steffens, Inez Milholland, Ray Stannard Baker, Florence Kelley, Charles Darrow, Sophonisba Breckinridge, William Dean Howells, and John Dewey. There are now over 500,000 members in the world. It is America's oldest and most well known civil rights group.

Events

One of the earliest battles of the NAACP went on for 30 years and was a top priority - lynching. They took the position that the Dryer Bill, which was federal, should be signed into law as it would finally provide justice and punish those that didn't prosecute the lynch mobs or were a part of one. Although the bill was never passed, the dialogue spurred on by the report created by the NAACP (Thirty Years of Lynching in the United States, 1889-1919) was credited with greatly lowering lynching. In 2005 the government finally apologized for the lynching tragedy noting that there had been 4,700 victims since 1882. On three different occasions, the Senate failed to pass anti lynching bills even with the persistence of the NAACP. While the apology was offered, it was not unaminous proving that even though time had passed the goals of the NAACP were still in need of attainment.

This subsection should provide some historical context for the founding of your group, explain the motivations behind it, and describe the steps taken and challenges faced by its founders to get the ball rolling.

Current objectives and activities

According to its own website,http://www.naacp.org/about/mission/index.htm, the vision of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People is to promote an end to racial hatred and discrimination in our society where all citizens are to be treated equally under the law. The objectives listed by the organization are:

To ensure the politcal, educational, social and economic equality of all citizens.

To achieve equality of rights and eliminate race prejudice among the citizens of the United States

To remove all barriers of racial discrimination through democratic processes

To seek enactiment and enforcment of federal, state and local laws securing civil rights

To inform the public of the adverse effects of racial discrimination and to seek its elimination

To educate persons as to their constitutional rights and to take all lawful action to secure the exercise thereof, and to take any other lawful action in the furtherance of these objectives, consistent with the NAACP's Articles of Incorporation and this Constitution

One of the objectives of the NAACP is to ensure positive portrayals of African Americans in the media. In the late 1800s, stereo types of black people were prevalent in films. Blackface was one of many offensive examples that were all the rage when the NAACP was created in 1909. The movie Birth of a Nation caused a great controversy as it was extremely racist and portrayed the fleeing of the slaves as the cause for the destruction of the way of life in the South. The repercussions of this film were that blacks were mistreated in towns where the movie played. The positive ramification was that the NAACP received recognition for speaking out as the issue was so widely known.

In the 1940s, the NAACP's Executive Secretary Walter White pressed hard on Hollywood to stop creating and encouraging these stereotypical roles for African Americans. He made headway and was deemed controversial because black actors of the day were vocally opposed to his strategy. Hattie McDaniel, who was an Oscar winner, was attributed with stating that she would prefer to portray a maid in a film, than to actually be one.

The 1950s saw the advent of television and with this came more of the same stereotypes as had been seen on film and heard on the radio. While the NAACP was unsuccessful in attempts to stop offensive shows like Amos N' Andy, it pressed on toward equality in the media.

The statistics they have from as recently as 2007 show that there are still major hurdles in equality in the images in the media. While things have improved since 1999 where the NAACP called out the fact that there were no people of color in a leading role for the entire season, in fact, since 2002 the number of African Americans and other minorities on primetime shows has been dropping. In order to combat this, the organization will continue monitoring the situation and bringing this type of information to the country's attention. While they have threatened a boycott, the NAACP prefers to negotiate and educate without denying the possibility of impending marches.

Organizational structure

This section should describe the group's organizational structure, including its principal leadership positions and their current incumbents.

Right after the group was formed in 1909 they won a series of cases regarding discriminary voting practices in the state of Oklahoma and the organization became known as a legal advocate.

One of the major achievements of the NAACP is the creation of The Crisis which is a magazine for civil rights. It is one of the oldest journals in the United States. It's goal is to be a respected periodical filled with opinion, high level thinking and analysis. This is a bi monthly publication focused on discussing matters of interest for the country, the world, people of cullor and all types of cultural achievements.

This section should recount the group's major achievements, including but not limited to legislative and/or legal victories.

In developing this final section, be especially careful about maintaining a neutral stance and tone. Your aim should be to document the public's perception of your group and/or any controversies in which it is or has been embroiled without weighing in with your own opinion about them.