IN THESE TIMES • JANUARYS, 1996 and former street hood as a composite of LACK AMERICA black history's pantheon of heroes—a combination of W.E.B.DuBois' brilliance, Martin Luther King's eloquence, Thur- good Marshall's toughness and the caring of Harriet Tubman. The judge's hyperbole reflects the relief felt among the NAACP's factious 64- A man for member board that, in selecting Mfume, they have finally forged a consensus. After a 16-month search for a successor to Ben- the season jamin Chavis, the board had seemed hope- lessly divided. Just a day before they chose Mfume, according to reports, some mem- bers had threatened to reject any candi- date other than acting Executive Director Earl Shinhoster. Mfume's nomination broke the deadlock. "I don't think anyone else could have brought us together to this point," said Chairwoman Myrlie Evers- Williams, joining Mfume's hallelujah cho- rus. "It does seem that something spiritual happened." Praise for the board's selection also echoes through the halls of black leader- ship. In the estimation of Rep. John Lewis f Kweisi Mfume didn't (D-GA), Mfume matches "the skills and vision of prede- exist the NAACP would cessors James Weldon Johnson, Walter White, Roy have had to invent him. Wilkins and Benjamin Hooks." The Rev. Jesse Jackson, a The 47-year-old represen- former candidate for Mfume's job who now heads both tative from Maryland's the National Rainbow Coalition (NRC) and Operation As the new 7th Congressional District PUSH, also had nice things to say about the NAACP's leader of the is such a perfect fit as the new leader, albeit in terms considerably less reverential. new president and chief Kweisi Mfume (pronounced Kwah-EE-see Oom-FOO- NAACP, executive officer of the may) is one of the rare stars to emerge from the political National Association for quicksand of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC). Kweisi Mfume the Advancement of Col- Traditionally, Congress has been the career terminus for ored People, it's as if fate many African-American politicians. Those who haven't promises to itself had made the choice. sought lifer status in that institution have tended to fade An NAACP search com- into political oblivion. Only two CBC members have rejuvenate mittee actually performed risen to post-congressional prominence: former Pennsyl- that duty, but A. Leon vania Rep. William Gray, who now expertly leads the the black Higginbotham Jr., a United Negro College Fund, and Harold Washington, the liberation retired federal judge and late representative from Illinois' First District, who went co-chairman of that search on to fame as Chicago's first black mayor. movement. committee, talks as if the Mfume's star was burnished in Congress but the story group merely acted as of how he arrived has emblematic resonance. Born fate's regent. Frizzell Gray in Baltimore, he and grew-up in some of "We have done what the city's roughest neighborhoods. During his early geneticists have never been teens, his abusive stepfather abandoned the family and By Salim Muwakldl able to do," Higginbotham left them in desperate poverty. Mfume's mother died joked during the exuberant when he was 16. Traumatized and disillusioned, he quit news conference announc- school and starting running with a street gang involved ing Mfume's selection. in petty crimes. He also fathered five children by four Higginbotham hailed the different women. four-term congressman "Many years ago," Mfume recounted during a recent LICENSED TO UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED IN THESE TIMES • JANUARY 8,1SS8 news conference, "when I was on my way to hell in a handbasket as a high school dropout, as a teen-aged par- ent, as someone who had given up on his society and had gotten away from his church and spiritual values that were a part of me as a child, I had become hard- ened and in many respects even heartless." fume can't say exactly Mwhat prompted him to change is life, but he describes it as an epiphany and links it to a recognition of his African cultural her- itage. To symbolize his transformation he adopted the Swahili name for "con- quering son of kings." In the mid-1970s Mfume hosted a popular Baltimore radio talk show called "Ebony Reflec- tions" and gained wide recognition as an astute and militant partisan for the rights of the black communi- ty. In 1979 he won a seat on the Baltimore City Council, where his acrimonious con- frontations with Mayor William Donald Shaefer and the city's white political establishment became leg- endary. Along the way he graduated with honors from Morgan State University and earned a masters degree in liberal arts from Johns Hop- kins University. In 1986 Mfume chal- lenged a powerful black New NAACP head Methodist Episcopal Church in Mfume's Baltimore dis- political dynasty to win the Kweisi Mfume trict expresses mixed feelings about the move. "I think congressional seat. Rep. Par- with Jesse Jackson. there is an up side and a down side. For Congressman ren Mitchell (D-MD) was ________________ Mfume to leave Congress, the state of Maryland as a leaving Congress and had ••••^••••••^B whole would be losing a tremendous leader. He is designated nephew Clarence someone that has consistently and without fail stood up Mitchell III as his heir apparent. Mfume won that Demo- and fought for the interests of the people of our state. cratic primary, and since that time his share of the vote But I can't help but believe that he could be a saving totals has never dropped below 80 percent. force to the beleaguered NAACP." Given his popularity, Mfume's departure from Con- Mfume's congressional tenure may have been golden gress leaves many of his constituents saddened. The to his local constituents but his national stature was Rev. Frank Reid of the influential Bethel African largely undistinguished. That began to change in 1992, LICENSED TO UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED IN THESE TIMES • JANUARYS, 1996 when he was elected CBC chair by a 27-9 vote over for- His alliance with Farrakhan provoked intense criti- mer Rep. Craig Washington (D-TX) in the caucus' first cism—from various civil rights groups and from within contested election. Mfume's willingness to compromise the CBC itself—and he was forced to backpedal. But in a had provoked Washington's challenge. But his ascension letter responding to his critics, Mfume refused to aban- to CBC leadership has apparently invigorated his militant don his tactical approach. He wrote that the CBC would impulses, and although Washington later lost his seat, "continue to seek a dialogue and to work where possible Mfume seems to have incorporated the Texas congress- with those who we feel are committed ... to real and man's concerns into his leadership style. meaningful social change for our people, including the His term coincided with the election of the the first Nation of Islam." Democrat president in 12 years and largest group of black Congress members in U.S. history. Adroitly n a sense, the NAACP job comes just at the right time for exploiting the CBC's new power, Mfume turned the I the ambitious Mfume. The optimism with which the group into a formidable voting bloc and, with varying CBC emerged from the 1992 elections has faded, and with degrees of success, used its leverage to influence policy at Congress firmly controlled by conservative Republicans, the White House and on Capitol Hill. What's more, he the caucus has sunk into virtual irrelevance. And Mfume ably pursued a larger strategy of building coalitions, as may be content to leave behind him some of the controver- when he aligned the CBC much more closely with His- sy he engendered at the CBC. "[He] never regained his panic members fighting anti-immigration legislation. political footing after the covenant with Farrakhan, and the "We understand the damage, more than others, of just divided caucus suffered," says David Bositis, a senior policy what bigotry can do," he said at the time. analyst at the Joint Center for Political and Economic Stud- He also moved to build coalitions within the African- ies, a Washington think tank that focuses on issues related American community. During the 1993 annual CBC leg- to African-Americans. islative conference—an event widely disparaged for its The Farrakhan question will follow Mfume to the glittering excesses—he invited the participation of many NAACP. It was Mfume's "sacred covenant," after all, that non-traditional black leaders, including leaders of vari- initially soured some board members on his nomination. ous street gangs. At this meeting he also announced a They remembered that the Rev. Benjamin Chavis, the for- "sacred covenant" with, among other groups, Minister mer executive director who was fired for financial impro- Louis Farrakhan's Nation of Islam. prieties in August 1994, initially met internal resistance because of his associations with Far- Common Sons* rakhan. But it was the success of the and a Little Fir* Farrakhan-organized Million Man Women and Working- March and the NAACP's embarrass- The ClOr Class Politics in the ment for not participating more signifi- United States, 1935-1955 1900—1961 cantly in black America's largest-ever Robert H. Zieger Ainielise Orleck demonstration that eased the way for The gripping collective Mfume's selection. "An incomparable biography of four Jewish The nomination of a redeemed stick- institutional history immigrant women radi- up kid to head this venerable American of the CIO that cals who rose from the garment-shop floor to institution offers the NAACP another surpasses all previous positions of influence shot at relevance.