Tea Party vs. NAACP, Part 2: Much Heat, Very Little Light

All the Tea Party had to do in the face of an NAACP resolution calling for leaders to denounce racist elements on its fringe was say: "Sure. Racism has no place in the group."

But that's not the way it's turning out.

"You're dealing with people who are professional race baiters, who make a very good living off this kind of thing, " Mark Williams of Tea Party Express said on NPR's Morning Edition. "They make more money off of race than any slave trader ever. It's time groups like the NAACP went to the trash heap of history where they belong with all the other vile racist groups that emerged in our history."

On Tuesday, at its annual convention in Kansas City, Missouri, the NAACP approved a resolution calling on leaders of the Tea Party movement to repudiate "racist elements," characterized by a few posters and signs at rallies and events. Tea Party members and supporters disputed the charges. The St. Louis Tea Party passed its own resolution, condemning the NAACP for "hypocritically engaging in the very conduct it purports to oppose."

Since then, there have been signs that NAACP leaders and those sympathetic to the civil rights organization were backing off just a bit.

NAACP President Ben Jealous told Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne in his Thursday column, "We know there are black Tea Party members, and we want black people to feel comfortable taking leadership positions in all parties in this country." Then he added a message for Tea Party leaders: "All we're asking is for you to act responsibly and say there's no space for bigots in the Tea Party."

Jealous seemed perturbed that the focus was placed on only part of his speech at the organization's Kansas City gathering. "I give a 42-page speech. Half a page is focused on the Tea Party," Jealous said in the Kansas City Star. "We need the media to pay attention to the issues that are most important to this country" such as jobs, education and crime. (I don't quite believe his shock that a challenge to the headline-making Tea Party would grab headlines.)

The Revs. Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton -- never afraid of a fight -- played down the resolution, with Jackson calling it a "diversion" and Sharpton saying in the Star, "I'm not mad at the Tea Party for rallying, I'm mad that we're not rallying," before promoting a planned Oct. 2 march in Washington to raise awareness of the problems facing minority neighborhoods.

As proof that the movement doesn't tolerate crossing the line, Tea Party leaders could have pointed to the Mason City, Iowa, billboard erected by the North Iowa Tea Party -- comparing President Barack Obama to Hitler and Lenin -- that was taken down at their urging.

Instead, however, the back-and-forth continues.

Sarah Palin weighed in on the resolution on Facebook, saying, "To be unjustly accused of association with what Reagan so aptly called that 'legacy of evil' is a traumatizing experience, and one of which the honest, freedom-loving patriots of the Tea Party movement are truly undeserving."

Michael Steele, Republican National Committee chairman, issued a statement that said in part: "Tea Party activists are your mom or dad, your local grocer, banker, hairdresser or doctor. They are a diverse group of passionate Americans who want to ensure that our nation returns to founding principles that honor the Constitution, limit government's role in our lives, and support policies that empower free markets and free enterprise."

And then there's Williams, former chairman of the Tea Party Express, which has sponsored bus tours and rallies across the country. In addition to the quote from the NPR interview, he called the NAACP "a bunch of old fossils looking to make a buck off skin color" in an exchange with correspondent Roland Martin on CNN.

In an Associated Press story, he linked Jackson, Sharpton and NAACP officials. "I'm not surprised they are jumping into the fray here because the NAACP just tapped a gulf oil well full of cash contributions that will arrive from this resolution," he said. "And I know Al and Jesse want their piece of it. The slave traders of the 16th century should have been as good at exploiting Africans as these people are, because it's just disgusting."

His remarks show an astounding lack of historical perspective. The NAACP can be criticized for spending time on headline-making issues (remember when it buried the N-word) in an effort to find its way. But no one can deny the organization's essential role in making America more just.

Since the NAACP was established by whites and blacks in 1909 – a time of lynchings and entrenched discrimination – its members have worked toward the American ideal of equality, racking up legal victories that tore down barriers.

In 2010, the NAACP isn't what it once was. It struggles to hone its message and establish a relevant agenda at a time when legal vestiges of discrimination have been removed. But that doesn't make it the equivalent of the Ku Klux Klan. When I read the e-mails and comments comparing the NAACP to that hate group it fought against, I lose all hope.

There have been a few reasonable exchanges prompted by the resolution, such as one between Hilary Shelton of the NAACP's Washington's Bureau and Mark Skoda, founder of the Memphis Tea Party, on CNN (and highlighted on a Baltimore Sun blog) that acknowledges some shared goals amid differences. Still, this unnecessary skirmish only hardens both sides and energizes voters looking for relief or revolution in the 2010 midterm elections.

And it's only July.

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