Du Bois and others founded the Niagara Movement 1908 Race riots erupted in Springfield, Illinois, Abraham Lincoln’s hometown 1909 On 100th anniversary of Lincoln’s birthday, more than si
Trang 1This stipulation meant that all slaves and their descendants had to pass a rigorous literacy test based on knowledge of the state constitution and other highly technical documents Few,
if any, African Americans passed the test
The NAACP appointed its first African American executive director, JAMES WELDON JOHNSON (1871–1931), in 1920 Under Johnson and his successor, Walter White, who led the organization from 1931 to 1955, the NAACP worked for the passage of a federal anti-lynching law Although unsuccessful in its efforts to pass a federal law, the NAACP brought public attention to the brutality of
LYNCHING and helped to significantly reduce its occurrence As a result, lynching (the infliction
of punishment, usually by hanging, by a mob without trial) is now illegal in every state
In 1941 the NAACP established its Washington, D.C., bureau as the legislative advocacy and lobbying arm of the organization The bureau does the strategic planning and coordination of NAACP political action and legislation program It acts as the liaison between NAACP units and government agen-cies, and it coordinates the work of other organizations that support NAACP programs and proposals
The bureau sponsors the annual Legislative Mobilization, which informs participants of the NAACP legislative agenda, monitors and advo-cates for NAACP civil rights and related
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People
1905 W E B Du Bois and others founded the Niagara Movement
1908 Race riots erupted in Springfield, Illinois, Abraham Lincoln’s hometown
1909 On 100th anniversary of Lincoln’s birthday, more than sixty citizens issued a “call” for a national conference to renew the struggle for civil and political
liberty; the group and conference formed the foundation of the NAACP
1910 National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) chosen as group’s name at second annual conference; William Walling chosen as
executive director; W E B Du Bois chosen as director of publicity and research and editor of the Crisis
1911 NAACP incorporated
1915 In Guinn v United States, the Supreme Court struck down grandfather clauses in state constitutions as unconstitutional barriers to voting rights granted
under the Fifteenth Amendment
1917 Supreme Court barred municipal ordinances requiring racial segregation in housing in Buchanan v Warley
1920 NAACP appointed its first African American executive director, James Weldon Johnson
1923 Supreme Court ruled in Moore v Dempsey that exclusion of African Americans from a jury was inconsistent with the right to a fair trial
1931 Walter White appointed to succeed Johnson as director of NAACP
1934 Charles Hamilton Houston hired as NAACP’s first full-time attorney
1936 Thurgood Marshall joined NAACP as special counsel
1940 NAACP created separate legal arm, the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, and appointed Marshall as its director-counsel
1941 Secretary of Army authorized first segregated airman unit, the 99th Squadron, better known as the Tuskegee Airmen
1948 Marshall’s team argued Shelley v Kraemer, which struck down racially restrictive (land) covenants; President Truman abolished racial segregation in armed
services by executive order
1950 In Sweatt v Painter, Supreme Court ruled racially segregated professional schools inherently unequal and therefore unconstitutional; first integrated
combat units saw action in Korea
1954 Marshall’s team argued Brown v Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, which ruled racial segregation in public schools unconstitutional
1955 Roy Wilkins appointed to succeed White as NAACP’s executive director
1961 Marshall appointed to U.S Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit; Jack Greenberg succeeded Marshall as director of LDF
1964 NAACP lobbying led to passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964
1965 NAACP lobbying led to passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965
1967 Thurgood Marshall became first African American associate justice of the Supreme Court
1968 NAACP lobbying led to passage of the Fair Housing Act of 1968
1972 U.S Supreme Court declared existing capital punishment laws unconstitutional in Furman v Georgia
1974 NAACP experienced a setback when Supreme Court overturned efforts to integrate largely white suburban school districts with largely black urban
districts in Milliken v Bradley
1976 Georgia, Florida, and Texas drafted new death penalty laws; Supreme Court upheld these new laws
1977 Benjamin Hooks succeeded Wilkins as NAACP’s executive director
1978 Supreme Court placed limits on affirmative action programs in Regents of University of California v Bakke
1993 Benjamin F Chavis Jr appointed to succeed Hooks as NAACP’s executive director
1994 NAACP board of directors voted to oust Chavis after sexual harassment suit was filed against him
1995 Myrlie Evers-Williams replaced William F Gibson as chair of the NAACP board of directors
1996 NAACP board appointed Kweisi Mfume, a U.S representative from Maryland, as president and chief financial officer; Mfume cut national staff by third as first step in returning NAACP to financial health
1997 NAACP launched the Economic Reciprocity Program
2000 TV diversity agreements; retirement of the debt and first six years of a budget surplus; largest African American voter turnout in 20 years
2001 Cincinnati riots; development of five year strategic plan
2009 NAACP celebrated its 100th anniversary
SOURCE: NAACP Web page, available online at http://www.naacp.org; Simple Justice by Richard Kluger (1975).
ILLUSTRATION BY GGS
CREATIVE RESOURCES.
REPRODUCED BY
PERMISSION OF GALE,
A PART OF CENGAGE
LEARNING.
168 NAACP
Trang 2legislation, and prepares an annual Report Card,
showing how each member of Congress voted
on key civil rights issues
For its early LITIGATION efforts, the NAACP
relied on lawyers who volunteered their services
In 1934 the group hired CHARLES HAMILTON
HOUSTON, an African American and the dean of
Howard Law School, as its first full-time attorney
The following year Houston started a legal
campaign to end school segregation Houston
was assisted by THURGOOD MARSHALL, a young
lawyer who would go on to argue many cases
before the Supreme Court and in 1967 become
the first African American appointed to the
Court In 1940, the NAACP appointed Marshall
director-counsel of its new legal branch, theNAACP
In 1948 Marshall, along with fellow attorneys,
won a critical victory in Shelley v Kraemer (334
U.S 1, 68 S Ct 836, 92 L Ed 1161 [1948]),
putting an end to the enforcement of racially
restrictive REAL ESTATE covenants that prevented
blacks from purchasing homes in white
neighbor-hoods In 1957, the LDF became a separate entity
After succeeding in Supreme Court cases
concerning unequal salary scales for black
teachers and segregation in graduate and
professional schools, the NAACP achieved its
most celebrated triumph before the Court in
Brown, a decision that declared racial
segrega-tion in public schools to be unconstitusegrega-tional
The Brown decision sparked another civil
rights initiative, the Montgomery, Alabama, bus
boycott of 1955 The boycott catapultedMARTIN
LUTHER KING JR to national recognition and
spurred the creation of theSOUTHERN CHRISTIAN
1960s, the SCLC, the STUDENT NONVIOLENT
COORDINATING COMMITTEE(SNCC), the Congress
of Racial Equality (CORE), and the NATIONAL
African Americans These groups adopted a
direct-action approach to promoting African
American interests by conducting highly
publi-cized sit-ins and demonstrations
The NAACP, meanwhile, drew criticism for
its devotion to traditional legal and political
means for seeking social change ROY WILKINS,
executive director of the NAACP from 1955 to
1975, voiced his preference for traditional tactics
over“the kind that picks a fight with the sheriff
and gets somebody’s head beaten” (Spear 1984,
7:402) Although many viewed it as overly
conservative in its civil rights approach, the NAACP helped pass important civil rights legislation such as the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (42 U.S.C.A § 2000a et seq.), theVOTING RIGHTS ACT OF 1965 (42 U.S.C.A § 1973 et seq.), and theFAIR HOUSING ACT OF1968 (42 U.S.C.A § 3601
et seq.) The NAACP remained an interracial group and spurned the call for black nationalism and separatism voiced by SNCC, the Black Panthers, and other groups that turned to blacks-only membership later in the 1960s
Unlike many of the more radical civil rights groups, the NAACP outlasted the turbulent 1960s However, it experienced setbacks during the 1970s in Supreme Court cases such as Bradley v Millikin (418 U.S 717, 94 S Ct 3112,
41 L Ed 2d 1069 [1974]), which overturned efforts to integrate largely white suburban public school districts and largely black urban districts, and Regents of University of California v Bakke (438 U.S 265, 98 S Ct 2733, 57 L Ed 2d 750 [1978]), which placed limits on AFFIRMATIVE ACTIONprograms
NAACP director in 1977 Hooks held that office until 1993, when he was replaced by Benjamin F Chavis Jr Leadership and funding problems plagued the NAACP during the mid-1990s After a SEXUAL HARASSMENTsuit was filed against Chavis in 1994, the NAACP board of directors voted to oust him as executive director The following year, it dismissed board chairman William F Gibson and replaced him with MYRLIE EVERS-WILLIAMS, the widow of civil rights activistMEDGAR EVERS Seeking to put aside its troubles, on February 20, 1996, the NAACP board appointed Kweisi Mfume, a U.S repre-sentative from Maryland and head of the Congressional Black Caucus, as the organiza-tion’s new president and chief executive officer
To restore the organization’s financial stability, Mfume reduced the national staff by one-third
Mfume stepped down in 2004
Among its many tasks, the NAACP works on the local level to handle cases of racial discrimi-nation; offers referral services, tutorials, and day care; sponsors the NAACP National Housing Corporation to help develop low- and moderate-income housing for families; offers programs to youths and prison inmates; and maintains a law library It also lobbies Congress regarding the appointment of Supreme Court justices
The NAACP accepts people of all races and religions as members In the early 2000s, it had a
NAACP 169
Trang 3membership of more than 500,000, with 2,200 units (including more than 600 youth councils and college chapters) in the United States and around the world The organization continues to struggle with the need to increase membership and retain relevancy while advocating for various civil rights issues In 2000 the board instituted mandatory training for NAACP local leadership
More than 10,000 branch officers and executive committee members attended the training, and the organization removed 800 officers and committee members who did not attend
The NAACP has also taken steps to build coalitions with black youth Former NAACP president Kweisi Mfume sat on the board of Summit Action Network, a coalition of hip hop music stars as well as record company execu-tives and community organizations that seek to educate and mobilize fans of rap music to register and vote in local and national elections
In addition, the NAACP has sought to over-come political differences and gain the support
of the country’s major Latino civil right organizations, including the LEAGUE OF UNITED
NATIONAL COUNCIL OF LA RAZA In January 2003, the NAACP announced that theUNITED NATIONS
had designated it as a non-governmental organization (NGO) The NGO designation meant that the NAACP could advise and consult with foreign governments and with the U.N secretariat on issues relating toHUMAN RIGHTS
In May 2008 the NAACP selected Benjamin
T Jealous, an activist and former news execu-tive, to serve as president and CEO of the organization At 35, Jealous was the youngest leader in the organization’s history In February
2009, the NAACP celebrated its 100th anniver-sary, amidst ongoing debate over whether the organization remained necessary in the modern world Although some argued that the organi-zation had become irrelevant, citing the election
ofBARACK OBAMAas the first African American U
S president, Jealous urged otherwise The NAACP centennial convention turned its focus
to addressing the modern issues of predatory lending and AIDS, and Jealous promised to focus on ongoing human rights issues during his term
FURTHER READINGS NAACP Available online at www.naacp.org (accessed September 16, 2009).
Rhym, Darren 2002 The NAACP Philadelphia: Chelsea House.
Schneider, Mark R 2002 We Return Fighting: The Civil Rights Movement in the Jazz Age Boston: Northeastern Univ Press.
Sullivan, Patricia 2009 Lift Every Voice: The NAACP and the Making of the Civil Rights Movement New York: New Press.
CROSS REFERENCE Discrimination.
NAACP LEGAL DEFENSE AND EDUCATIONAL FUND
In 1940, the organization formerly known as the National Association for the Advancement
of Colored People and now called the NAACP
launched the Legal Defense and Educational Fund (LDF) Since its founding, the LDF has been involved in more cases before the U.S Supreme Court than any other nongovernmen-tal organization
The National Association for the Advance-ment of Colored People (NAACP), which had been founded in 1909 to support civil rights, soon found itself needing direction and aid as it sought to help people find their way through the criminal justice system Under the leader-ship of future Supreme Court JusticeTHURGOOD MARSHALL, the Legal Defense and Educational Fund (LDF) was created to provide information about the criminal justice system and legal assistance to indigent African Americans
In 1957, three years after the Supreme Court’s landmark decision in BROWN V BOARD
OF EDUCATION OF TOPEKA,KANSAS(347 U.S 483, 47
S Ct 686, 98 L Ed 873), which held that
SEGREGATION in public schools was unconstitu-tional, the LDF was established as an entirely separate organization from the NAACP The LDF is headquartered in New York City and has regional offices in Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles The LDF has close to two dozen attorneys on staff whose work is supplemented
by assistance from hundreds of attorneys around the United States
The LDF primarily works with issues involving education, AFFIRMATIVE ACTION, fair employment and economic access, issues re-lated to voting and other forms of civic and political participation, and criminal justice issues, including the death penalty and prison reform With more than 100 active cases, the
170 NAACP LEGAL DEFENSE AND EDUCATIONAL FUND
Trang 4LDF has one of the largest legal caseloads of any
public service organization in the country
In 2007 John Payton, an attorney well
known for his successful record in important
CIVIL RIGHTS LITIGATION, was named
director-counsel and president of the LDF In May
2008 Payton was named one of the “Most
Influential Minority Lawyers in America” by the
National Law Journal At the time of his
appointment, his accomplishments were said
to make him well suited to follow in the
footsteps of THURGOOD MARSHALL, also a former
director-counsel of the LDF
While the primary focus of the LDF is on
court cases, the fund also monitors legislation,
provides advocacy, education research, and
builds coalitions with related organizations The
scope of LDF activity has also widened to include
advocacy for other minorities in this country as
well as for globalHUMAN RIGHTS To this end, the
LDF has aided in the establishment of similar
organizations that advocate for other minority
groups in the United States Additionally, the
fund has used its experience and legal expertise
to help form public-interest legal organizations
in Brazil, Canada, and South Africa
In addition to the Brown case, which
resulted in a flood of legal cases around the
country relating to SCHOOL DESEGREGATION, the
LDF won a number of significant cases in
the 1950s that concerned housing
DISCRIMINA-TION, voting access, jury selection, the use of
forced confessions, and access to counsel by
indigent persons
In the 1960s the LDF provided counsel for
MARTIN LUTHER KING JR and other civil rights
activists The LDF also began its drive to abolish
CAPITAL PUNISHMENT LDF provided counsel in
numerous death penalty cases and was able to
stop executions in the United States between
1966 and 1978 Since 1965 the LDF has
published Death Row USA, a list of death-row
inmates In 2008 the LDF continued its fight
against capital punishment, winning a life
sentence for a mentally retarded man who had
been on Pennsylvania’s Death Row for 26 years
Over time, LDF has also fought for the
rights of indigent defendants to obtain adequate
LEGAL REPRESENTATION In Richmond v District
Court of Maryland, a 2008 action that
chal-lenged the practice of the city of Baltimore in
not providing indigent defendants with legal
counsel upon their first appearance in court
LDF filed aFRIEND OF THE COURTbrief In its brief, LDF argued that the relevant law obligates the appointment of counsel at the initial appearance stage of the proceedings
In the 1980s and 1990s the LDF undertook hundreds of CLASS ACTION suits against employ-ers, unions, and governmental units that have helped secure and safeguard the employment rights of thousands of workers
The LDF also continued to support major voting rights legislation and to be involved in numerous cases aimed at securing voting rights for minorities In the early 2000s the LDF continued to be involved in cases stemming from the redistricting of congressional districts after the 2000 census After the 2000 presiden-tial election, the LDF and five other civil rights organizations filed a class action lawsuit against Florida’s SECRETARY OF STATE and other elected officials, alleging that a significant number of minority citizens were unable to vote or faced severe obstacles in trying to register and vote
Prior to the 2008 presidential election, the LDF unveiled a campaign called Prepared to Vote, which was designed to augment tradi-tional voter participation efforts by providing critical election information to minority communities The program components include community–based workshops, the distribution
of community-friendly materials, meetings with election officials, and an educational Website
The LDF created the Prepare to Vote campaign
to ensure that the voting process is administered uniformly and fairly in minority communities
The LDF has likewise fought in support of equal education and affirmative action In February 2003, the LDF filed briefs in two major suits that challenged the use of race-conscious criteria in the admissions programs
of the University of Michigan law school and its undergraduate School of Literature, Science, and the Arts The Supreme Court ultimately decided in favor of the University of Michigan race-conscious criteria for admissions (Grutter v
Bollinger, U.S., , 123 S Ct 2235, _
L Ed 2d [U.S., Jun 23, 2003]) As of 2010 the LDF continued its fight in support of affi-rmative action, battling against anti-affiaffi-rmative action ballot initiatives in five states
FURTHER READINGS Greenberg, Jack 1994 Crusaders in the Courts: How a Dedicated Band of Lawyers Fought for the Civil Rights Revolution New York: BasicBooks.
NAACP LEGAL DEFENSE AND EDUCATIONAL FUND 171
Trang 5Kluger, Richard 2004 Simple Justice: The History of Brown v.
Board of Education and Black America’s Struggle for Equality Rev ed New York: Knopf.
Orfield, Gary, Susan E Eaton, and Elaine R Jones 1997.
Dismantling Desegregation: The Quiet Reversal of Brown
v Board of Education New York: New Press.
NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund Available online at www.naacpldf.org (accessed September 16, 2009).
Schwartz, Bernard 1986 Swann’s Way: The School Busing Case and the Supreme Court New York: Oxford Univ Press.
CROSS REFERENCES Civil Rights Acts; Equal Protection; NAACP.
vNADER, RALPH Considered the father of the CONSUMER PROTEC-TION movement, Ralph Nader has had a great effect on U.S law andPUBLIC POLICYof the late twentieth century Nader’s advocacy on behalf
of consumers and workers hastened into reality many features of the contemporary political landscape The work of this lawyer and irrepressible gadfly of the powers that be, which began in the mid-1960s, has led to the passage
of numerous consumer-protection laws in such areas as automobiles, mining, insurance, gas pipelines, and meatpacking, as well as the creation of government agencies such as the National Highway Traffic Safety Administra-tion, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, the ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION
COMMISSION Nader himself has founded many well-known consumer advocacy groups, includ-ing the PUBLIC INTEREST Research Group, the Clean Water Action Project, the Center for Auto
Safety, and the Project on Corporate Responsi-bility His goal in these efforts, he has said, is
“nothing less than the qualitative reform of the industrial revolution.”
Nader was born February 27, 1934, in Winsted, Connecticut, to Nadra Nader and Rose Bouziane Nader, Lebanese immigrants who owned and operated a restaurant and bakery
He is the youngest of five children He attended the Gilbert School and Princeton University on scholarships At Princeton he entered the
WOODROW WILSONSchool of Public and Interna-tional Affairs, and he graduated magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa in 1955 During an era of conformity, his challenges to school authorities and procedures at Princeton made him stand out At one point, he protested the use
of the poisonous insecticide dichlorodipehnyl-trichloroethane (DDT) on campus trees After Princeton, Nader attended Harvard Law School, where he edited the Harvard Law Record, and graduated with distinction in 1958
It was at Harvard that he first became interested
in auto safety After studying auto-injury cases,
in 1958 he published his first article on the subject,“American Cars: Designed for Death,” in the Harvard Law Record It contained a thesis that he would bring to national attention in the mid-1960s: Auto fatalities result not just from driver error, as the auto industry had main-tained, but also from poor vehicle design Nader followed his law degree with six months of service in the Army and then a period of personal travel through Latin America, Europe, and Africa Upon his return, he established a
Ralph Nader 1934–
2000 1975
1950
1939–45 World War II
1934 Born,
Winsted, Conn.
1950–53 Korean War
1961–73 Vietnam War
1958 Published first article on auto injury cases, in the
Harvard Law Record; earned LL.B from Harvard Law School
1964–65 Served as consultant at Labor Department
◆
1965 Unsafe at Any Speed published
◆
◆
◆
◆ ◆
1966 Highway Safety Act and National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act passed by Congress
1967 Initiated publicity campaign that helped pass the Wholesome Meat Act
1971 Founded Public Citizen Foundation
◆
1969 Founded the Center for the Study
of Responsive Law
1972 Congress created Consumer Product Safety Commission
1970 Occupational Safety and Health Administration and Environmental Protection Agency created by acts of Congress
1988 Helped win California referendum mandating auto insurance rate rollbacks; helped block proposed congressional pay raise
1992 Ran for president as independent
2002 Crashing the Party published
2000 Cutting Corporate Welfare published; ran for president on the Green Party platform
◆
1996 Ran for president on the Green Party platform; No Contest published
2004 Ran for president as independent
◆
2007 The Seventeen Traditions published
◆
2008 Ran for president
as independent
172 NADER, RALPH
Trang 6PRIVATE LAW practice in Hartford, Connecticut
created an informal legal aid society, and lectured
from 1961 to 1963 at the University of Hartford
Having worked at the local level for
auto-safety regulations in the years subsequent to his
graduation from Harvard, Nader decided to go
to Washington, D.C., in 1964, where he hoped
to have more influence Through his friendship
with Daniel P Moynihan, who then was serving
as assistant secretary of labor, Nader worked as
a consultant at the DEPARTMENT OF LABOR and
wrote a study that called for federal
responsibil-ity over auto safety
Nader left the Department of Labor in May
1965 and devoted himself to completing what
would become his most celebrated book, Unsafe
at Any Speed: The Designed-in Dangers of the
American Automobile The book was published
later that year and quickly became a best-seller
In it, Nader painted a grim picture of motor
vehicle injuries and fatalities, noting that 47,700
people were killed in auto accidents in 1964 He
made an eloquent appeal for federal car-safety
standards that would both prevent accidents
from occurring and better protect passengers in
the event of an accident The book also
communicated a philosophy regarding public
regulation of technology that would cause him
to do battle on many other issues “A great
problem of contemporary life,” he wrote,
“is how to control the power of economic
interests which ignore the harmful effects of
their applied science and technology.” Nader
has devoted his life to solving this problem
Taking some of his inspiration from the
CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT, Nader stood up to the
most powerful companies in the world His
book targeted the safety problems of the
Chevrolet Corvair, a product of the world’s
largest company, General Motors (GM) He
convincingly marshaled evidence that the driver
could lose control of the Corvair even when it
was moving slowly, thus making it “unsafe at
any speed.” The Goliath GM did not take kindly
to the stones thrown by this David, and the
company began a campaign of harassment and
intimidation that was intended to abort Nader’s
efforts Subsequent congressional committee
hearings in 1966 revealed that GM’s campaign
against Nader had involved harassing phone
calls and attempts to lure Nader into
compromising situations with women The
company formally apologized before Congress
for these tactics
Many politicians in Washington, D.C., and many Americans were receptive to Nader’s ideas In 1966, in his State of the Union address, PresidentLYNDON B.JOHNSONcalled for a national highway safety act Later that year, Congress passed the Highway Safety Act (80 Stat 731 [23 U.S.C.A § 401 note]) and the National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act (80 Stat
718 [15 U.S.C.A § 1381 note]) The latter created a new government body, later named the National Highway Traffic Safety Adminis-tration, that oversaw the creation of federal safety standards for automobiles and was also empow-ered to authorize recalls of unsafe vehicles In subsequent years, these laws and others for which Nader had advocated helped to bring about a marked decrease in traffic fatalities per vehicle mile As the Washington Post exclaimed,
on August 30, 1966,“[A] one-man lobby for the public prevailed over the nation’s most power-ful industry.”
Nader’s first work in the area of auto safety remains his most famous consumer advocacy
However, he has remained a tireless proponent
of consumers’ and workers’ rights on many different fronts Shortly after his triumph with auto regulation, Nader initiated a publicity campaign that helped to pass the Wholesome
Ralph Nader.
AP IMAGES
T HE MOST IMPORTANT OFFICE
IN A MERICA FOR ANYONE TO ACHIEVE
IS FULL - TIME CITIZEN
—R ALPH N ADER NADER, RALPH 173
Trang 7Meat Act, 81 Stat 584, 19 U.S.C.A 1306 (1967), which established stricter federal guidelines for meatpacking plants By the late 1960s he began
to mobilize college students who joined him in his investigations of public policy and the effectiveness of government regulations These young forces came to be called “Nader’s Raiders,” and many of them eventually rose to positions of influence in the government and in public policy organizations By the mid-1970s, the various groups that Nader had created, including Public Interest Research Groups in many states, were doing research and financing legal action in relation to myriad public policy issues, including tax reform, consumer-product safety, and corporate responsibility
During Ronald Reagan’s presidency in the 1980s, Nader’s influence in Washington, D.C., declined, particularly as the Reagan administra-tion dismantled much of the government regulation that Nader had helped to establish
He did not give up his cause, however In the late 1980s, he was again in the media spotlight, this time through his attempts to lower car-insurance rates in California and to block a proposed congressional pay increase During the 1980s and 1990s, he also addressed the savings-and-loan bailout problem, well before it became high on the nation’s agenda; opposed the use of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), which damage the ozone layer; and worked to prevent limitations
on damages that consumers may receive from corporations through civil lawsuits
Nader has run for president in every presidential election from 1992 to 2008 In
1992, he entered the race as a write-in candidate
Four years later, he was nominated as a candidate
by the GREEN PARTY, which has its strongest support in California With political activist Winona LaDuke as his running mate, he ran a no-frills campaign, accepting no taxpayer money, eschewing advertising, and often traveling alone
He earned 684,902 votes that year, including two percent of the votes in California
Nader ran again in the 2000 election He raised more than $8 million for the campaign, some $30 million less than REFORM PARTY candi-datePAT BUCHANAN Running again with LaDuke, Nader finished third in the election, with 2,882,955 votes, while Buchanan finished with 448,895 Several supporters urged Nader to run again in the 2004 election, which he did That time, the support that had carried him through the previous election was non-existent as many
called for him to remove himself from the running Nader ran for president again in 2008 as
an independent and received 0.6% of the votes Nader has written and edited dozens of books during his career, including Crashing the Party, which details his run during the 2000 presidential election Other books include The Consumer and Corporate Accountability (1973), Corporate Power in America (1973), Working on the System: A Comprehensive Manual for Citizen Access to Federal Agencies (1974), Government Regulation: What Kind of Reform? (1976), The Big Boys: Power and Position in American Business (1986), and Collision Course: The Truth about Airline Safety (1994)
FURTHER READINGS Herrnson, Paul S., and John C Green, eds 1998 Multiparty Politics in America Lanham, Md.: Rowman & Littlefield Martin, Justin 2002 Nader: Crusader, Spoiler, Icon Cambridge, Mass.: Perseus.
Nader, Ralph 2007 The Seventeen Traditions New York: HarperCollins.
——— 2002 Crashing the Party: Taking on the Corporate Government in an Age of Surrender New York: Thomas Dunne Books/St Martin ’s Press.
——— 2000 The Ralph Nader Reader New York: Seven Stories Press.
——— 1972 Unsafe at Any Speed: The Designed-in Dangers
of the American Automobile Rev ed New York: Grossman.
Nader, Ralph, and Wesley J Smith 1996 No Contest: Corporate Lawyers and the Perversion of Justice in America New York: Random House.
CROSS REFERENCE Green Party.
NAFTA SeeNORTH AMERICAN FREE TRADE AGREEMENT
NAKED CONTRACT From the Latin term nudum pactum, or “bare agreement.” An agreement between two parties that is without any legal effect because no consideration has been exchanged between the parties A naked contract, also known as a “nude contract,” is unenforceable in a court of law
informal agreement that was not legally en-forceable, because it did not fall within the specific classes of agreements that could support
a legal action A pactum could, however, create
an exception to or modification of an existing obligation
174 NAFTA
Trang 8The designation of an individual person or of a
firm or corporation A word or combination of
words used to distinguish a person, thing, or class
from others
An individual’s name comprises a name
given at birth, known as the given name or first
name, selected by the parents, and the surname
or last name, which identifies the family to
which he or she belongs Ordinarily an
individual is not properly identified unless he
or she is called or described by this given name
in addition to the surname This rule has
significance, among other times, when students
are designated in school records and when
parties are called or referred to in LEGAL
PROCEEDINGS, including CHILD CUSTODY actions
The general rule is that when identity is certain,
a small variance in name, such as that caused by
typographical errors, is unimportant
The method by which an individual can
change his or her name is usually prescribed
by state statutes and involves filing a certificate
in, or making an application to, a court
Whether or not a name change will be granted
is ordinarily a matter of judicial discretion
In more recent times, more states have moved
away from this and allowed name changes
regardless of reason
In recent years, married women have begun
to depart from the traditional practice of taking
their husband’s surname upon marriage
In-stead they retain their birth names, the
surnames possessed before marriage All 50
states now allow a wife to keep her birth name
or use her husband’s surname In addition,
several states now recognize the rights of
women in choosing names for their children
Interestingly, the majority of states do not give
statutory authority for a husband to adopt his
wife’s surname
FURTHER READING
Frandina, Michael Mahoney 2009 “A Man’s Right to
Choose His Surname in Marriage: A Proposal ” Duke
Journal of Gender Law & Policy (January), 155.
NAPOLEONIC CODE
The first modern organized body of law governing
France, also known as the Code Napoleon or Code
Civil, enacted by Napoléon I in 1804
In 1800 Napoléon I appointed a commis-sion of four persons to undertake the task of compiling the Napoleonic Code Their efforts, along with those of J J Cambacérès, were instrumental in the preparation of the final draft The Napoleonic Code assimilated the private law of France, which was the law governing transactions and relationships be-tween individuals The Code, which is regarded
by some commentators as the first modern counterpart toROMAN LAW, is currently in effect
in France in an amended form
The Napoleonic Code is a revised version of the Roman law or CIVIL LAW, which predomi-nated in Europe, with numerous French modifications, some of which were based on the Germanic law that had been in effect in northern France The code draws upon the Institutes of the Roman CORPUS JURIS CIVILISfor its categories of the civil law: property rights, such as licenses; the acquisition of property, such as trusts; and personal status, such as legitimacy of birth
Napoléon applied the code to the territories
he governed—namely, some of the German states, the low countries, and northern Italy It was extremely influential in Spain and, eventu-ally, in Latin America as well as in all other European nations except England, where the
prevailed It was the harbinger, in France and abroad, of codifications of other areas of law, such as CRIMINAL LAW, CIVIL PROCEDURE, and
COMMERCIAL LAW The Napoleonic Code served
as the prototype for subsequent codes during the nineteenth century in 24 countries; the province of Québec and the state of Louisiana have derived a substantial portion of their laws from it (The other 49 states in America follow the common law tradition.) Napoléon also promulgated four other codes: the Code of Civil Procedure (1807), the Commercial Code (1808), the Code of Criminal Procedure (1811), and the Penal Code (1811)
NARAL PRO-CHOICE AMERICA NARAL Pro-Choice America, founded in 1969
as the National ABORTION and Reproductive Rights Action League, is a nonprofit organiza-tion that was formed primarily to maintain a woman’s LEGAL RIGHTto have an abortion The mission of NARAL, however, has broadened to include supporting policies that enable women
NARAL PRO-CHOICE AMERICA 175
Trang 9and men to make responsible decisions about sexuality, contraception, pregnancy, childbirth, and abortion NARAL is comprised of a network of 35 state affiliates and has 500,000 members It has proven to be an effective organization, promoting pro-choice candidates for state and federal offices and LOBBYING for pro-choice legislation
Since the U.S Supreme Court legalized abortion in ROE V WADE, 410 U.S 113, 93
S Ct 705, 35 L Ed 2d 147 (1973), opponents
of abortion have sought to overturn or limit this decision NARAL has vigorously defended Roe but has also encouraged better sex education and the use of birth control to make abortion necessary less often Through NARAL Pro-Choice America PAC, its political action committee, NARAL has been a driving force behind the election of many pro-choice candi-dates NARAL Pro-Choice America PAC mounts campaigns to elect pro-choice candi-dates and defeat candicandi-dates opposed to legalized abortion, using paid advertising and get-out-the-vote efforts It also persuaded the Wal-Mart and Kroger Corporations to cease blocking women’s access to emergency contraception
The NARAL Pro-Choice America Founda-tion, a charitable organization founded in 1977, supports research and legal work, publishes substantive policy reports, mounts public edu-cation campaigns and other communiedu-cations projects, and provides leadership training for grassroots activists The NARAL Foundation and NARAL employ a computerized state-by-state database, NARAL*STAR (State Tracking of Abortion Rights), which provides up-to-the-minute information for NARAL staff, affiliates, policy makers, media, and coalition partners on state laws related to reproductive rights, pend-ing legislation, state constitutions, and state executive branches Since 2005 the organization has helped defeat seven anti-choice ballot measures in four states
NARAL and the NARAL Foundation regu-larly publish Who Decides? A State-by-State Review of Abortion Rights, a compilation of abortion-related information in each state, including the position on choice of elected officials, summaries of selected statutes and regulations, and recent legislative activity
NARAL worked with the Clinton adminis-tration to reverse policies of the Reagan and
GEORGE H.W BUSH administrations dealing with
abortion It helped remove bans on the testing
of RU-486 (a nonsurgical abortion method), the use of fetal tissue in scientific research, and the provision of abortion services at military hospitals NARAL also played a major role in the passage of the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, which places certain restrictions
on protestors’ ability to obstruct or hinder persons seeking access to abortion services Since 1996, when Congress enacted a bill banning the practice of partial-birth abortions, NARAL has been on the defensive Though President BILL CLINTON vetoed the bill, many states have since passed laws banning the procedure, and Congress continues to debate the issue
The election ofGEORGE W.BUSHas president
in 2000, and the gain of Republican seats in both the House and Senate in 2002, strength-ened the position of abortion opponents and gave increased urgency to the NARAL pro-choice mission NARAL helped block the appointment of Bush’s anti-choice nominee Richard Honaker to the federal bench The organization continues to fight for increased access to federal funding of abortions for poor women, federal employees, and women in the military It has mounted vigorous campaigns opposing President Bush’s judicial nominees who are opposed to abortion The organiza-tion also launched “Generation Pro-Choice,”
a Web site aimed at educating college students and younger women about their reproductive rights and encouraging them to become pro-choice advocates Since 2006 it has been instrumental in electing 44 new pro-choice members of the House and nine pro-choice senators, and supported Barack Obama’s bid for the presidency
FURTHER READING NARAL 2009 “How We Win.” Available online at http:// www.prochoiceamerica.org/about-us/how-we-win/; website home page: http://www.prochoiceamerica.org/ (accessed August 5, 2009).
CROSS REFERENCES Abortion; Fetal Rights; Women ’s Rights.
NARCOTICS ACTS Control over, and prevention of, the distribution and usage of narcotic drugs has been a major priority of the federal government and the various state governments since the early part of the
176 NARCOTICS ACTS
Trang 10twentieth century Notwithstanding these efforts,
statistics on the use of narcotics in the United
States remain startling They encompass not only
the trafficking and arrests associated with illegal
substances, but also the vast numbers associated
with illegal trafficking of legal prescription
medications In the new millennium, the exposure
of rampant use of anabolic steroids has put new
burdens on enforcement activities because these
substances are often found in non-prescription
dietary supplements formerly not subject to control
or inspection
Background
In any given year, the number of arrests and
convictions associated with the trafficking of
drugs remains startling The Justice Department’s
DRUG ENFORCEMENT ADMINISTRATION(DEA), tasked
with oversight, announced that in 2008 alone,
it had made 26,425 domestic arrests involving a
cumulative figure of over nine million
halluci-nogenic dosage units in drug seizures (This
figure actually represented a decrease in arrests
from the 29,097 reported for 2007.) The four
major drug classifications involved in the 2008
statistics were cocaine (49,823 kilograms seized);
heroin (598.6 kilograms seized); marijuana
(660,969 kilograms seized); and
methamphet-amine (1,540 kilograms seized)
According to the National Household Drug
Survey on Drug Abuse, conducted by the
ADMINISTRATION, 55.6 percent of respondents
between the ages of 18 and 25 said that they
had used illicit drugs This compares to 53.3
percent of respondents between the ages of 26
and 34, and 28.4 percent of respondents between
the ages of 12 and 17 The National Institute on
Drug Abuse’s 2002 Monitoring the Future Study
found that 53 percent of high-school seniors
claimed to have used narcotics, including 41
percent who said that they had used drugs in the
past year, and 25.4 percent who said that they
had used drugs in the past month
The efforts of law enforcement officers
have had some effect on the use and transfer
of narcotics in the past, although these
efforts have been costly In 2001 federal
agents seized approximately 1,215 metric tons
of marijuana, 106 metric tons of cocaine,
3.6 metric tons of methamphetamine, and
2.5 metric tons of heroin The costs to society
of enforcing narcotics laws have continued to
increase In 1992 the total estimated costs to
society of narcotics use was $102 billion By
2000 this number had grown to $160 billion, including almost $15 billion in health care costs
Development of Federal Narcotics Laws During the Civil War, forms of opiates were considered “miracle” drugs that could be used
as anesthetics when a doctor performed surgery
Without opiates, surgeries during that period, which often consisted of amputations, involved
a group of men holding down a patient while
a doctor sawed off the limb of a patient By the 1870s, opiates, cocaine, and other drugs were used in a variety of medical concoctions, leading
to increases in addictions
The use of opium, cocaine, and other drugs continued through most of the nineteenth century The type of addiction during that time that caused the most concern was alcoholism, and because the causes of addiction and the dangers of narcotics were both unknown, doctors recommended morphine and heroin
as remedies for addiction to alcohol Cocaine was also used in tonics, such as the first form of the mixture that became known as Coca-Cola
Moreover, patients, including those of Sigmund Freud, were treated for depression with cocaine
Congress enacted the PURE FOOD AND DRUG ACT OF 1906, ch 3915, 34 Stat 768, which formed
gave it the power to regulate food and drugs
Drug addiction began to drop as a result of early FDA regulations Eight years later, Congress enacted the Harrison Tax Act, ch 1, 38 Stat
789, which prohibited the dispensation and distribution of narcotic drugs In 1922, Con-gress enacted the Narcotics Drug Import and Export Act, ch 202, 42 Stat 596, which prohibited importation and use of opium and other narcotics except for medical purposes
Between 1922 and 1970 Congress enacted several additional laws that were designed to curb narcotics importation, trade, and use
Drugs such as marijuana and heroin were prohibited, as was the cultivation of opium poppies The Narcotic Control Act of 1956,
ch 629, 70 Stat 567, criminalized the transport
of narcotics, including marijuana Some legisla-tion began to focus upon rehabilitalegisla-tion of narcotics addicts For example, the Narcotic Addict Rehabilitation Act of 1966, Pub L No
89-793, 80 Stat 1438, provided for treatment of addicts as an alternative toINCARCERATION
NARCOTICS ACTS 177