In their opening addresses to the meeting NAACP chairman Julian Bond and the association’s president, Kweisi Mfume, underscored the significance of holding the convention in Florida. In the 2000 presidential election, Democrat Albert Gore lost by a narrow margin in Florida to Republican George Bush. Many in the Democratic party and liberal organizations like the NAACP have charged that Florida’s governor, who is the brother of the president, stole the election. George Bush was declared president when the disputed vote count in his favor was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court.

“It is of course a pleasure to be in Florida—the state whose motto is, ‘It ain’t over until your brother counts the votes,’” Bond said to cheers from the audience.

Alluding to the widespread voting rights violations against Blacks in the 2000 election, Mfume said, “There is no greater imperative than the need to protect the right of all Americans to be able to cast a free and unfettered vote…. And there is no better place to make that point than right here in the state of Florida.”

“That’s why voter registration and voter turnout must be a top priority for every branch,” Bond stated. “The countdown starts now. If a branch isn’t registering voters and isn’t preparing now for a grassroots turnout program next year, it isn’t doing its job.”

Mfume and Bond rebuked President Bush’s refusal to meet with the NAACP during his administration or to address its conventions since he took office. Mfume noted that during his election campaign Bush did address the association’s 2000 convention.

In a nonelection year, a number of Democratic candidates also hesitated to participate in a scheduled presidential debate at the convention. Six candidates did join the debate, including Senators John Kerry and John Edwards, who decided to attend at the last moment. Senators Joseph Lieberman and Reps. Richard Gephardt and Dennis Kucinich did not show up. Mfume scorned the three saying they have “become persona non-grata” and that their “political capital is now equivalent to confederate dollars.” The three candidates did attend the convention on its final day, and were allowed to explain their absence from the debate.  
 
Will use high court ruling
Bond allotted a substantial portion of his remarks to the recent Supreme Court decision upholding the use of race in affirmative action programs. “The Court struck down the points but upheld the principle,” he stated. “The Court gave legal sanction to what we knew to be morally, socially, and educationally correct.” Bond said that the other important reason the convention was being held in Miami was to underscore the association’s plans to use the Supreme Court’s Michigan decision to challenge state legislative and gubernatorial executive orders that have abolished affirmative action programs. Among these is the One Florida Initiative, an executive order Florida governor John Ellis Bush signed in 2000, which abolished affirmative action programs in state education.

Noting the steady trends of re-segregation of Florida’s public schools, Bond denounced the governor’s “Talented 20 Program.” This “race neutral” alternative to affirmative action supposedly guarantees admission to Florida’s university system of the top 20 students from each high-school graduating class. These programs “depend for any success on continued racial segregation in high school,” Bond said, “and do nothing to increase minority enrollments in private colleges or graduate and professional schools.”

Directly addressing the governor, Bond said the NAACP will “monitor commitment to the Supreme Court’s endorsement of race as a tool in achieving diversity.”

“Just as the ultra-right-wing conservatives brought litigation against…affirmative action programs,” Mfume stated in his remarks, “the NAACP is preparing to bring law suit after law suit against every college and university that refuses to comply with and abide by the new law of the land.”

The convention proceedings featured a rally in support of affirmative action that was attended by 700 mostly young people who are members of the NAACP Youth and Colleges Division.

The NAACP leaders also castigated the U.S. administration’s policy toward Africa and labeled President Bush’s five-day trip to Africa as an “exotic photo-op presidential visit.”

“We find it peculiar, and we are perplexed, that the president can travel across the great oceans to meet with legitimate black leaders but refuses to meet with legitimate black leaders in America,” Mfume said. Bond called for cancellation of Africa’s “unsustainable and largely illegitimate debt,” and added that “Africa deserves her fair share of trade and aid.”  
 
Push for U.S. intervention in Liberia
An unscheduled plenary session featured Democratic Party politician Jesse Jackson, who was introduced as “Special Envoy to Africa” during William Clinton’s administration. “We have an obligation to help Liberia,” Jackson said. “We turned our back on the legitimate government in Liberia when it was overthrown by Sgt. Samuel Doe. He was then fêted at the White House by Ronald Reagan. And the tragedy in Liberia today is the result of that policy.”

At the end of Jackson’s talk the convention passed a special resolution calling on the White House to deploy U.S. troops to lead a “peacekeeping” force in Liberia.

Mfume and Bond also reiterated the group’s opposition to the disparate treatment of Haitian and Cuban immigrants. The convention passed a resolution entitled, “Justice for Detained Haitian Asylum Seekers.” Hundreds of Haitian immigrants have been held at immigration facilities here since last fall.

During the discussion a delegate from Miami likened the treatment of Haitians to that of African slaves. “Husbands and wives are separated, even the children are held in separate facilities,” she said.

Diplomats from seven Caribbean nations participated in a plenary on the region. Introducing them, Mfume said, “The Free Trade Agreement is not a Fair Trade Agreement. It has devastated the fruit and sugar industries throughout much of the Caribbean.”

Colin Granderson, Assistant Secretary General of the Caribbean Economic Community (CARICOM), outlined the group’s deteriorating relations with Washington. “The implementation of FTAA will result in loss of tariffs income which can amount to as much as 55 percent of revenues to pay basic government operating expenses,” Granderson said. “In addition, we opposed Washington’s unilateral war against Iraq, and the unfair treatment of Haitian immigrants.” He reported that Washington has discontinued military assistance to CARICOM member states because of their refusal to sign bilateral agreements with the United States exempting U.S. citizens from being charged and tried in the International Court in The Hague.

A number of delegates applauded as Granderson expressed opposition to Washington’s economic war against Cuba. “We are against a policy of isolation of Cuba,” said the CARICOM official. Representatives from Cuba had been invited to participate in the panel but no explanation was given for their absence. Since April, Cuban diplomats in the United States have not been allowed to travel outside the Interstate 495 beltway that surrounds Washington, D.C. The only exception is strictly consular business, as determined by the U.S. State Department.

Two people identifying themselves as Cubans wandered through the convention corridors distributing a flyer that said: “Black Cubans Welcome NAACP. Join us for a solemn vigil to honor human rights activists in Cuba.” Neither of them was Black. They did not get a friendly reception—most delegates refused to take the flyers or discarded them.  
 
 
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