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May 23, 2012
®** ÿ o rtla n ô (Observer
Page II
NAACP Endorses Marriage Equality
Activists stand
against same-sex
discrimination
(AP) — NAACP President Ben
jam in Jealous said M onday he
hopes the group's resolution sup
porting same-sex marriage will en
courage blacks to support marriage
equality as a civil right.
At a meeting of the 103-year-old
civil rights group’s board of direc
tors on Saturday, the organization
voted to support marriage equality
as a continuation of its historic
Benjamin Jealous
commitment to equal protection
under the law. The resolution was help ensure that our country's more
approved about two weeks after recent tradition of using federal and
P resid en t B arack O bam a a n state constitutions to expand rights
nounced his support for gay mar continues, we will be very proud of
riage.
our work."
"I hope this will be a game-
Jealous struggled to speak while
changer," Jealous told The Asso recalling how his white father and
ciated Press in an interview. "There black mother confronted marriage
is a game being played right now to laws that forced them to marry in
enshrine discrimination into state Washington, D.C., in 1966 because
constitutions across the country, interracial marriage was illegal in
and if we can change that game and Maryland and his mother’s home
Census Shows Racial Changes
might take decades to overcome,"
For the first
Harrison said.
As a whole, the nation's minor
time, majority
ity population continues to rise,
following a higher-than-expected
bom are
Hispanic count in the 2010 census.
Minorities increased 1.9 percent to
non-white
114.1 million, or 36.6 percent of the
(AP) - For the first time, racial
and ethnic minorities make up more
than half the children bom in the
U.S., capping decades of heady
immigration growth that is now
slowing.
New 2011 census estimates high
light sw eeping changes in the
nation's racial makeup and the pro
longed impact of a weak economy,
which is now resulting in fewer
Hispanics entering the U.S.
"This is an important landmark, "
said Roderick Harrison, a former
chief of racial statistics at the Cen
sus Bureau who is now a sociolo
gist at Howard University. "This
generation is growing up much more
accustomed to diversity than its
elders."
The report comes as the Supreme
Court prepares to rule on the legal
ity of Arizona's strict immigration
law, with many states weighing simi
lar get-tough measures.
"We remain in a dangerous pe
riod where those appealing to anti
immigration elements are fueling a
divisiveness and hostility that
e e• t • w« • • r
r T
total U.S. population, lifted by prior
waves of immigration that brought
in young families and boosted the
number of Hispanic women in their
prime childbearing years.
But a recent slowdow n in the
growth o f the Hispanic and Asian
populations is shifting notions
on when the tipping point in U.S.
diversity will come — the time
when non-H ispanic whites be
come a m inority. A fter 2010 cen
sus results suggested a cross
over as early as 2040, dem ogra
phers now believe the pivotal
m oment may be pushed back sev
eral years when new projections
are released in December.
The annual growth rates for His
panics and Asians fell sharply last
year to just over 2 percent, roughly
half the rates in 2000 and the lowest
in more than a decade. The black
growth rate stayed flat at 1 percent.
Minorities made up roughly 2.02
million, or 50.4 percent of U.S. births
in the 12-month period ending July
2011. That compares with 37 per
cent in 1990.
«eoe«
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town of Baltimore until 1967. Jeal
ous noted that the civil rights orga
nization has opposed laws barring
gay marriage in the past.
"What has changed is that this
is the first time that we have made
a full statement on marriage equal
ity that goes beyond the circum
stances of any one proposed law or
any one state," Jealous said.
Roslyn Brock, who chairs the
NAACP board of directors, empha
sized that the resolution focused
on marriage equality in the eyes of
government, not religion.
"As the nation's leading and old
est civil rights organization, it is not
our role, nor our intent, to express
how any place of worship should act
in its own house," Brock said.
Same-sex marriage is legal in six
states and the District of Columbia,
but 31 states have passed amend
ments to ban it in their constitu
tions. The federal government also
doesn’t recognize gay marriages
under the Defense of Marriage Act.
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