NAACP chairman Bond revisits the 'dream'

Julian Bond once took a class at Morehouse College in Georgia taught by the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Today, the civil rights activist and chairman of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People is dedicated to upholding the principles for which the legendary King once fought.

"We were never intimate friends," Bond said in an interview yesterday. "But I saw him frequently during the civil rights movements. I had a great deal of admiration and respect for him."

After serving 21 years in the Georgia legislature, Bond is now a history professor at the University of Virginia and a Distinguished Professor at American University in Washington, D.C. He holds 19 honorary degrees and was the founder of the Atlanta student sit-in and anti-segregation organization in 1960.

From his observations as a professor, Bond said the average college student today is not as aggressive in working to improve race relations as in the 1960s.

"College students today are active in a tremendous variety of things," he said, "but they tend to be soft things like Habitat for Humanity and collecting clothes for the homeless. Not to say those are not honorable pursuits, but students of my generation challenged society."

"I'm not saying that students today are inactive, I'm just saying the kinds of things students are doing are more social service than social justice, and there is a real need out there for advocates for social justice."

Bond said he does not think the spirit of King lives on at the University in African-American students to the degree it should.

"I don't see the level of active engagement like he would have pursued," Bond said. "Everyone sees the 1963 'I have a dream' Martin Luther King," he said, "but he lived five more years after that speech. He became a vigorous political critic, and was much more aggressive."

Bond, who in his college years helped to form the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, talked about the progress the University has made during the last three decades.

"Princeton is a much better place now than was true in 1957," he said,."I wouldn't have been invited to speak here then."

Bond said he believes the University is working to improve race relations. Asked whether he thought University students could further pursue racial equality, he said, "I know they can and I hope they will."

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Bond said affirmative action in school admissions and other institutions was a worthwhile program but argued that affirmative action by itself only preserves the present state of racial inequality. He addressed the issue last night in a speech he gave to a packed McCosh 50 auditorium.

"Look at it this way, it's the fourth quarter of a football game between a white team and a black team. The white team is ahead 145-3. They have been cheating since the game began. The white team owns the ball, the uniforms, the field, the goal posts and the referee. All of a sudden the white quarterback feels badly about things that happened before he entered the game, and turns to the black team and says, 'Hey, can't we just play fair?' "

Bond also offered some insight into the failed presidential candidacy of Bill Bradley '65. While asserting that the NAACP is an impartial organization, he remarked that Bradley's lack of support from the African-American community came down to a lack of action on Bradley's part. "Bradley talked about race, and Gore actually did things about race, and for people who follow race relations, that made all the difference," he said.

Bond said the United States still must take steps to end racial discrimination. "Jim Crowe may be dead, but John Rocker is alive and well. Racism is a central fact of life for every non-white American."