WASHINGTON, D.C. – National Urban League president and CEO, Marc H. Morial, recently issued a statement commending the Small Business Administration’s (SBA) newly-announced efforts to increase access to federal contracting and lending opportunities for as many small businesses as possible, including minority-owned firms that have historically received a smaller share of federal procurement opportunities: “The […]
Marc Morial
Meet Jimmy Crow, Insurrectionist And Suppressor, Heir To Jim And James Crow, Esquire
Meet Jimmy Crow. You may remember Jimmy’s grandfather, Jim Crow. Jim sometimes wore a hood and a robe, and sometimes a sheriff’s badge. He administered incomprehensible “literacy tests” to Black citizens trying to register to vote. He clubbed John Lewis nearly to death on the Edmund Pettus Bridge. The n-word flowed freely from Jim’s lips. […]
Confederate Monuments and Symbols are Advertisements For a Product No One Wants Anymore#TakeEmDown, NOW
By Marc H. Morial (Be Equal #27) – Mississippi’s decision this week to eliminate a Confederate symbol from its state flag is the culmination of more than 40 years of activism, and a single step in the ongoing effort to eliminate white supremacist imagery and monuments from our public spaces. It seems at last that […]
Transformational Change Needed to Cure the Virus of Racism Infecting Local Police
By Marc H. Morial (To Be Equal #23) – Black Americans in 2020 are contending with the devastating impact of two viruses – coronavirus and racism. Five years ago, in the wake of Michael Brown’s death at the hands of Ferguson, Missouri, police, the National Urban League called for comprehensive reform of police recruitment, training […]
New Jersey Ends Prison Gerrymandering; Other States And The Federal Government Must Follow Its Example
By Marc H. Morial, (To Be Equal #4) – The Census is one of the most powerful tools the African American community has to claim our rightful voice in the political, legislative and social institutions of our nation. Unfortunately, it also is one of the most abused. One of the ways the Census is abused […]
National Urban League Vows to Oppose Housing Finance Reform That Does Not Preserve and Strengthen Homeownership Opportunities for Families of Color
By Marc H Morial, NUL (To Be Equal #36) – The United States’ long history of discriminatory mortgage policies have led to vast disparities in homeownership. Only about 41 percent of Black households are homeowners, compared to more than 73 percent of white households. The Trump Administration’s proposed reforms to federal housing finance could make […]
Attitudes About Guns Safety Are Changing, But Senate Leadership Is Mired In The Past
NEW YORK (To Be Equal #35 by Marc H. Morial) – The facts on gun safety are clear. Since 1994, background checks have blocked over 3.5 million gun sales to felons, domestic abusers, and other people who aren’t allowed to have guns under existing law. About 90 percent of Americans support background checks for all […]
Jussie Smollett Case Threatens to Distract from The Rising Tide of Hate Crime
By Marc Morial (To Be Equal #8) – This week, the Southern Poverty Law Center announced that the number of hate groups in the United States continued to rise for the fourth consecutive year in 2018. Also, this week, a television actor was arrested on charges of staging a fake racist and homophobic attack on […]
Breaking the Gubernatorial Glass Ceiling
By Marc Morial (NUL To Be Equal #35) – In the 240-year history of the United States, four African-American men have presided as the chief executive of a state or commonwealth. Only two were elected in their own right – Deval Patrick of Massachusetts, in 2006, and Douglas Wilder of Virginia, in 1989. David Paterson […]