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November 9th, 2009

Posted By Mel Gagarin | November 9th, 2009 | Category: Media Watch | No Comments » Print This Post Print This Post

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LDF News and Media Today:

A sampling of Race, Justice, Equality and Democracy in the news.

Deputy White House Counsel to Leave for Anti-Poverty Job

Butts was general counsel to the presidential transition that began a year ago. Previously, she was a senior vice president at the liberal Center for American Progress and a top aide to then-presidential candidate and House Majority Leader Dick Gephardt (D-Mo.). She has also been an assistant counsel to the NAACP Legal Defense & Educational Fund.

Supreme Court to Hear Arguments on Sentencing Juveniles to Life Without Parole

Many civil rights groups, academics, and social scientists have spoken out against these sentencing practices. Charles Ogletree, who filed a brief for the NAACP Legal Defense & Education Fund in support of Graham and Sullivan, said that the Court should apply the same logic to these case it used to decide Roper v. Simmons, which struck down capital punishment for minors as unconstitutional.

After 40 Years, Age Discrimination Still Gets Second-Class Treatment

The sole dissenter was Justice Thurgood Marshall, who had been a legendary litigator for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund. Older people, Justice Marshall said, are not in the same category as blacks when it comes to discrimination. They are not “isolated in society,” he noted, and there are even laws according them special benefits.

Newark students design ornaments depicting American landmarks for White House Christmas tree

The Chancellor Avenue students were chosen for the assignment by a White House urban policy staff member, Alaina Beverly, who is a former associate of Chancellor Vice Principal Charity Haygood and her husband, Ryan Haygood, a lawyer for the NAACP’s Legal Defense Fund.

Ga. man handles civil rights

Edward DuBose is beginning his third consecutive term as president of the Georgia State Conference of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.

No refuge when innocent are framed

Some U.S. Supreme Court members reacted with confusion bordering on dismay at arguments for dismissing a suit against former Pottawattamie County prosecutors accused of conspiring to put two men in prison for 25 years for a murder they did not commit. Other members of the court, however, were troubled at the prospect of a ruling that might expose every prosecutor in the country to personal liability every time a defendant is convicted.

Persistence pays at polls, but how many give up?

Voting should always be non-negotiable to African Americans. For much of this nation’s history, black people were kept from participating in the democratic process. Poll taxes, literacy tests, grandfather clauses and violence kept people of color from voting.

Philadelphia to Pay $5.9 Million to Settle Strip-Search Claims

A federal judge has approved a $5.9 million settlement in the civil rights suit challenging Philadelphia’s blanket policy of strip-searching every person admitted into the city’s prison system.

Imprisoning a Child for Life

The United States could be the only nation in the world where a 13-year-old child can be sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole, even for crimes that do not include murder. This grim distinction should trouble Americans deeply, as should all of the barbaric sentencing policies for children that this country embraces but that most of the world has abandoned.

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