Institutionalization, 1977-80

In spring 1978, TransAfrica, a lobbying organization dedicating to amplifying African Americans’ voices in U.S. foreign policy debates, opened its D.C. office under Executive Director Randal Robinson. A former Administrative Assistant to Rep. Charles Diggs, Robinson had the backing of the Congressional Black Caucus and a broad coalition of activists, elected officials, and academics who had been working on issues concerning southern Africa for most of the previous decade. TransAfrica grew out of the 1976 Black Forum on Foreign Policy Leadership Conference where attendees expressed a need for a 'outside' pressure group that could complement the Congressional Black Caucus’ efforts ‘inside’ Congress. Its first policy initiative was to push the Carter Administration to take a stronger stand against white minority rule in South Africa and Rhodesia. When the Ronald Reagan Administration struck a more cooperative stance toward South Africa, TransAfrica moved from public criticism and lobbying to direct action. In 1981, Robinson released confidential memorandums between the South African Government and the State Department, exposing a scheme to normalize relations with South Africa if it granted independence to Namibia. In 1983, it worked with D.C. lawmakers to pass legislation that would divest the city of any investments in South Africa. And in 1984, TransAfrica was a founding member of the Free South Africa Movement which staged a year-long picket outside the South African Embassy. Meanwhile, the group worked closely with members of Congress to introduce sanctions legislation, which eventually passed in 1986 over President Reagan’s veto. TransAfrica would use the notoriety it received from the anti-apartheid struggle to raise money and expand. In 1993, the group purchased a stately, turn-of-the-century mansion at 1744 R Street NW, a demonstration that it had arrived as a Washington institution. TransAfrica’s newfound acceptance did not blunt its advocacy. In 1994, Robinson staged a twenty-seven day hunger strike to protest U.S. policy toward Haiti and, the follow year, criticized the military government of Suni Abacha of Nigeria. These stands cost the organization donations but Robinson nonetheless left it with an impressive endowment when he retired in 2001, handing the reins to labor organizer Bill Fletcher. Despite this bequest, in the early 21st century TransAfrica declined as the African Americans foreign policy consensus on Africa began to fall apart. The organization struggled to raise money and affect policy until 2014 when it dissolved.

Sources: “New Lobby of Blacks Will Seek to Influence U.S. Policy in Africa,” Washington Post, Apr 22, 1978. “A Black Political Group Set Up as Africa Lobby,” Washington Post, May 21, 1978. “Documents Link Namibia Solution To Better U.S. Ties to South Africa,” New York Times, May 30, 1981. “D.C. acts against firms that invest in S. Africa,” Afro-American, Mar 19, 1983. “Three Arrested at S. African Embassy,” Boston Globe, November 22, 1984. “Blacks Form 'Free S. Africa Movement,'” Washington Post, Nov 24, 1984. “Working Profile; Lobbyist with a Target: South Africa,” New York Times, Dec 8, 1984. “Building A Movement To Last,” Washington Post, June 5, 1993. “Robinson Begins Push for Democracy in Nigeria” Black Issues in Higher Education v12, i4 (Apr 20, 1995): 27. “Here's to You, Mr. Robinson,” Washington Post, Dec 4, 2001. Ronald Williams, A Black Embassy, forthcoming from UNC Press.

On May 28, 1977, several thousand people turned out for African Liberation Day, though they did not all attend the same event. Over the course of the previous two years, the robust, ideologically diverse Black Power coalition that had organized the first three African Liberation Days had splintered into warring factions. At the core of their disputes were strategic disagreements between nationalists and different groups of Marxist-Leninists. While the All African People’s Revolutionary Party, which had staged the 1976 African Liberation Day, called for African Americans to create an all-black organization to fight for the liberation of Africa, the African Liberation Support Committee (in coalition with the majority white Revolutionary Youth League) had adopted Marxism-Leninism and welcomed participation from white activists. The AAPRP rallied in the southern end of the park while the African Liberation Support Committee gathered at the northern end along Euclid Street, NW. The African Liberation Support Coalition, a third group led by Abdul Alkalimat, a Chicago activist who had recently broken from the AAPRP, rallied in Kalorama Park before marching to Lafayette Park. The leaders of all three groups criticized the others. Ture called the organizers of the competing rallies "political amateurs," while Alkalimat dismissed Ture as a "narrow" nationalist. Amiri Baraka, the Newark activist who had been a driving force behind the African Liberation Support Committee, later wrote a friend that Alkalimat and Ture's events were "phony demos to help the bourgeoise confuse the people." The AAPRP event was easily the largest of the three, both because it drew on the group's nationwide network (rally goers were bussed in from AAPRP chapters as far away as Boston) and its excellent cultural programing. Sun Ra performed at the AAPRP rally.

Sources: “A Great Day for Rallies,” Washington Post, May 29, 1977. “African Liberation draws thousands to nation's capital,” Bay State Banner, June 2, 1977. “African Liberation Day scheduled” Bay State Banner, May 4, 1978. Amiri Baraka to Richard Gibson, June 1, 1977, Richard T. Gibson Papers MS 2302 Series 1, Box 12, Folder 4: correspondence with Amiri Baraka.

On August 5, 1977, Tanzanian President Julius Nyerere visited Howard University where President James Cheek presented him with an honorary doctorate. Speaking to an overflow crowd at Cramton Auditorium, with many of the activists who had worked with him on Six-PAC seated in the audience, Nyerere delivered "The Plea of the Poor: New Economic Order Needed for the World Community." The speech was a wide-ranging call for a restructuring of the world political economy to address poverty. "The poor are not poor because of their own actions or inactions,” Nyerere declared, “but rather because of years of exploitation, racism, and apartheid." The event, which coincided with his state visit with President Jimmy Carter, was organized by the Committee in Solidarity with the Embassy of Tanzania.

Sources: "Tanzania's Nyerere to see Carter on African, international issues," Afro-American, Aug 6, 1977. "Nyerere Addresses Overflow Crowd At Howard Univ.," Sun Reporter (San Francisco), Aug 25, 1977. Julius Nyerere, "The Plea of The Poor: New Economic Order Needed For the World Community," New Directions, Vol. 4: Iss. 4, Article 8. http://dh.howard.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1600&context=newdirections.

The Black Leadership Forum (BLF) was founded in August of 1977 at a meeting called by Urban League President Vernon Jordan. The group comprised the CEO’s of approximately sixteen national black organizations - among them Dorothy Height, Coretta Scott King, Walter Fauntroy, and Jesse Jackson - and aimed to "monitor, protect and ensure" the gains of African Americans in the post-civil rights era. Operating as a kind of African American board of directors, the BLF hoped to engage in a dialogue with the president and other national leaders, and support federal policies regarding racial equity. For instance, in a 1983 mailgram to Ronald Reagan, the group asked the President to fire Secretary of Interior James Watt, who had made unsavory comments regarding the racial and gender composition of a new commission on coal in the United States. The mailgram stated: "The increasing latitude which is being given to the expression of bigotry in our society cannot be divorced from the license provided by the tolerance with which such flagrant behavior, as Mr. Watts continues to exhibit, is accepted in high places." Though the BLF continues to exist today, it is much diminished from its high point of the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Sources: "Hooks Elected to Black Leadership Forum,” The Skanner (Portland, OR), February 13, 1980. “Lowery Heads Black Leadership Forum,” Atlanta Daily Star, March 30, 1982. “Black Leadership Forum Vows to Guard Black Gains,” Baltimore Afro-American, October 15, 1983. “Black Leadership Forum to React to Texaco Plan on Affirmative Action,” New York Amsterdam News, December 21, 1996. “Black Leadership Forum’s Think Tank,” Atlanta Inquirer, December 6, 1997. Southern Christian Leadership Conference Records / MSS 1083, Emory University Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library, Box 141, folder 13, Minutes "Summit conference of black leaders" November 4, 1977. The memo is stamped "confidential."

The Roots Activity Learning Center is an independent school founded in 1977 by former D.C. Public School teacher Bernida Thompson. With its Afrocentric curriculum, the school offered classes for students in pre-kindergarten through 8th grade and hosted over 100 students each year during the 1980s and 1990s. Using the seven principles of the Nguzo Saba, teachers treated all grades like part of a large family, where older students helped to teach younger students. In 1995-6 a contractor doing construction adjacent to the school collapsed its outer wall then refused to pay for the damage, forcing the school into protracted litigation. In 1999, the organization founded a separate charter school. Roots continues to operate from its original location at 6222 North Capital Street, NW today.

Sources: "Pride, heritage and values." Washington Post, Nov 20, 1988. “Chavis joins fight for Roots school,” Afro-American Red Star, Nov 18, 1995. https://www.rootsactivitylc.org/.

The National Black Leadership Roundtable (NBLR) was founded in 1977 on the recommendation of the Congressional Black Caucus Political Brain Trust, then headed by Walter Fauntroy. Its purpose was to create a mechanism for black leaders to meet periodically and coordinate their activities on behalf of the national black community. Initially the NBLR operated as a "loosely organized, unstaffed body, with the Congressional Black Caucus acting as its secretariat," according to one official history. After the Black Leadership Family released its 1982 "PLAN for the Unity, Survival, and Progress of Black People," the group established the NBLR as a formal body to carry out the plan's mandates. Subsequently, the NBLR evolved into what Del. Walter Fauntroy called a "parliament for… national Black organizations [300 were members at its height] to debate issues of critical concern to the black community and to develop and implement collective projects that address these issues." Between 1984 and 1987, the NBLR hosted black leadership summits at Howard University Law School to craft plans for carrying out the Plan’s mandates. In 1984 and again in 1986, the group conducted voter education and mobilization work in choice states where the black vote had the potential to be the margin of victory. Its 1986 efforts were decisive in securing Democratic control of the Senate for the first time since 1980. Though the organization was closed in 1990, Fauntroy attempted to revive it in 1997. The new iteration of the group lasted for approximately ten years and operated primarily as a personal political base for Fauntroy.

Sources: “Open letter to Reagan, Amsterdam News, Sep 21, 1985. “Some Senators Won Because Of Blacks, NBLR Members Say,” Washington Informer, Nov. 19, 1986. “The Roundtable Returns!” Washington Informer, Sept 24, 1997. Walter E. Fauntroy papers, Special Collections Research Center, The George Washington University, Box 422, Folder 3, "National black Leadership Roundtable 1984 Voter Registration Get out the vote national drive and optional national tours." Walter E. Fauntroy papers, Special Collections Research Center, The George Washington University, Box 155, Folder undated, "A Call for a Black Leadership Conference on the Unity, Survival, and Progress of Black America."

The National Organization of Black University and College Students (NOBUCS) was a national network of black college students that advocated for increased federal support for HBCUs. Founded at Howard University in 1977, the organization grew quickly, boasting 9,000 members within two years. The following year, it partnered with Howard School of Communications professor Tony Brown, the National Association for Equal Opportunity in Higher Education, and the United Negro College Fund to stage a "Black College Day" march down Pennsylvania Ave. calling for increased Department of Education funding for HBCUs. The crowd of 10,000 students and supporters demonstrated the ideological complexity of the sprawling and diverse organization, whose chapters ranged from Pan-Africanist to integrationist and neo-Marxist to pro-capitalist. The public reaction to the march was mixed. The Howard student newspaper and the Howard University Student Association raised ideological and strategic objections to the event. The Ronald Reagan campaign, hoping to use the march to deflect charges of racism, endorsed it and promised to send a "high level representative." In the early 1980s, the Howard chapter of NOBUCS engaged the black nationalist politics roiling the District. In 1983, the group hosted Louis Farrakhan for one of his may visits to campus. On this occasion, the Minister endorsed the Jesse Jackson campaign for president. After 1984, the organization witnessed a steep decline. It was defunct by 1987.

Sources: "Controversial March For Black Colleges," Washington Post, Sept. 29, 1980. Joshua Myers, We Are Worth Fighting For (2019), 69 and 76-88.

The Harambee Hotel opened on March 7, 1978 at the corner of Georgia Ave. and Bryant Street NW. The hotel, named using the Swahili word for unity, was a project of D.C. businessman and restaurateur Ed Murphy. The hotel’s initial funding came through the People’s Involvement Corporation, an anti-poverty program that secured the hotel a $7.2 million loan through the federal Economic Development Administration. Using the language and collective appeal of Black Power business, Murphy insisted that his goal was less to make money than to provide friendly service and create jobs for neighborhood residents. The hotel was initially a success, drawing a diverse base of customers and employing roughly 200 people, nearly all of whom were African American. Yet after only one year, the hotel began experiencing major financial issues. In 1981, the Economic Development Administration terminated the hotel’s lease. Later that year, the property was sold to Howard University to be run as the Howard University Inn and site of the University’s hotel administration program.

Sources: “Harambee Sold to Howard For $1.3 Million,” Washington Post, March 11, 1981 “Harambee Hotel Off to Good Start,” Washington Post, July 9, 1978.

The All African People’s Revolutionary Party hosted African Liberation Day on the last weekend in May in Malcolm X Park from 1978-91. The event became standardized during this period. Attendees, many bussed in from AAPRP chapters in other states, dressed all in white to, in the organizers’ words, symbolize “purity, justice, and peace.” A small contingent would stage a short march through Adams Morgan or down to embassy row in the morning, before retiring to the park for speeches and entertainment. The crowd patronized the African American vendors who set up on either side of the large lawn in the northern section of the park, selling books, food, wax cloth, shea butter and incense, while Kwame Ture, or his representative, Bob Brown, exhorted them to join the AAPRP. In between the speeches, attendees were entertained by the likes of South African trumpeter Hugh Masekela (1979) or the African Heritage Dancers and Drummers (1983). His dominance of the event secure, Ture used the proceeding to settle old ideological scores. In 1986, for instance, he gave reporters a self-congratulatory history of African Liberation Day that denigrated the African Liberation Support Committee. Arguing that his mentor and former President of Ghana Kwame Nkrumah started African Liberation Day in 1958, Ture claimed that celebrations in the United States were haphazard and spontaneous until his AAPRP took control of the D.C. rally a decade before. “Opportunists tried to steal it,” Ture stated, “But now they are not around which reveals their insincerity.” Attendance stayed high through the early 1980s, likely in response to African Americans’ concern over the Reagan Administration’s support for South Africa, counterrevolutionary forces in the frontline states, and the invasion of Grenada. One thousand five hundred marched in 1979; 1000 in 1980; 3,000 in 1981; 3,000 in 1983; 700 in 1984; and 2,000 in 1985. Though the local press does not offer crowd estimates for much of late 1980s, the available figures suggest that attendance dropped significantly. In 1986, the Post reported that “several hundred,” attended the event, while only 200 came out on May 26, 1990. The later turned out to be the second to last African Liberation Day in the District, winding down a tumultuous but impressive nineteen-year run.

Sources: “Africa is the focus for Washington rallies,” Bay State Banner, May 10, 1979. “African Liberation Day draws over 1500 to D.C.” Bay State Banner, May 31, 1979. “Photo Standalone 1,” Washington Post, May 25, 1980. “Around the Globe,” Washington Informer, May 15, 1980. “African Liberation Day Nears,” Washington Post, May 21, 1981. “3,000 Marchers Celebrate African Liberation Day,” Washington Post, May 24, 1981. “Parades and Picnics Draw Stay-in-Towners,” Washington Post, May 29, 1983. “Town and Around,” Washington Informer, June 1, 1983. “700 Celebrate African Liberation Day,” Washington Post, May 27, 1984. “Freedom Rally Held: Apartheid Protested at Event For African Liberation Day,” Washington Post, May 26, 1985. "African Liberation Day--no picnic,” Afro-American, Jun 7, 1986. “Celebration of African Unity,” Washington Post, May 27, 1990. “Think Globally, Party Locally,” Washington Post,  April 5, 1991.

The Southern Africa Support Project (SASP) was a local organizing and fundraising group founded by D.C. activists in June 1978. It conducted public information events about white minority rule in Namibia, Zimbabwe, and South Africa and the destabilizing effects of these governments on the independent "frontlines states" of Mozambique, Angola, Zambia, Botswana, and Tanzania. To educate the D.C. community about events in these countries, it organized "Southern Africa Week" where it staged public lectures, films and other educational events starting in 1978. Each year the week was named after a country. In 1980 the group held Zimbabwe Week, and in 1981 Namibia Week. During these weeks, SASP also held radiothons (on WHUR and WPFW), danceathons (sometimes featuring Go-Go bands Rare Essence and Junkyard), and races to raise money and collect supplies for the frontline states and insurgent groups like the African National Congress. Often the group held their fundraisers at Freedom Plaza to gain maximum visibility, and members of the D.C. Council would stop by to make statements of solidarity. In 1986, for instance, the group collected $6,000 for medical supplies for women and children in the South West African People’s Organization camps in Angola. "In essence" former SASP chairwoman Sylvia Hill recalls of these events, "our strategy was to center the struggle in the mainstream of black political life." The group was never large - it had about twenty core members at its height and members often met around each other’s kitchen tables – but it was packed with seasoned activists who had worked in the Temporary Secretariat for Six-PAC, the Center for Black Education, and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. It also worked with other groups to expand its reach. SASP organizers collaborated with members of the D.C. Council to secure D.C. divestment from South Africa, TransAfrica to stage the year-long picket outside the South African Embassy, and members of the Congressional Black Caucus to pass sanctions legislation in Congress. The group operated through 1991. All in all, it had raised $200,000 for southern African freedom struggles in thirteen years.

Sources: "Heartfelt Outpouring for Mandela; Anti-Apartheid Activists, Public Energized by Today's Visit," Washington Post, June 24, 1990. Maize Woodford, "Glossary of Organizations," The Black Scholar, Vol. 36, No. 1 (SPRING 2006), pp. 63-69. Southern Africa Support Project Report, (1984). Sylvia Hill, Interview by William Minter, Washington, D.C., August 12, 2004 http://www.noeasyvictories.org/interviews/int16_hill.php. Southern African News Vol 1. No. 5 Feb/ March 1980.

On January 15, 1979, approximately 500 D.C. residents gathered in freezing temperatures for the first Anacostia Martin Luther King Jr. Day parade, which coincided with the fiftieth anniversary of the slain civil rights leader’s birth. The District government declared the day a city holiday and all nonessential government employees and schoolchildren had the day off. Capitalizing on the city’s support, Ward 8 Councilwoman Wilhelmina Rolark organized a memorial parade along Martin Luther King Jr. Ave. between the Curtis Building and Covenant Baptist United Church. Her husband, and leader of the United Black Fund, Calvin Rolark, served as the grand marshal and Mayor Marion Barry delivered the keynote address at a memorial service in Covenant Baptist that afternoon. Though small in its first year, the parade ballooned in size in 1980 when Stevie Wonder served as grand marshal. Riding in a vintage convertible Cadillac in unseasonably warm 55 degree weather, the singer of "Happy Birthday" drew between 10,000 and 15,000 to Martin Luther King Ave. SE. That afternoon Dick Gregory, Mayor Barry, and Rep. Ronald Dellums of California joined the memorial service at Covenant Baptist. Thus established, the parade has remained a vital element of the city’s Martin Luther King Jr. Day celebrations down to the present.

Sources: “Martin Luther King Birthday Features Memorials, Parade,” Washington Post, Jan 15, 1979. “King Legacy Recalled: Children Assess Legacy of Dr. King,” Washington Post, Jan 16, 1979. “D.C. to Note King Birthday,” Evening Star, January 14, 1980. “D.C. Celebrates King Birthday.” Evening Star, January 16, 1980. “Stevie Wonder helps lure 10,000 for King memorial.” Baltimore Afro-American, January 26, 1980.

The D.C. Bank Campaign was a research and protest organization created in 1979. Working with the Washington Office on Africa, the United Church of Christ Task Force on Southern Africa, and Non-Intervention in Chile, the D.C. Bank Campaign published a report in summer 1979 showing that Riggs Bank made over 75% of its home purchase and improvement loans to predominantly white areas of the city and only 24% in predominantly African American areas. The report moved the D.C. Comptroller to begin an investigation into potential lending discrimination by D.C. banks. Noting that the bank also offered credits of up to $73 million to the Chilean military, $10 million to the Argentine military, and had made over $7 million in loans to the South African government or private companies in that country between 1973 and 1978, organizers called on D.C. residents to stage a mass withdrawal of their funds. On June 16, 1979, the third anniversary of the Soweto student uprising, the group commenced its withdrawal campaign. Twenty individuals and four organizations closed their accounts on that day, withdrawing more than $44,000. Into the early 1980s, the D.C. Bank Campaign continued to pressure local institutions to divest from South Africa. In March 1980, the group picketed outside the Riggs shareholder meeting. In May 1981, the group worked with the Southern Africa Support Project, TransAfrica, the Washington Office on Africa, and the National Black Political Party (D.C. Chapter) to stage a raucous protest in Lafayette Park when Secretary of State Alexander Haig met with South African Foreign Minister Pik Botha. There are no news reports on the group after 1981.

Sources: “Riggs Target Of Protest,” Washington Informer, Jun 27, 1979. “Mayor's Africa Trip Touches Off Debate: Trip Sparks Controversy,” Washington Post, Jul 5, 1979. “Riggs Bank Stands Firm On Its Lending Policy,” Washington Informer, Aug 23, 1979. “Cites Recession Dangers: Burke Cites Dangers Of Global Recession,” Washington Post, Mar 13, 1980. “Comptroller Staging Major Review of Mortgage Lending,” Washington Post, Apr 4, 1980. “Protest Against Botha Visit,” Washington Informer, May 21, 1981.

The National Conference of Artists, a twenty-two year old organization of 1,000 black artists, held its national conference in Washington, D.C. in April 1980. The week of festivities began on April 2 when President Jimmy Carter hosted 300 black artists in the East Room of the White House. There, at the urging of the NCA organizer Barbara Hudson, he singled out ten elder black artists - Richmond Barthe, Romare Bearden, Margaret Burroughs, Ernest Crichlow, Lois Mailou Jones, Jacob Lawrence, Archibald J. Motley, James L. Wells, Charles White, and Hale Woodruff – for special recognition. In the following week, the NAC’s activities blanketed the city. Mayor Marion Barry declared the week Afro-American Visual Artists’ Week. The Corcoran Gallery staged exhibits of the ten artists honored at the White House; the Martin Luther King Jr. Library hosted a showcase of young African American artists; and the Women’s Art Center hosted an event featuring black women artists, among nearly two dozen other events. The conference would seed several of the black art galleries that would dot the District in the next decade.

Sources: “Black Artists - Vivid Scenes and Urban Images,” Evening Star (Published as the Washington Star), April 2, 1980. “The Art of Clout: 1,000 Blacks Who ‘Happen to be Artists,” Washington Post, April 3, 1980. “Uncovering an Afro-American Treasure-Trove,” Washington Post, Mar 14, 1980.