BY DR. BENJAMIN CHAVIS   In recognition of the 75th Anniversary of the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA), I believe it is important to emphasize both the historical and contemporary mission, value and success of the Black Press in America. For the past 188 years Black Americans have labored diligently and responsibly to publish and distribute Black-owned newspapers in the interests of m ...

    SENS. BURR AND TILLIS AMONG THE 47 GOP’ERS WHO SIGNED IRAN LETTER [WASHINGTON, D.C] Among the 47 Republican US senators who signed and sent a open letter to the Iranian government in hope of crippling Pres. Obama’s negotiations over their nuclear capabilities, were North Carolina senators Richard Burr and Thom Tillis. Burr is the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee. The letter, sp ...

BY REV. JESSE JACKSON President Obama marked the 50th anniversary of Selma by celebrating the ordinary heroes who sacrificed so much to make America better. Noting that nearly 100 members of Congress were in the audience, he urged them to return to Washington to strengthen the Voting Rights Act, weakened by the ill-considered decision of five conservative Supreme Court Justices in Shelby County v. Holder. ...

BY HARRY ALFORD The communications network of the National Black Chamber of Commerce has evolved along with the Internet. When we first started back in the late 1980s, we would write and print out letters through a pinwheel printer. To print out 50 copies of a letter would take about an hour. Then, we would mail the 50 letters and wait a couple of days for them to reach our database. Before long, we would d ...

BY DR. BENJAMIN CHAVIS, JR. The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) report on the Ferguson, Mo. Police Department sheds a brighter light on a serious racial injustice malignancy that is not isolated or unique to that besieged city. What the Justice Department concluded in Ferguson, after months of intense investigation, exposes a systematic pattern of injustice and inequality that can actually be found in many ...

BY GEORGE CURRY Lyndon B. Johnson has done more to help African Americans and poor people than any modern president. But his defenders are cheapening his legacy by inflating his accomplishments, which is an insult to the people – Black and White – who lost their lives fighting for civil rights. The first and most obnoxious example of a LBJ supporter becoming unhinged is Joseph A. Califano, Jr., President Jo ...

I didn’t arrest my cop friend’s attention BY ALMA GILL, NNPA COLUMNIST   Dear Alma, Ok, I was with a police officer for 10 years. He did some awful things in our relationship. Meaning he cheated on me. A lot of it was through the Internet or through the phone. Meaning he was sexting many other women. Which he considered not cheating. We were living together and I was battling lupus. He said it was beca ...

UNC SYSTEM BOARD ELIMINATES THREE CAMPUS CENTERS [CHARLOTTE] As expected, the UNC Board of Governors Feb. 27th voted to discontinue three campus centers it deemed to be unnecessary, amid criticism that the Republican-led board did so out of political retribution. Acting on a recommendation from its committee, the board eliminated the UNC Center on Poverty, Work and Opportunity at Chapel Hill, the NC Center ...

  BY CASH MICHAELS OF THE WILMINGTON JOURNAL   In the aftermath of the fatal August 2014 police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo. that touched off weeks of national debate and demonstrations, the US Justice Dept. has concluded that even before that fateful incident, the police department there demonstrated clear patterns of racial bias towards its black citizens. According to published re ...

BY ALMA GILL NNPA COLUMNIST Mother moved in but won’t move out Dear Alma, My mother and I have a decent relationship. She was on drugs when I was growing up, but she’s stopped and is doing fine. She is healthy and able. She lives with me and my kids. She doesn’t pay rent or help with the kids. I’m 36 and she’s 55. When she moved in, I thought it was temporary and wanted to help her get on her feet. Now she ...