About Us

NAACP of Martha’s Vineyard… Envisioning Equality for Everyone.

The NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) is the oldest, largest, and strongest civil rights organization in the United States. Your Martha’s Vineyard Branch is one of the most diverse racially and ethnically anywhere. Our active programs show everyone how effective a branch can be. All of our members are dedicated to the cause of civil rights. Individual reasons for joining are as diverse as the membership itself.

Successfully negotiates several employment and housing discrimination cases before they become legal cases.
Collaborates with Vineyard organizations e.g. the MV Hebrew Center, the Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head (Aquinnah) and local police departments and banks on health, education and disparate treatment initiatives.
Awards scholarships every year to Martha’s Vineyard high school students who exemplify the ideals of civil rights and good citizenship.
Serves on Martha’s Vineyard School’s teacher and principal search committees.
Works to increase the voter registration and turn out for local and national elections.
Provides charitable donations to organizations in need.

Leadership

President: Shawn Ramoutar
1st Vice President: Russell Ashton
2nd Vice President: Gretchen Underwood
Treasurer: Tracy Dawson
Assistant Treasurer: Vacant
Secretary: David Marinelli
Assistant Secretary: Toni Kauffman
Executive Committee Members:
Joel Weintraub, Dr. Lorna Andrade, Rita Brown, Andrea Cisco, Alex Palmer, Carlos Trindade, Suzie Pacheco, Carrie Tankard, and Grace Robinson.

Mission

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) was founded more than 100 years ago by a group of progressive thinkers committed to racial equality. It remains the largest, oldest, and most effective civil rights organization in the country. The original purpose of the NAACP was to secure for blacks their rights as citizens, justice in the courts, and equal opportunity in every economic, political and social endeavor in the United States.

The mission of the MVNAACP is to promote an inclusive environment that embraces, respects, and values the diversity in the island community. Today, we have adapted our agenda to address the civil rights issues of our time for all people: unequal education; economic and political empowerment; criminal justice reform; health-care access and quality of treatment; civic engagement and voting rights. Despite significant gains over the past 103 years, the NAACP is needed now more than ever to address the continuing and deliberate disparities.

How the National NAACP Began

In the summer of 1908, the USA was shocked by the account of race riots in Springfield, IL. A mob of the “best citizens” of Abraham Lincoln’s hometown had raged for two days, killed and wounded scores of Black people and driven thousands from the city. Articles on the subject had appeared in newspapers and magazines. One such article, which appeared in the Independent on September 3, 1908, written by William English Walling and entitled “Race War in the North,” ended with the sentence “Yet who realized the seriousness of the situation, and what large and powerful body of citizens is ready to come to their aid?” Mrs. Mary White Ovington answered that challenge by meeting Mr. Walling and Dr. Henry Moskowitz during the first week of 1909.

It was in the little room of a New York apartment that the NAACP was born. The call was made to others to join the cause. The celebration of the centennial of the birth of Abraham Lincoln was the date. “Hence we call upon all the believers in democracy to join in a national conference for the discussion of present evils, the voicing of protest and the renewal of the struggle for civil and political liberty.” Dr. W. E. B. Du Bois, Mary Church Terrell, and Dr. J. Milton Walton, from Atlanta, and Rev. Francis J. Grimke from Washington, DC, were among those who signed the Call.

It was at a second conference in New York in May 1910 that a permanent body to be known as the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People was organized.

When Dr. W. E. B. Du Bois was called to the conference, he brought the conference into close touch with the Niagara Movement, an organization of colored people that had been formed in 1905 at Niagara, NY. This organization had been involved in the work of legal redress along the lines of the NAACP. In 1910, it had conducted important civil rights cases and had in its membership some of the prominent colored lawyers in the country, among them Mr. W. Ashbie Hawkins, its treasurer.

The first issue of The Crisis, the official news organ of the NAACP, was published in November 1910. Its name was suggested by James Russell Lowell’s poem “The Present Crisis.”

The NAACP was incorporated in the State of New York in 1911. The principal objectives as stated in the Certificate of Incorporation were as follows:

voluntarily to promote equality of rights and eradicate race prejudice among the citizens of the United States;
to advance the interest of colored citizens;
to secure for them impartial suffrage; and
to increase their opportunities for securing justice in the courts, education for their children, employment according to their ability, and complete equality before the law.

NAACP Today

Today, the NAACP works along four main lines in pursuit of its goals:

it uses the courts, state and federal, to secure justice and level barriers;
it works for the enactment of national, state, and local laws to protect civil rights and ban racial discrimination;
it carries out an educational program in the effort to create a climate of opinion in favor of equal rights and human brotherhood; and
it engages in selective buying campaigns, picketing, and direct action programs.

The basic policies of the Association are developed at its annual convention by delegates elected to represent local NAACP units. In the form of resolutions, policies are presented to the National Board of Directors for ratification.

For additional information, please visit the website of our national organization: NAACP.