On the Edge of a New Millennium: Stepping Up Efforts in the Fight for Civil Rights

In 1996, Wade Henderson took the helm of The Leadership Conference — then known as the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights or LCCR — after serving as Washington Bureau chief of the NAACP and associate director of the ACLU, lured by the breadth and reach of the coalition, which then consisted of 180 organizations representing people of color, women, labor, people with disabilities, seniors, children, the LGBTQ+ community, and religious groups.

“The civil rights movement of the next century will be built around these various constituencies,” he told The Washington Post at the time.

Under Henderson’s two decades of leadership, LCCR would grow from 180 to more than 200 member organizations and from a staff of seven to 45 — adding policy, finance and administration, development, field, and communications departments, as well as the Americans for Financial Reform project — which would greatly increase LCCR’s capacity to respond to the needs of its member organizations.

During Henderson’s first few years, LCCR would gain national attention on civil rights issues affecting all people in the United States, taking on new projects and campaigns that addressed anti-hate crimes initiatives, a fair and accurate 2000 Census, judicial appointments, immigration reform, the digital divide, and criminal justice reform, among other issues. LCCR would also significantly broaden its affirmative action efforts at the state and local levels. In addition, LCCR would make major operational improvements, expanding its offices, upgrading its communications systems, and launching a new website (the award-winning civilrights.org).

And as the end of the decade drew near, LCCR would address emerging issues, some of which foreshadowed greater challenges yet to come.

In December 1996, LCCR released a report on the threats to voting rights for all Americans. The study documented many instances of outright intimidation and harassment, including cases where persons with disabilities were denied adequate time to vote and were disparaged for “slowing other voters down.” In partnership with the Department of Justice, LCCR would establish a toll-free hotline number (1-800-FAIRVOTE) to encourage citizens to monitor Election Day activities and file complaints on voting irregularities. The hotline allowed eligible voters to report instances of voter intimidation, coercion, or any attempts to prevent them from exercising their right to vote.

In 1997, President Bill Clinton would convene the first-ever White House Conference on Hate Crimes, which had been a key ask in LCCR’s hate crimes report, “Cause for Concern: Hate Crimes in America.” The need to comprehensively address hate crimes would become even more urgent with the murders in 1998 of Matthew Shepard near Laramie, Wyoming and James Byrd, Jr., in Jasper, Texas. LCCR would go on to work to strengthen federal legislation and expand the definition of federal hate crimes to include gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, and disability.

Affirmative action would come under attack in Congress, the states, the news media, academia, and the public policy community. Working with its allies in the House of Representatives and Senate, LCCR would help to fend off five separate legislative attacks against affirmative action programs in the 105^th Congress. In the national battle of ideas, LCCR held several conferences on affirmative action — bringing together civil rights activists, attorneys, educators, students, and business leaders — to help develop and promote a strategy to counter anti-affirmative action initiatives. With mixed success, LCCR also worked in the states to oppose referendum issues to restrict or even abolish affirmative action. While such initiatives were approved in California and Michigan in 1996, what threatened to be a tidal wave began to diminish toward the end of the decade.

Mobilizing its knowledge, prestige, and wide-ranging support, LCCR also worked to inform President Clinton’s review of affirmative action programs throughout the federal government. While some administration officials and advisers initially wanted more drastic changes in these programs, the review eventually adopted the watchword, “Mend it; don’t end it,” and maintained the great majority of these efforts.

Tackling yet another challenging issue, LCCR conducted a campaign to highlight and address the most objectionable aspects of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996. On other fronts, LCCR would help to gain the largest increase in federal funding for civil rights enforcement in two decades, defeated efforts to repeal provisions of the National Voter Registration Act, and preserved the Fair Housing and Community Reinvestment Acts.

The late 1990s also saw the emergence of the internet as a worldwide public square for the exchange of information and ideas. In November 1997, LCCR and its sister organization launched the definitive civil rights website, civilrights.org. The site would go on to be nominated for a Smithsonian computer award for visionary use of technology. Meanwhile, LCCR’s Digital Opportunity Initiative would help the civil rights coalition more effectively leverage the powers of the internet to improve the efficiency and capacity of their organizations and to bridge the digital divide that disadvantaged their low-income constituents.

LCCR would also work to ensure adequate funding for the 2000 Census and would help to defeat efforts to prohibit scientific sampling techniques in communities who had been undercounted in the past.

In January 1998, LCCR’s last surviving founder, Arnold Aronson, was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, following in the footsteps of Roy Wilkins and A. Philip Randolph, who had also received this honor. Following Aronson’s death one month later, LCCR would hold a memorial service and establish the Arnold Aronson Fellowship Program. The program would help LCCR expand its internship program and train the next generation of civil rights leaders.

New Year’s Day 2000 would mark the beginning of a new decade, a new century, and a new millennium. From a disputed presidential election to a terrorist attack on American soil and the inauguration of the first Black president, few could have anticipated the triumphs and tragedies ahead.

Read more about The Leadership Conference’s history and legacy in our 75^th anniversary series: “This Is a Time for Action”: On This MLK Day, We Honor Our 75-Year-Old Coalition’s Legacy, Courage, and Resilience; At 75, Our Work Continues; Chaos, Confusion, & Abuse of Power: Trump’s First Week Back in Office; An Unending Fight to Hold on to What We Had Won; Progress Against the Odds; and Passing the Torch of National Leadership.