Large SCLC faction calls for leaders in criminal probe to resign

By Cameron McWhirter

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

About half of the national board of directors of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference issued a resolution Saturday calling for the organization's chair and treasurer, both involved in a criminal probe of SCLC finances, to resign.

"We can no longer be silent," said board member Bernard Lafayette Jr., spokesman for 23 members of the 44-member board. At Lafayette's side were board member Martin Luther King III and Sylvia Tucker, a vice chair of the organization. "Something is wrong and we want to get it straightened out," he added.

The Atlanta-based organization is in a state of confusion and upheaval. In recent weeks, longtime Chair Raleigh Trammell and supporters have been sending official letters from SCLC headquarters to board members who oppose them and removing them from their posts, so it is unclear how many of the board members are still officially active or whether Trammell had the authority to take such action. Saturday's announcement marked yet another implosion for the once-proud and powerful organization co-founded by the Rev. Martin Luther King.

The anti-Trammell group, which met at a hotel conference room in College Park, have retained attorney Charles Mathis of Atlanta to begin a legal effort to take control of the SCLC away from Trammell and treasurer Spiver Gordon. Mathis said he will file the first of several motions this week in Fulton Superior Court.

Trammell and Gordon could not be reached for comment Saturday, however a press release issued Friday night by the SCLC national office denounced Saturday's meeting as illegitimate.

Neither of the men have been charged with any crime, but  FBI agents have seized records from Trammell's home and office in Dayton, Ohio and Fulton County District Attorney Paul Howard has empaneled a grand jury to consider whether to bring criminal charges against the men. In recent months, board members have handed over bank records, meeting transcripts, e-mails and letters to Howard's office, the Alabama attorney general's office and the FBI.

Questions about SCLC finances were first raised last summer when a former board member said as much as $1.4 million of SCLC money had disappeared. According to records obtained by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution in January, payments from SCLC funds were made to organizations only Trammell and Gordon controlled. According to the documents, the men wrote checks to themselves, paid for personal funeral expenses and credit card and insurance bills, and sent money to their individual chapters and their special projects.

Last October, Bernice King, daughter of Martin Luther King, was elected SCLC president by the board. She has yet to take office. She was not present at Saturday's meeting and has remained silent amid the political turmoil now engulfing the organization. She could not be immediately reached Saturday for comment.

Founded in Atlanta in 1957 and headed initially by  the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., the SCLC was one of the nation's most effective political organizations in the late 1950s and early 1960s.

It led critical battles against segregation in Selma, Ala., and elsewhere. It helped organize the 1963 March on Washington, where King delivered his historic "I have a dream" speech. The SCLC was instrumental in the passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Act, which ended institutional segregation and reshaped America.

In recent decades, the organization has lost influence, funding and membership. In 2003, animosity among board members erupted in lawsuits and resignations. At the SCLC's 2004 convention, police were called when fights broke out among competing factions.

Yet afterward, the organization retained some prestige and was able to raise corporate donations for a new headquarters on Auburn Avenue, which opened in 2007. Then Sen. Barack Obama and former President Bill Clinton both attended the ceremonies.

At Saturday's meeting, Lafayette said, "the SCLC is not dead....we may stumble but we are not fallen."

The coming months -- with legal battles and public infighting a certainty and criminal charges a distinct possibility -- will test that statement. The anti-Trammell faction announced Saturday the SCLC annual meeting will be held in late April in Atlanta. The pro-Trammell faction has announced it plans to hold the SCLC annual meeting at the same time -- in Eutaw, Ala.