RALEIGH – The state chapter of the NAACP will continue on with its sixth week of Moral Monday protests that have led to the arrests of more than 300 people.
Carrboro Mayor Mark Chilton was arrested last Monday inside the General Assembly, along with Chapel Hill Town Council member Donna Bell, and Carrboro Aldermen Damon Seils, Michelle Johnson and Sammy Slade.
Rally leader and NAACP state chapter president Rev. William Barber said clergy members from across the state will lead this Monday’s demonstration against policies of the Republican-controlled legislature.
“Our job through this movement is to expose those extreme immoral policies that hurt everyone. They impact all people and it’s beginning to work,” Barber said.
The NAACP and its supporters contest the social, economic, voting and education policies of the General Assembly. Many also oppose the state’s decision to reject the Medicaid expansion under federal health care reform, cut unemployment insurance and end the earned income tax credit, among other issues.
Barber announced via teleconference Friday the NAACP will follow up the protest with “Witness Wednesday” to mark the 50th anniversary of the assassination of civil rights activist Medgar Evers. The group will also announce details of a voter registration tour.
“We will have pictures of the martyrs who have died—black, white and Jewish—to protect all of the rights of those we are also trying to protect,” Barber said.
The group’s rallies have grown in size every week since they began in late April, most recently drawing more than 1,600 by some estimates. The number of arrests has grown each week as well—last week’s topping upwards of 150.
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Barber called in forces from elsewhere. The most noteworthy of the traveling activists (that we know of) came from Service Employees International Union 1199, United Healthcare Workers East, which claims 400,000 members along the Atlantic coast from Massachusetts to Florida. Besides the presence of chapter president George Gresham (in photo), Barber told reporters that participants came from as far away as California, New York and Florida.