Black organizations, some founded in the 1800s, still exist. Are they still needed?
- Many Black organizations were founded in the 1800s, some even before the end of slavery.
- Historically Black colleges and universities are one example. But there are many others.
- Are they still needed today? Civil rights leaders and experts explain.
WASHINGTON ‒ Enslaved Black people were banned from reading and writing and even those who had their freedom couldn't always access formal schooling, so African Americans began founding colleges of their own.
“Black organizations exist because we were locked out of mainstream White organizations,’’ said Marc Morial, president of the National Urban League, a civil rights organization. “And even today we remain locked out of the leadership.”
Hispanic, Asian, Jewish and other groups exist for similar reasons.
With the Trump administration’s efforts to eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives across federal agencies, in the private sector and at higher education institutions, such affinity organizations have been the focus of more attention with some public officials and others questioning why they exist.
Morial said those questions are precisely why such groups are still needed.
“This period is showing us why these organizations are relevant,’’ he said.
Diversity efforts unnecessary, adminstration says
Following Trump's lead, a number of administration officials have slammed efforts to celebrate diversity and have eliminated nearly all of the government-funded positions that promoted it.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told staff in January they couldn’t use official resources to host events related to cultural awareness months, including Black History Month, Women’s History Month and National Disability Employment Awareness Month.
Hegseth also set up a task force to abolish DEI offices. "I think the single dumbest phrase in military history is ‘Our diversity is our strength,’ " Hegseth said at a townhall at the Pentagon in February.
Jonathan Butcher, a senior fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation, said mandatory affinity groups in public settings such as schools are inappropriate. He said those groups are segregating students by race for a lecture or topic.
He pointed to Wellesley Public School district in Massachusetts which was sued for creating racial affinity groups. The district settled in 2022, saying the groups are open to all students.
“When you couch having a conversation about issues related to race and dividing the students according to ethnicity in order to have such programming, I find that to be highly inappropriate,’’ Butcher said. “That is what a part of the Civil Rights Act was meant to prevent.”
Butcher said, however, groups whose memberships are voluntary like the Congressional Black Caucus don’t break the law.
“It is an opportunity for those members to represent what they believe are the interests of constituents who share their race or ethnicity," he said.
Butcher called it a unique American experience to form such groups as long as they’re not exclusionary.
“If there are people, regardless of the skin color, who share the same interests, there shouldn’t be a reason that they would be excluded from such a group,’’ he said.
‘A space where you’re comfortable’
Historically, African Americans and other people of color and faith, including Jewish people, were often denied access to White places of worship, professional associations, brotherhood organizations and schools, said Roger Davidson, Jr., associate professor of history at Bowie State University, a historically Black school in Maryland.
He noted for example that the African Methodist Episcopal Church was created when the Methodist Episcopal Church discriminated against Black worshippers.
And some students of color who attended predominately White colleges formed or joined groups like Black student unions to bond and unite around issues, Davidson said.
“Sometimes you have to have a space where you're comfortable,’’ he said. “Because though you may say you can go join other spaces, you may not be made welcome.’’
Many historically Black colleges and Universities, or HBCUs, were created in the early to mid 1800's, some in the wake of hundreds of years of slavery and a period when Black people could be killed for trying to read or write.
“They were created as an act of social justice in response to the reality of our people that education did in fact matter,’’ said Cynthia Neal Spence, an associate professor of sociology at Spelman College, a historically Black school in Atlanta. Some students were direct descendants of people who had been enslaved.
Spence also pointed to other groups like the Congressional Black Caucus, which was formed in 1971 by 13 Black lawmakers.
“These individuals united because even though they had gone through the electoral process and they were inhabiting the halls of Congress … their ideas were not being valued," Spence said. “They were being dismissed by some ‒ not all ‒ but by some members of Congress who did not believe that they belonged.”
She and others said for some members of affinity groups there is strength in numbers where they can be a powerful voting bloc or special interest group.
“Part of it is how do we also make certain that the issues that are of particular attention to our communities remain in the center and not on the margin," Spence said.
Juan Proaño, CEO of the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), said his civil rights organization was founded because of discrimination in the South and Southwest against Mexican Americans and to battle voting rights issues, such as poll taxes and English-only ballots.
“The purpose, obviously, is to bring together the collective interest, the political power, the economic influence of any group or any intersectional group to advocate on behalf of the community as a whole,’’ he said.
Proaño noted that many legacy organizations like LULAC and the NAACP worked together in the 1950s and 1960s during the Civil Rights Movement and later in the 1970s over such issues.
“That's really when those organizations started to explode,’’ he said, noting the Chicano Movement and the Black Panthers. “They were powerful movements, generational movements.’’
‘The problems still exist’
Lately, even the existence of some voluntary affinity groups has triggered backlash.
Leaders of some affinity organizations said the anti-DEI efforts have only bolstered the case for why their groups are still needed. They point to efforts to push back against negative and stereotypical rhetoric about immigrants of color.
“People unite around like issues, like experiences,’’ Spence said. “But when we do it … it's as if we're somewhere trying to plot the revolution ‒ and that's not what we're doing. We're just seeking like mindedness.”
“This year is a reminder that organizations like LULAC are probably more important than ever,’’ Proaño said. “In a way you could say that we're still fighting a lot of the same fights that we were fighting in 1929, period.’’
Davidson agreed.
“The NAACP, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, still exists because the problems still exist,’’ he said. “HBCUs still exist because partially the problem still exists … You shut them down, you're shutting down opportunities for a lot of people. ‘’