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Wal-Mart, Credit Cards and the SCLC

Gawker breaks down a strange story from the Washington Post today. You can read the full story here, but we’ll add a third point to Hamilton’s argument: the story also shows just how powerful Wal-Mart’s political contributions can be, and the depths organizations will go to to stay in Wal-Mart’s good graces. (We won’t even get in to the pros and cons of Wal-Mart’s credit cards, but for those interested, read our blog archives on the matter here.)

The New Civil Rights: Keeping Wal-Mart Happy [Consumerist]

The story we’re about to bring you is sad on so many levels. Well, two levels. First, it illustrates the disappointing and kind of disgusting decline of a legendary civil rights institution, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), former home of Martin Luther King, Jr. Second, it shows what a farce half of the things you see on editorial pages are, if they come from public figures. We’ll give you a condensed version of this ongoing media vs. advocacy group vs. PR firm controversy—as you read it, ask yourself whether MLK would have found himself caught up in this crap.

Charles Steele, Jr., president of the SCLC, wrote an editorial which ran in several southern newspapers. The editorial was against upcoming legislation that would limit credit card fees—a bill favored by retailers (which would save money) but not by credit card companies (which would lose money in fees).

Here’s the problem: Steele didn’t write the editorial. A PR firm working for the credit card companies contracted a third party to write it, and it somehow got submitted to the papers without getting approved by Steele.

Fucked up, right? It’s obviously a huge mistake by the PR firm. It makes the papers look foolish for running an editorial that the “author” hadn’t even seen. And, of course, nobody wants to wake up one day and read something in the paper with their name on it that they’ve never seen.

But Steele and the SCLC aren’t heroic in this. Check out their main complaint:

The [editorial that ran] reads: “The proposed law would boost the profits of Wal-Mart, J.C. Penney and Home Depot, but it would take money out of the pockets of the small businesses and consumers it’s supposed to help.”

Wal-Mart is listed on the SCLC’s Web site as a sponsor of the organization. No one at the SCLC would want to insult a large benefactor.

It’s not that the SCLC is too preoccupied with real civil rights issues; they’re obviously known as a group-for-hire that various lobbies can sign on to support their various causes, in order to give them a sheen of support from the civil rights community. It’s just that they didn’t want to piss off Wal-Mart.

Let freedom ring.

Posted by Alex Goldschmidt on Tuesday, July 29, 2008

Click Here for a Printer-Friendly Version

COMMENTS

SCLC shifts boycott to Shell Oil Corp.

By S.A. REID
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Published on: 06/16/08

The Southern Christian Leadership Conference is taking its own steps to address today’s soaring gasoline prices — a national boycott of the nation’s five largest oil companies.

The boycott that began in May targeting Exxon Mobil Corp. has turned its attention for the next 30 days to Shell Oil Corp. Next up will be BP, Chevron Corp., and ConocoPhillips Co. during the coming months, as the boycott runs into mid-October.
SCLC hopes to pressure oil companies to forgo multi-billion dollar profits in favor of lowering prices.

Officials with the Atlanta-based organization consider record gas prices a human and civil rights issue that threatens to further divide the nation’s haves and have-nots.

The Rev. Charles Steele, SCLC president, said it boils down to “greed.”

“We understand the free market system,” Steele said Monday. “We’re saying it’s a difference between making a profit and greed.”

SCLC also is considering asking U.S. workers to voice their concern by staying off their jobs July 1-2.

Other boycott partners are Concerned Black Clergy of Metro Atlanta, the AFL-CIO, the Nation of Islam, Ghandi Foundation and the Georgia Association of Black Elected Officials~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Note:"We’re saying it’s a difference between making a profit and greed.”........Funny, but that’s what a lot of people say about WalMart.

ddrb in
Tuesday, July 29 at 02:51 PM

Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), organization of black churches and ministers which, under the leadership of Martin Luther King, Jr., formed the backbone of the civil rights movement in the United States during the 1950s and 1960s.

SCLC was founded in 1957 after the bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama, during 1955 and 1956. The boycott led the Supreme Court of the United States to rule in 1956 in favor of a lower court decision striking down the city’s segregated seating practices. It inspired many black leaders to believe that nonviolent direct action and protests, like the boycott, might succeed in battles against segregation, where the nonconfrontational legal strategy of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) had yielded only slow change.

SCLC was closely associated with King, who believed that nonviolent civil disobedience could help to end segregation and foster social justice for blacks. King’s charismatic personality dominated SCLC, but other activists also contributed to its success. They included Ralph Abernathy, who was King’s closest associate and who was frequently jailed with King for acts of civil disobedience; ANDREW YOUNG, an SCLC leader who later became U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and mayor of Atlanta; and Jesse Jackson, a clergyman who led efforts to pressure to hire more blacks in the mid-1960s and became a well-known civil rights activist in the 1970s and 1980s.~~~~~~~~~~~~~~(msn Encarta)~~~~~~Note:As has been discussed here very recently, Andrew Young was affiliated as spokesperson for a controversial group entitled Working Families for WalMart . According to Wikipedia,the group was actually a public relations campaign by WalMart’s own PR firm,Edelman. This revelation ,coupled with disparaging quotes regarding other minorities, made publicly by Young HIMSELF,led to his voluntary resignation as a spokesman and advocate for WalMart’s interests.

ddrb in
Tuesday, July 29 at 03:32 PM

Sounds like SCLC has sold it’s soul to the beast of Betonville.
I wonder how much it took, How many palms got greased, how many hands in the Walmart Jar?

The Struggle against oppressive authority is universal & eternal.

Onward Christian Soldiers in
Wednesday, July 30 at 01:32 PM

.........."Some people say a man is made out of mud
A poor man’s made out of muscle and blood
Muscle and blood and skin and bones
A mind that’s weak and a back that’s strong

You load sixteen tons, and whattaya get?
Another day older and deeper in debt
St. Peter don’cha call me, cause I can’t go
I owe my soul to the company store”.................(Tennessee Ernie Ford--Lyrics Download)

ddrb in
Wednesday, July 30 at 01:53 PM

why is it none of you that bitch about wms credit cards never bitch and moan and raise the same fuss about target,sears and etcs credit cards?

m att hew vantress in gresham,oregon
Thursday, July 31 at 04:24 AM

Wonder if the SCLC will renounce and reject WalMart because of the WalMart managers meetings ,created to influence employees voting rights? Seems to me this is the kind of “implied coercion” that civil rights groups were ORIGINALLY created to combat. How could an organization ,with the legacy of Martin Luther King so prominent in its history, WILLINGLY have their name linked to WalMart now,in light of this latest travesty-especially with so many blacks both shopping and working for WalMart--and the call to reject the black candidate,Obama?

ddrb in
Friday, August 01 at 06:23 PM

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