NAACP Endorses Same-Sex Marriage

The NAACP on Saturday resolved to support same-sex marriage by voting to affirm marriage equality as a civil right.

Benjamin Todd Jealous, President and CEO of the NAACP, stated: "Civil marriage is a civil right and a matter of civil law. The NAACP's support for marriage equality is deeply rooted in the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution and equal protection of all people."

Roslyn M. Brock, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the NAACP, added that the "mission of the NAACP has always been to ensure the political, social and economic equality of all people."

The move was met with praise by Freedom to Marry, who stated that "the NAACP resoundingly affirmed that the freedom to marry is a civil right and family value that belongs to all of us, and that discriminatory barriers to marriage must fall."

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Release from NAACP:
NAACP Passes Resolution in Support of Marriage Equality
Decision Affirms Opposition to Government Efforts to Codify Discrimination

(Miami, Florida) The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People today released a resolution supporting marriage equality. At a meeting of the 103-year old civil rights group's board of directors, the organization voted to support marriage equality as a continuation of its historic commitment to equal protection under the law.

"The mission of the NAACP has always been to ensure the political, social and economic equality of all people," said Roslyn M. Brock, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the NAACP. "We have and will oppose efforts to codify discrimination into law."

"Civil marriage is a civil right and a matter of civil law. The NAACP's support for marriage equality is deeply rooted in the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution and equal protection of all people." said Benjamin Todd Jealous, President and CEO of the NAACP.

The NAACP has addressed civil rights with regard to marriage since Loving v. Virginia declared anti-miscegenation laws unconstitutional in 1967. In recent years the NAACP has taken public positions against state and federal efforts to ban the rights and privileges for LGBT citizens, including strong opposition to Proposition 8 in California, the Defense of Marriage Act, and most recently, North Carolina's Amendment 1, which changed the state constitution's to prohibit same sex marriage.

Below is the text of the resolution passed by the NAACP board of directors:

The NAACP Constitution affirmatively states our objective to ensure the "political, educational, social and economic equality" of all people. Therefore, the NAACP has opposed and will continue to oppose any national, state, local policy or legislative initiative that seeks to codify discrimination or hatred into the law or to remove the Constitutional rights of LGBT citizens. We support marriage equality consistent with equal protection under the law provided under the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution. Further, we strongly affirm the religious freedoms of all people as protected by the First Amendment.

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Freedom to Marry statement:

"The NAACP has long been the nation's conscience and champion for an America where all share equally in the promise of liberty and justice for all. Today the NAACP resoundingly affirmed that the freedom to marry is a civil right and family value that belongs to all of us, and that discriminatory barriers to marriage must fall. The toxic tactics of anti-gay groups like NOM to 'drive a wedge between blacks and gays' will be washed away in the wave of righteous affirmation."