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"Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott
(R-Miss.), who last week claimed 'no firsthand knowledge' of the controversial
Council of Conservative Citizens, six
years ago told the group's members they 'stand for the right principles
and the right philosophy'" (Thomas B. Edsall, The Washington Post,
December 16, 1998).
"In the Spring 1992 newsletter
(Volume 23, Number 2), provided by a Dallas man, Ed Sebasta, who has followed
the organization's activities, Lott is pictured speaking to the group with
its banner in the background" (Thomas B. Edsall, The Washington
Post, December 16, 1998).
"In his speech, Lott, according
to the newsletter, called the Citizen Informer, warns against the forces
supporting government spending: 'We need more meetings like this across
the nation' to offset these liberal pressures. 'The people in this room
stand for the right principles and the right philosophy. Let's take it in
the right direction and our children will be the beneficiaries'" (Thomas
B. Edsall, The Washington Post, December 16, 1998).
"The CCC, which has strong ties
to the old white Citizens Councils, is considered racist by conservatives
and liberals. Many of the most prominent figures in the organization are
proponents of preserving the white race and culture, which they see under
assault by immigration, intermarriage and growing numbers of Hispanic Americans"
(Thomas B. Edsall, The Washington Post, December 16, 1998).
"The Citizens Council, many of
whose members helped found the CCC, was a segregationist organization. The
membership generally included local establishment figures in the South,
small businessmen, mayors and other white community leaders. The leader
of the Mississippi CCC, William Lord, who is pictured next to Lott in the
1992 newsletter was a regional organizer for the Citizens Council. The national
chief executive of the CCC, Gordon Lee Baum, was a Midwest director"
(Thomas B. Edsall, The Washington Post, December 16, 1998).
"A number of the leaders of the
CCC describe their views as 'racialist,' and adamntly reject portrayal as
white supremacist. Jared Taylor, a Washington area leader of the CCC and
publisher of the magazine American Renaissance,
wrote in an essay currently appearing on the magazine's Web site: ... 'AR
expresses an unapologetic preference for the culture and way of life of
whites. It also expresses the belief that only the biological heirs to the
creators of European civilization will carry that civilization forward in
a meaningful way'" (Thomas B. Edsall, The Washington Post, December
16, 1998).
"After the (Citizen) Informer article
became available, Lott's spokesman disassociated Lott from the CCC and sharply
criticized the organization: 'This group harbors views which Senator Lott
firmly rejects. He has absolutely no involvement with them either now or
in the future,' John Czwartacki said this week" (Thomas B. Edsall,
The Washington Post, December 16, 1998).
"He defended Lott's 1992 keynote
speech to the CCC at a Greenwood Miss., meeting, arguing: 'This appears
to have been a widely attended political gathering with the senator giving
what sounds like generic stump speech remarks ... With their votes, contributions
or time, tens of thousands of people endorse Trent Lott's views. That endorsement
does not necessarily go the other way around'" (Thomas B. Edsall,
The Washington Post, December 16, 1998).
On another front, Harvard law professor
Alan Dershowitz, an impeachment opponent, "complained that impeachment
advocate Rep. Robert L. Barr Jr. (R-Ga.) had spoken to a CCC meeting in
Charleston, S.C., this year. The charge brought an angry response from Barr,
who contended Dershowitz was trying to smear him" (Thomas B. Edsall,
The Washington Post, December 16, 1998).
"Barr, a conservative member of
the House Judiciary Committee, said in an interview that he went to the
Charleston meeting of the CCC at the request of Buddy Witherspoon, Republican
national committeeman for South Carolina. He said that if he had had any
notion of the views toward racial issues held by leaders of the group --
some view intermarriage as a threat to the white race -- he never would
have attended the session" (Thomas B. Edsall, The Washington Post,
December 12, 1998).
"Barr said the material he was
supplied describing the CCC indicated that it was a mainstream conservative
grass-roots group, and that it had endorsements from such political figures
as Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-Miss.), Mississippi Gov. Kirk Fordice
(R) and Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.)" (Thomas B. Edsall, The Washington
Post, December 12, 1998).
"Gordon Lee Baum, the national
chief executive of the council, headquartered in St. Louis, said Barr was
given copies of the organization's magazine, the Citizen Informer, before
his speech. Most issues of the Informer have columns attacking interracial
marriage, warning that the white race faces the danger of extinction"
(Thomas B. Edsall, The Washington Post, December 12, 1998).
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