National

Moral Monday Leader Inspires Protests, Arrests and Action

Published

11 years ago

July 27, 2015

In this May 19, 2014 photo, demonstrators follow Rev. William Barber, right, president of the state chapter of the NAACP and architect of the protests known as “Moral Monday,” into the Legislative Building during a Moral Monday protest in Raleigh, N.C. (AP Photo/Gerry Broome)

Martha Waggoner, ASSOCIATED PRESS

GOLDSBORO, N.C. (AP) — The Rev. William Barber walks gingerly with a cane, in a hunched-over posture, yet here he is on a recent Monday, leading 3,500 protesters on a downtown street.

He says God must have a sense of humor to call on a man who has such difficulty walking to lead the Moral Monday protests that began in North Carolina two years ago.

Barber’s speeches and his throwback tactics — in vogue again following several deaths of black men at the hands of police — draw comparisons to the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. More than 1,000 demonstrators have been arrested for civil disobedience in North Carolina since Barber, president of the state NAACP, started the legislative protests.

The demonstrations have spread to at least half a dozen other states and given him minor celebrity status. Supporters wear “I went to jail with Rev. Barber” buttons. Barber has been jailed five times himself.

“What I know is what we are in is a time when we can’t afford to be silent,” Barber said, perched against a tall stool in his office at his church in Goldsboro. “We are battling for the soul and consciousness of this country.”

The protests target conservative politics and Republicans, who took control of the North Carolina Statehouse and governor’s office in 2013, and cover everything from redistricting to labor laws to women’s rights, gay rights and the environment. Moral Mondays are the legislative protest piece of the broader Forward Together movement led by the NAACP, which is in court over the state’s new voting law and will be back in court next month to challenge redistricting.

Detractors accuse Barber of grandstanding or say he is continuously repeating himself and not worth their time. A former state senator once called his movement “Moron Monday.”

His supporters say his leadership is reminiscent of both King and Ella Baker, who helped form the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee in 1960.

“I think he’s tremendously courageous,” said Eddie Glaude Jr., a religion and African-American studies professor at Princeton University. “He’s concerned about the state of black America, the state of brown America. He’s concerned about the LGBTQ community. He’s concerned about the most marginalized.”

Scholar and civil rights activist Cornel West, who is friends with Barber, describes him as “the only King-like figure we have in the country right now.”

“I have just been overwhelmed by his intellectual and spiritual power,” West said.

To understand Barber’s desire to help the disenfranchised is to know his father’s influence. Almost every story Barber tells somehow references Buster Barber, who would point to Jesus’ first sermon, when he said he had been anointed “to proclaim good news to the poor.”

“And my father was very clear that to be Christian, to follow Jesus is to be concerned about the weightier matters of the law, of justice and mercy,” Barber said.

He was 4 years old when his parents returned from Indianapolis to his father’s roots in eastern North Carolina, called there by local leaders who wanted their help with desegregating the schools. His father, now deceased, was an educator and minister, and his 81-year-old mother has worked as a secretary in schools.

Students once called his mother the n-word, Barber said; now their children and grandchildren call her Mother Barber.

He took his parents’ lessons about equality to heart, becoming the first black student elected alone as student body president of Plymouth High school; previously, a white student and a black student had shared the position. He understood the value of education and got a doctoral degree.

He can speak thoughtfully and quietly, quoting the Bible, the Constitution and poets, or he can jump and shout, and he often does during speeches.

Willie Jennings, a professor at Duke University, is one of Barber’s closest friends. They got to know each other when Barber was getting his master’s degree in divinity at Duke and Jennings was a doctoral student.

“William has, for many years, even before Moral Monday, he has always spoken to people with power, whether they be political figures, military,” Jennings said. “He has always spoken to them and challenged them to give account of how what they do will help poor people.”

Poverty wasn’t merely a lesson in the Barber household; it was a part of the family’s life. His mother, Eleanor, recalls when Billy — his nickname — was in sixth grade and came home in tears because other children were making fun of his shoes. They were called “bobos” — off-brand versions of then-popular Chuck Taylor sneaker by Converse.

The Chuck Taylors “screeched” as they gripped the basketball court. The bobos just slid out from under you, Barber said.

Barber’s paying job is as minister of Greenleaf Christian Church in Goldsboro. The NAACP doesn’t pay him for his work as state chapter president or as chair of the political action committee of the organization’s national board. He has no set speaker’s fee, although he sometimes gets paid for speeches. He also will talk to groups that can’t afford anything but his transportation.

He and his wife have five children; because of death threats, he shields them from reporters.

His difficulty walking isn’t the result of his weight — he’s lost 150 pounds in recent years and is trying to lose more — but of an inflammatory disease that also causes a bend in his neck that gives him that hunched-over appearance.

Among Barber’s supporters is Leslie Boyd, 62, of Asheville. She has been arrested twice and estimates that she’s attended about 80 percent of Moral Monday events. Her impetus is the death of her son, who was 33 when he died of colon cancer in 2008. He might have survived if insurance has allowed him to have a colonoscopy every year, she said.

“He just struck me as somebody who was going in the right direction, and I wanted to go with him,” she said of Barber. “He’s an amazing leader. He’s just a wonderful human being. … He stands up and speaks out where he sees things that are wrong.”

The GOP leadership and Barber get under each other’s skin more than either lets on. The best-known criticism of Barber came two years ago, just after the Moral Monday protests had started, from then-Sen. Thom Goolsby, who wrote a column referring to the movement as “Moron Mondays.”

More recently, state Republican Party leaders set up a website accusing Barber of taking money from unions. Barber does speak to unions and supports their efforts.

Two GOP leaders declined to be interviewed about Barber. A spokeswoman for Senate Majority Leader Phil Berger wrote that Barber “has been making the same claims for years now — and this point in the legislative session, we simply don’t have time to respond.”

Barber resists calls to raise his national profile, believing change in the country starts in the South, where his parents brought him more than 40 years ago to fight segregation. He’ll stay in North Carolina and fight, just as they did.

“We can overcome the crippling realities of our current moment because when you come together, things can be changed,” he said. “This kind of prophetic hope is not the kind that sets you to peace; it’s the kind that stirs you to action.”

___

Associated Press writer Kathy Matheson in Philadelphia contributed to this report.

___

Martha Waggoner can be reached at http://twitter.com/mjwaggonernc.
Copyright 2015 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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Asm. Corey Jackson Announces Launch of 24-Hour Childcare in His District

Assemblymember Corey Jackson has secured $2 million in state funding for a proposed childcare special district in Moreno Valley and Perris. This funding aims to establish a system providing 24-hour, seven-day-a-week childcare, which would be California’s first special district focused solely on childcare. The initiative seeks to address the area’s designation as a “childcare desert” and high costs for working families. The funding will cover startup, planning, and formation costs for the district. Read more about the specifics of this groundbreaking initiative.

Published

1 day ago

September 28, 2026

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Assemblymember Corey Jackson (D-Moreno Valley). File photo.

By Bo Tefu, California Black Media

Assemblymember Corey Jackson (D-Moreno Valley) has secured $2 million in state funding to launch a proposed childcare special district serving families in Moreno Valley and Perris, paving the way for a system designed to provide childcare 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

The Moreno Valley-Perris Childcare Special District would be the first special district in California focused specifically on childcare, according to Jackson’s office. The state funding will cover startup, planning, and formation costs and help the district meet requirements set by the Riverside Local Agency Formation Commission, or LAFCO.

The proposed district would coordinate a mixed-delivery childcare system that could include home-based and center-based care. The goal is to provide universal childcare for families who work overnight, early morning, or other nontraditional shifts.

Jackson’s office says Moreno Valley is a certified “childcare desert,” with licensed childcare spaces available for only 15% of children with working parents. Infant care in Moreno Valley averages $2,776 a month, or about 35.7% of median household income. In Perris, licensed infant care can cost more than 60% of an individual worker’s gross median earnings, according to the assemblymember’s office.

“Securing this $2 million in startup funding is a monumental victory for the working-class families of Moreno Valley and Perris who have been trapped in a childcare desert for far too long,” Jackson said.

The proposal follows Jackson’s unsuccessful effort to establish the district through Assembly Bill 2083. The legislation would have created the district as a dependent special district covering Moreno Valley, Perris and their spheres of influence, with Riverside LAFCO responsible for reviewing its formation and boundaries.

The new funding allows the district’s formation to move forward without requiring mandatory contributions from local school districts and other stakeholders, according to Jackson’s office. His spokesperson, Daniel Peeden, said Jackson hopes the district can be operating by 2028.

The proposal has faced questions from some local officials. Moreno Valley City Councilmember Ed Delgado, who is running against Jackson for the 60th Assembly District seat, said he supports affordable childcare but questioned how the proposed district would operate and how much it would ultimately cost.

“Basically, he didn’t have a plan. We didn’t see a plan,” Delgado said, adding that officials had questions about operating costs, insurance and eligibility.

“It’s going to take a lot more than $2 million to create a special district to provide affordable childcare,” Delgado said.

Delgado has suggested working with existing childcare centers to subsidize costs for local families rather than creating a new agency.

Jackson’s office says the program will lower barriers to “workforce participation” and reduce “affordability anxiety” for young families. This landmark District is poised to trigger a virtuous cycle of economic upward mobility and long-term regional prosperity in the 60th Assembly District, his office added.

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Black History

IN MEMORIAM: The Rev. Leon “Sonny” Clark, Longtime Orange County Pastor and Community Leader, Dies at 72

Rev. Leon William “Sonny” Clark, the longtime pastor of New Spirit Baptist Church in Santa Ana and a prominent faith and community leader in Orange County, passed away on September 9 at the age of 72. Born in Bennettsville, South Carolina, Clark was a U.S. Navy veteran who dedicated his life to service. He served various Southern California churches before leading New Spirit Baptist Church for over 22 years, extending his work into counseling, mentoring, and civic engagement, and supporting the African American community. To learn more about his life and contributions, read more.

Published

1 day ago

September 28, 2026

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The Rev. Leon “Sonny” Clark. File photo.

By Bo Tefu, California Black Media

Rev. Leon William “Sonny” Clark, longtime pastor of New Spirit Baptist Church in Santa Ana and a respected faith and community leader in Orange County, died Sept. 9. He was 72.

Born Oct. 2, 1953, in Bennettsville, South Carolina, Clark was a U.S. Navy veteran who later built a life of service centered on family, faith, ministry, and community.

Clark began his formal ministry at Metropolitan Baptist Church in Altadena in 1978. After acknowledging his call to ministry in 1980, he preached his first sermon and went on to serve churches throughout Southern California, including Second Baptist Church in Riverside, Mount Vernon Baptist Church in Rubidoux, Antioch Missionary Baptist Church in Pomona, and Friendship Baptist Church in Yorba Linda.

In November 2003, Clark was called to lead New Spirit Baptist Church in Santa Ana, where he served as pastor for more than 22 years. His work extended beyond the pulpit through counseling, mentoring, civic engagement, and efforts to strengthen Orange County’s African American community.

Clark served on the Orange County Heritage Council and supported efforts to preserve and celebrate African American history and culture. He helped organize the Orange County Black History Parade and Unity Festival, served on the Interfaith Committee and the Orange County Transit Authority, and served as president of the Orange County Ministers Conference.

In 2024, the City of Santa Ana recognized Clark for his contributions to the community. He also received the Orange County Southern Baptist Association Hall of Faith Award and was previously honored as Pastor of the Year by the Orange County Heritage Council.

Clark is survived by his wife, Andrea Joyles Clark; six children, Shawn Williams, Le Ondra Clark Harvey, Kyla Coward, Joshua Clark, Marissa Clark and Ashley Clark; grandchildren and great-grandchildren; siblings; extended family; and the New Spirit Baptist Church congregation.

A wake will be held Thursday, Oct. 1, from 4 to 8 p.m. at New Spirit Baptist Church, 701 S. Sullivan St. in Santa Ana, with a remembrance service from 5 to 6:30 p.m.

A Celebration of Life will be held Friday, Oct. 2, at Friendship Baptist Church, 17145 Bastanchury Road in Yorba Linda. Viewing begins at noon, followed by the service at 1 p.m.

Burial will take place Monday, Oct. 5, at 10:15 a.m. at Riverside National Cemetery.

Clark often shared a guiding principle that shaped his ministry: “Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.”

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Economy

Poll: Becerra Widens His Lead Over Hilton; Californians Split on Wealth Tax

A new Public Policy Institute of California poll shows Democrat Xavier Becerra leads Republican Steve Hilton by 22 points in California’s governor’s race, with 60% of likely voters supporting Becerra compared to 38% for Hilton. The September survey also reveals Californians are closely divided on a proposed one-time tax on billionaires, with 52% of likely voters in favor of Proposition 40. Affordability issues are a major factor for voters. Read more to learn about the poll’s additional findings on voter sentiment.

Published

1 day ago

September 28, 2026

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Democrat Xavier Becerra and Republican Steve Hilton.

By Bo Tefu, California Black Media

Democrat Xavier Becerra holds a 22-point lead over Republican Steve Hilton in California’s governor’s race, while voters remain closely divided over a proposed one-time tax on billionaires, according to a new Public Policy Institute of California poll.

The September PPIC survey found that 60% of likely voters support Becerra, compared with 38% for Hilton. His lead is actually narrower than it was in July, when he led Hilton 61% to 36%.

Becerra leads among independent voters, with 57% supporting him compared with 38% for Hilton. Party loyalty remains strong, with 93% of Democratic likely voters backing Becerra and 92% of Republicans supporting Hilton.

Hilton leads in the Central Valley, where 52% of likely voters support him compared with 46% for Becerra.

Affordability remains a major factor: 65% of likely voters say candidates’ plans to address cost-of-living issues are “very important” to their vote.

“Affordability continues to be top of mind for Californians when considering their choice for governor,” said Mark Baldassare, PPIC Statewide Survey director and Miller Chair in Public Policy.

The poll also found a narrow split over Proposition 40, a proposed one-time tax of up to 5% on taxpayers with assets exceeding $1 billion. Fifty-two percent of likely voters said they would vote yes, while 46% said they would vote no.

Support for the wealth tax varies sharply by party. Seventy-two percent of Democrats favor Proposition 40, compared with 46% of independents and 21% of Republicans.

Two competing measures also drew majority support. Fifty-one percent back Proposition 41, while 54% support Proposition 42, both of which could affect the wealth-tax proposal.

The findings come as Californians express broader frustration with the state’s political direction. Seventy-one percent of likely voters expect bad economic times in California over the next year.

“Californians are clearly grumpy and aren’t enamored with any particular political party or movement,” Baldassare said.

The survey interviewed 1,745 California adults, including 1,103 likely voters, from Sept. 4-10. The margin of error for likely voters is plus or minus 3.8 percentage points.