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Biographical Details of Leadership
Contemporary Lens on Black Leadership
Historical Focus on Race
Julian Bond
From his student days at Morehouse College to his current chairmanship of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), Julian Bond has been an active participant in the movements for civil rights and economic justice. In 1960, while a student at Morehouse, Bond became a founding member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC).
In 1965, Bond was elected to the Georgia House of Representatives but was prevented from taking his seat by members who objected to his opposition to the Vietnam War. He was re-elected to his own vacant seat and un-seated again. He was seated only after a third election and a unanimous decision of the United States Supreme Court.
Bond served as co-chair of a challenge delegation from Georgia to the 1968 Democratic Convention. The challengers were successful in unseating Georgia's regular Democrats, and Bond was nominated for vice-president, but had to decline because he was too young to qualify. Additionally, Bond served as the first president of the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Bond was a commentator on America's Black Forum, the oldest black-owned show in television syndication. Additionally, he has narrated many documentaries including the PBS series Eyes on the Prize. Bond's written works have been published in the New York Times and Viewpoint, a nationally syndicated newspaper column. Bond also published a collection of essays titled A Time to Speak, A Time to Act.
Between 1998 and 2010, Bond served as chairman of the board of the NAACP, the oldest and largest civil rights organization in the United States. The holder of numerous honorary degrees, he has been a professor at The University of Virginia and part-time faculty atAmerican University in Washington, D.C. In 2012, he retired from the University of Virginia as a Professor Emeritus.
Julian Bond died on August 15, 2015.