Press Release: Atlanta's Southern Elections Fund, Oct 16 1970

FOR INFORMATION CONTACT, (right aligned) Tony Harrison (right aligned) Southern Elections Fund (right aligned) (212) 666-5198 (right aligned)

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE October 16, 1970

Atlanta, Ga - The Southern Elections Fund (SEF) this week announced it had made grants to sixty-five candidates in four Southern states. The Fund, established in 1969 to give financial assistance to Southern office seekers below the Congressional and state-wide level, "gives its support to those candidates whom we believe will empower the powerless, and will democratize the political process in the states of the old Confederacy," a spokesman said. Candidates receiving SEF assistance in the past include Charles Evers, Mayor of Fayette, Mississippi; Zelma Wyche, Town Marshal of Tallulalah, Louisiana; and the present black members of the gGreene County, Alabama Board of Education. "The Fund, which depends entirely on public, non-deductible contributions, is the only organization of its kind" Georgia State Representative Julian Bond said. Bond, a member of the SEF Trustee Board, said the Fund "believes politics ought to be a grass roots affair, and that the political victories closest to the people - aldermen, county commissioners, sheriff, tax assessor - are in the long run, the most important."

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SOUTHERN ELECTIONS FUND. 2. A SEF brochure notes that "the big race against Southern congressmen and Senators cannot be won until a solid base is laid county to county." The Fund is a non-partisan organization. All disbursements are decided by a 14-member Board of Trustees whose members include Bond; Dr. John Cashin, Chairman of the predominately black National Democratic Party of Alabama; Brooklyn Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm; Detroit Congressman John Conyers; Lawrence Guyot, former chairman of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party; John Lewis, Director of the Voter Education Project; Attorney Charles Morgan, Jr., Director of the Southern Regional office of American Civil Liberties Union; anti-war activist Martin Peretz; the Rev. Channing Phillips, "favorite son" candidate for President from Washington D.C., at the 1968 Democratic Convention; Clarence Townes, former Deputy Director of the Republican National Committee; Mrs. Anne Wexler, a strategist in the 1968 McCarthy for President campaign; Dr. Gayraud Wilmore, Commission of the Presbyterian Church, U.S.A.; Tallulah, Louisiana Town Marshall Zelma Wyche, and the Rev. Andrew Young, Black Democratic nominee for Congress from Georgia's Fifth District. None of the Board members are eligible to receive SEF funds. "While there are several committees and fund raising money for

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3 candidates for the United States Senate and House of Representatives, the Southern Elections Fund is the only organization supporting rural candidates, candidates who cannot command national headlines and candidates whose politics represent real people and solutions to their problems, rather than slogans and rhetoric," Bond said. In Alabama, those receiving funds were; Lucius Black, Probate Judge, and six other candidates in Sumter County; Rev. William Branch and five others in Greene County; Eddie Ayers, Probate Judge and seven other candidates in Marengo County; Charles J. McCarthy, Probate Judge and eight others in Wilcox County; Lewis Black, Probate Judge, and eleven other candidates in Hale County; Albert Turner for Probate Judge and six other candidates in Perry County; E.D. Nixon, candidate for the House of Representatives; Robert Strickland, for House of Representatives; Thomas Reed, House of Representatives; Fred Gray, House of Representatives; O.B. Wilson, State Senate; Joe Breck Gantt, District Attorney, 22nd District, Jack Drake, Circuit Judge, 17th Judicial District. In Arkansas, candidates receiving funds were; Sam Sparks, Little Rock, State Senate; T.E. Patterson, Little Rock, House of Representatives; J.F. Colley, St. Francis, County Judge; and Ralph Nesbitt, Lee County, Sheriff. In South Carolina, candidates receiving funds were; James Clyburn, Charleston County, House of Representatives; Herbert Fielding, Charleston County, House of Representatives; James L. Felder, Richland County, House of Representatives; and I.S. Leevy Johnson, Richland County, House of Representatives. In Louisiana, Acie J. Belton, E. Baton Rouge, Parish School Board. -30- (centre aligned)