NAACP urged to keep fighting

DETROIT, July 9 (UPI) -- The head of one of the nation's oldest civil rights groups said many Americans wrongly think racial discrimination is a thing of the past in the United States.

Addressing the group's annual convention, NAACP Chairman Julian Bond said the country has taken several steps back on the road to racial equality during the administration of George Bush, The Detroit News reported Monday.

"We find ourselves re-fighting battles we thought we had already won," Bond told an audience of more than 2,000 gathered in Detroit.

As examples of backward moves, Bond pointed out the government's slow response to Hurricane Katrina and the U.S. Supreme Court's recent rejection of race-based school integration.

He said the high court's 5-4 decision barring school districts in Louisville, Ky. and Seattle from using race in assigning students to schools effectively threatens the 1954 ruling, Brown vs. Board of Education.

Bond called on members of the 98-year-old organization to continue to fight against educational inequality, poverty and voter disenfranchisement.