Word: clennon
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...divisions in the Plains Baptist Church became critical when black Preacher Clennon King challenged its whites-only membership policy late in the presidential campaign. When the deacons panicked and canceled services the Sunday before Election Day, Pastor Bruce Edwards told reporters that the eleven-year-old policy was "immoral and sinful" and that deacons routinely used the term niggers. At President-elect Carter's urging, the church later voted reluctantly to admit blacks. But an Old South faction, which disliked both Edwards' remarks and the fact that he had adopted a Polynesian boy, maneuvered to fire the pastor...
...church-membership drama erupted unexpectedly in the closing days of the campaign. The week before the election, a flamboyant black minister, the Rev. Clennon King, 60, decided to test church policy. Apparently after hearing that Carter said he presumed blacks were eligible for membership, King informed the church that he would apply on Sunday, Oct. 31. He also told the press. Come Sunday, he traveled the 30 miles from his home town of Albany, Ga. (pop. 80,000), only to find the church door locked, services suspended, and the minister, the Rev. Bruce Edwards, awaiting him outside...
...When he ran for the Albany city council, he distributed a poster showing him sticking out his tongue and waving his fingers near his ears. The caption: "You've tried everything else. Now try a crazy nigger." His brother C.B. King, an attorney, assured a Carter rally that Clennon was "emotionally and mentally disturbed...
...election, he insisted: "I can't resign from the human race because there's discrimination, and I don't intend to resign from my own church because there's discrimination." But Georgia Congressman Andrew Young, Carter's closest black adviser, said that if Clennon King were not attempting to integrate the church, "I would have...
...smiling. The church had voted, 120-66, to end discrimination; a committee would be set up to judge the "sincerity" of anyone wishing to join. Carter, who said he was proud of his church, played down his own role. Said he: "I was just one of the members." Clennon King exulted that the decision "vindicates the people of Plains." He added that he would be back next Sunday to test the new policy...