Roy Wilkins: The Quiet Revolutionary of the NAACP

In 1931, Roy Wilkins (1901–1981) went to work for the NAACP, devoting the next 46 years of his life to that organization—as assistant secretary to Walter White, editor of The Crisis, executive secretary, and later executive director—until his retirement in 1977. Journalist Ryan reminds readers that Wilkins was there at the milestones of American civil rights history, though more charismatic or activist figures received more attention. Wilkins’s primary tools were litigation and lobbying. His noteworthy successes, derived from organizational skill and political strategy, include the passage of the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act. The internecine organization controversies, the stresses and conflicts between the local chapters and the national organization, even the strains of diverse and often diverging personalities are carefully delineated. Although Wilkins’s early life gets brief treatment, the book’s true focus and achievement is in its highly detailed, richly researched account of Wilkins’s role in the NAACP, and, tangentially, his time as head of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights—quite fitting for a subject who devoted so much of his life to the organization. 13 photos. (Dec.)