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Show t NAACP Protests Baez Tabernacle Concert v The "Chronicle" learned Tuesday that folksinger Joan V" Baez, scheduled to sing to-' to-' night in the Salt Lake Taber-'n Taber-'n nacle, had been asked not to is? sing there by the Salt Lake Youth chapter of the National m ihn , Association for the Advance- ment of Colored People, as a protest against the failure of the L.D.S. Church "to take an adequate stand on civil rights." ACCORDING to John Wil liams, Salt Lake Youth Chapter Chap-ter president and a student at Westminister College, Man-nie Man-nie Greenhill of Boston, who is Miss Baez' manager, replied re-plied that she would appear in the Tabernacle due to contract arrangements. Mr. Greenhill added, however, how-ever, that Miss Baez would sing civil rights songs during her performance in the Tabernacle Taber-nacle and would make a statement about the L.D.S. Church and civil rights either during the preformance or shortly before the performance perform-ance at a press conference. MR. WILLIAMS said that his group had received no direct word from Miss Baez herself. In an initial telegram to Miss Baez, Mr. Williams wired, "The Youth NAACP of Salt Lake City requests that you change your performance of Wednesday, April 21st from the L.D.S. Tabernacle to another appropriate place such as the University in a public protest against the L.D.S. Church's stand on civil rights. "THE L.D.S. Church refused refus-ed to acknowledge civil rights as a moral issue but took a political stand on another moral issue the liquor bill." "The L.D.S. Church effectively effect-ively used their influence to kill the liquor bill but remained re-mained silent on the greatest moral issue today: civil rights." In a letter sent the following follow-ing day, Williams enclosed clippings concerning civil rights from past "Chronicle" issues and quoted from the Book of Mormon (Alma 3:6) what he stated was the "basic Mormon philosophy regarding the Negro": And the skins of the Lamanites were dark. . . which was a curse upon them." Williams called on Miss Baez to "reveal publicly the Utah situation to the citizens of the state and the nation" and to "make as great a contribution con-tribution to the Civil Rights Movement in Utah as you have made in Selma, Jackson or Montgomery." |