U.S. sues black activist on voting act violation

Prosecutor objects
The main white person who makes the claim is Ricky Walker, the county prosecuting attorney who believes Brown recruited an opponent for him simply because he’s white, an action Walker called “racist.”

Walker says that when he qualified to run again in 2003, Brown brought in a black lawyer from another part of the state to run against him. A circuit judge found that the lawyer, Winston James Thompson III, had not established residency, and Thompson was not allowed on the ballot.

“I think he just wanted to have a person in that office that he had some control over, a black person,” Walker says.

Brown, chairman of the Noxubee County Democratic Party since 2000, says Thompson recruited himself.

Republican chastises Justice Dept.
Brown’s defense attorney, prominent black Republican Wilbur Colom, disagrees with Brown’s political views but defends his right to speak.

“I think Ike does play race politics,” Colom says. “He is a black political leader who fights the fight like we were still in the 1970s. He doesn’t recognize the progress that we have made.”

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But Colom criticizes the Justice Department for filing a complaint against a black political consultant while ignoring similar behavior by white political operatives in Mississippi.

“It has overtones of politics and that’s the wrong road for Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department,” the attorney says. “It’s going to destroy their credibility the next time they ask black people to listen to them.”

‘Voter suppression’?
Democratic state Rep. Reecy Dickson says Brown is a political celebrity who evokes strong reactions from friends and foes. Brown moved to Noxubee County in 1979 to work on Dickson’s campaign for county superintendent of education and later helped her bid for the Legislature.

Asked if Brown is being fair, she smiles slightly.

“The question comes down to: What is fair in politics?” Dickson says. “I heard someone say once, ‘Fair died a long time ago.”’

Brown sees the Justice Department case as whites dissatisfied with growing black political power in east Mississippi — particularly his power. He says the lawsuit is a way to muddy his name.

“It’s all about voter suppression,” he says.

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