In photo-copied form, the file of Jackson Advocate articles on the Fred Newman cult (both Charles Tisdale's and mine) comprises about 40 or 45 pages. I will send them if you'll supply a postal address.
I did not keep the files from the lawsuit. As you may recall, the Advocate's editorial office was destroyed in a fire-bomb attack two years ago, with files strewn on the floor before it was torched, so I think those are probably lost for good.
(That story ought to be told more widely. True to form, the FBI, the Hinds County district attorney, and the daily media accused Tisdale of having set the fire himself, just as they behaved after a KKK machine-gun attack in the early 1980s. SCLC and other civil-rights groups protested to the Justice Dept., which reluctantly stepped in. It turned out that the hired arsonist had called his city council paymaster from the scene on a cell phone at about 2 o'clock a.m., to report that the deed had been done. I visited Jackson shortly after the fire. Tisdale had reopened in a run-down storefront across the street from his old office, and did not miss an issue. An anonymous friend of mine sent a donation to help, as I'm sure many others did also.)
As far as I know, digital files of our New Alliance Party report don't exist, although perhaps Chip Berlet could help with this. My first computer was a donation from him (a hand-me-down Kaypro from Holly Sklar) about ten years ago, too late for my Jackson Advocate or other articles of the previous 20 years, which were written in longhand or typed on my vintage 1938 Underwood Five machine.
If I recall correctly, Radical America published a skimpy summary and update of my NAP report in 1988, but I can't find a copy here.
Ken Lawrence
> About 15 years ago the New Alliance Party sued Charles Tisdale, publisher
of
> the Jackson Advocate (weekly newspaper serving Jackson's black community)
> and myself for two million dollars after the paper published a series of
> articles I wrote about the Newman cult, which was trying to build a base in
> Mississippi. . . .
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
>
> I'd be interested in reading this. I'd appreciate
> it if you could post or e-mail it.
>
> mbs