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ACORN: In a nutshellBill Buescher 4/29/09Political Science 101ACORN or The Associations of Community Organizations for Reform Now isaliberal lobbying group that is geared towards bringing about fair social and economic
 
 policies for the low and middle income classes. Over the past 30 years, ACORN has been very successful at bringing about these policies and is now prominent figure on thenational political scene, for reasons both good and bad.In 1970, George Wiley who was the leader of The NWRO (National WelfareRights Organization) saw an opportunity to expand his organization into something more powerful. The NWRO, which was fairly large organization at the time with 160 groupsin 60 cities, saw financial crisis at the beginning of the decade and it’s organizing,consisting of mostly poor black women, was weakening (Premilla. 2006). Wiley, who had been led the organization since the mid-sixties,saw an opportunity in Arkansas to expandthe strength of the social movement for the poor he was trying to create. So as he saw thestrength of his organization dwindling (Tsuchiya 2008), Wiley sent Wade Rathke toArkansas to start an organization geared towards organizing and supporting low-income,conservative whites in rural America (ACORN 2005).Rathke started the Arkansas Community Organization for reform now. ACORNquickly gained political strength in the south and Midwest. By 1975 it has become amulti-state organization with Texas and South Dakota being newly added (ACORN2005). In 1978, ACORN (now the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) ratified it’s “People’s Preamble” which was ratified at the 1979 St. Louisconvention. With Phrases like “Enough is enough. We will wait no longer for the crumbsat America's door. We will not be meek, but mighty. We will not starve on past promises, but feast on future dreams.” the objective of ACORN were clear from the beginning thatit was an organization based on, as Horowitz (2008) states “[mobilizing] local residentsinto demanding and getting their fair share”.In 1980, ACORN expanded to twenty states and started to become a prominent
 
figure in national politics (ACORN 2008). Throughout the earlier 1980’s ACORN, in protest to Reagan administrations economic policy or “Reaganomics” which, accordingto the Gale Virtual Reference Libarary, “consisted of four main initiatives: (1) taxreductions that would encourage investment and production, (2) spending cuts that wouldreduce the size of government, (3) elimination of federal regulations that wereconstricting business growth, and (4) a stable monetary policy that would keep inflationunder control” and in attempt to get low -income families into vacant housing, startedsquatting campaigns across the nation. People would move into vacant housing and, withneighborhood consent, would renovate it for comfortable living. ACORN continued it’s protest of insufficient social spending with the establishment of what were called“Reagan Ranches”. These tent cities were established to symbolize the homelessness perpetuated by Reagan policies and were successful in allowing ACORN to testify on thehousing crisis in America before a congressional committee in 1984 (ACORN 2005).These grandiose gestures of protest helped acorn gain national exposure and politicallegitimacy as a liberal advocacy group.Today, because of it’s roots, ACORN main priority is housing. In 2002, ACORNfiled a lawsuit against HBSC financial citing it’s predatory lending practices. In 2003,ACORN won $484 million dollars for the people affected by HSBC predatory lending(State of Washington v. Household international Inc.) The settlement also helped create a$72 million dollar foreclosure avoidance program to help homeowners who are in risk of loosing their house. In ACORN’s “People’s Platform” it states it has “Set a goal of amillion new units of federally subsidized, per year”(ACORN 2005). The organizationstill fights hard against “redlining” or loan discrimination for poor neighborhoods andworks on the behalf of low-income borrows to fight loan and mortgage malpractice (Jost
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