BALTIMORE— A federal judge here has turned thumb’s down on an Adam’s Mark Hotels & Resorts’ request to halt or limit a boycott by the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) against the hotel chain arising out of a 1999 incident of alleged discriminatory practices against black guests at the company’s Daytona Beach, FL property. Following the judge’s refusal last Friday to grant the injunction, the hotel chain indicated it will drop its litigation against the NAACP. Fred Kummer, Adam’s Mark president and chief executive officer, added that the hotel chain will “concentrate all our efforts on exoneration for Adam’s Mark by a jury of our peers” when the Black College Reunion lawsuit goes to trial in Orlando, FL in November. The counter-suit, as filed by Adam’s Mark parent company HBE Corp., alleged that an NAACP boycott would amount to “defamation and tortuous interference” with its business. In the wake of the ruling against the hotel chain, NAACP President/CEO Kweisi Mfume vowed that the boycott against Adam’s Mark would continue “until [the hotel chain]seeks to end all discriminatory treatment that may exist against its guests or employees, and until it publicly apologizes for the treatment of black guests at its Daytona Beach hotel.” Had the injunction against the civil rights organization been upheld by the court, it would have ostensibly prohibited the boycott called for by the NAACP against Adam’s Mark as well as limited the extent of picketing planned next week for several of the hotel chain’s locations around the country.—Michael Billig
