Committee of Concern

From July 12 to July 17, 1967, the city of Newark, New Jersey, was wrecked by racial violence. In six days of rioting, 23 people were killed, 725 were injured and nearly 1,500 were arrested. Property damage was estimated at over $10 million. While the riots were still in progress, sixty community leaders formed a Committee of Concern with the following aims: to help restore calm to the city, to study the causes of racial unrest, and to formulate goals for social and economic improvements that would address those causes.

The group elected as co-chairmen Malcolm D. Talbott and Oliver Lofton. Talbott, who was white and a former professor of law and dean at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, was, at the time, the vice president of Rutgers in charge of its Newark campus. Lofton, an African-American lawyer, was the administrative director of the Newark Legal Services Project. Other officers elected included Marion Kidd, a welfare recipient, as secretary, and Theron L. Marsh, executive vice president of the National Newark & Essex Bank, as treasurer. The Committee of Concern quickly grew to include 600 members from all walks of life. New Jersey's governor, Richard J. Hughes, authorized it to investigate the causes of the riots.

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