Matthew Stark (January 27, 1930 – April 10, 2018) was a noted civil rights activist in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and Lee County, Florida.
[1] Stark received his Ph.D. in Educational Administration and Counseling in June, 1963 from Case Western Reserve University.
"[3] "One of Stark's trademarks," a journalist noted in 1988, "has been holding MCLU press conferences on Sunday ... to seek maximum coverage.
"[2] During his time heading the MCLU, Stark was "denounced from pulpits as an agent of the devil and from police headquarters as a stooge for pornographers.
"[3] The losing side of the 1967 board election and policy change, among them longtime editor and activist Bernard Casserly, alleged that Stark's "vociferousness and his inability to separate civil liberties from [radical] political sentiment" caused a severe split in the organization and changed its focus from one "committed to civil liberties to one steeped in radical politics, one that endorsed political candidates, came out against the Vietnam War, and supported the impeachment of Richard Nixon."
They claim that Stark "orchestrated the 1967 board election so that the MCLU was, in effect, purged of those members opposed to political activism.
"[3] The organization also lost members over well-publicized national battles of the ACLU, especially its defense of a Nazi march in Skokie, Illinois, in 1977, and a Ku Klux Klan rally in Tupelo, Mississippi.
[5] In mid-1987, Stark went to half-time status at the MCLU but resumed his former role as board president and continued to oversee the staff.