There's no doubt the second group, though a subset of the first, is loudest.

        Yet many blacks, including leaders of traditional civil-rights organizations, have been reluctant to endorse the boycott, believing there are more productive ways to encourage racial progress.

        You can cross the National Urban League off that list.

        The Urban League, historically one of the nation's top civil-rights organizations, has crossed over to the boycott side.

        And it's high time.

        The Urban League has for years been so moderate, so mindful of its moneyed supporters and its go-along-to-get along membership, so focused on its self-help programs, that it has muted its own voice for change in society as a whole.

        Now the group has been dragged, reluctantly, into reality: It won't hold its 2003 convention in Cincinnati after all. Often a negative force — not just positive encouragement — must be applied to the push for racial progress.

Crossing a line

        The convention was considered a valuable catch for Cincinnati, with at least 4,000 conventioneers and at least $3.4 million in economic benefits envisioned for downtown.

        For more than a year after last year's unrest, the Urban League's leaders refused to change their convention plans. Leaders said they were giving the community a chance to change.

        The Urban League reaffirmed that decision Thursday, even though it faced the profoundly embarrassing prospect of other black groups protesting at its Los Angeles convention in two weeks and at affiliates in Chicago and Detroit.

        Hugh B. Price, the Urban League's president, said Thursday that Cincinnati's leadership deserved the benefit of the doubt. He promised to use the national group's presence here for good, to boost awareness of blacks' struggles for economic and law-enforcement respect.

        That choice, whether he intended it to or not, bestowed an aura of legitimacy on claims that the city's pace toward progress is good enough and that boycotters were merely bellyaching troublemakers seeking a spotlight.

Broken faith

        Now that aura has suddenly shifted to the boycotters.

        Police Chief Thomas Streicher and City Manager Valerie Lemmie on Friday suspended the police powers of Lt. Col. Ron Twitty, saying he lied about an accident involving his city-owned vehicle. Police held a press conference but revealed few details.

        Lt. Col. Twitty is more than just an assistant police chief, the highest ranking African-American officer on the force. He is for many blacks a living symbol of a chance for fairness with police. During the riots and long afterward, many blacks believed he listened to complaints about police and maybe followed up on them.

        His suspension changed the Urban League's mind.

        “What's most troubling,” Mr. Price said Monday, “is the fact that this controversial disciplinary action, which city officials must have realized would rankle the community, was revealed just one day after our announcement that we were bringing our annual conference to Cincinnati.”

        And so, once again, it's about respect and good faith — between police and black residents, between the Urban League and city leaders.

        The Urban League's decision not to come has resuscitated the struggling boycott movement.

        And no one had to tell Mr. Price, “I told you so!”

        E-mail damos@enquirer.com or call 768-8395

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