U.S. Civil Rights Chief Pendleton Dies in San Diego

Clarence M. Pendleton, the outspoken chairman of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission who angered liberals and fellow blacks because of his conservative views on busing and affirmative-action programs, died here Sunday.

Pendleton, 57, collapsed at about 10 a.m. while working out at the San Diego Hilton Tennis Club and died an hour later at a hospital of an apparent heart attack, authorities said.

Pendleton’s tenure in the U.S. Civil Rights Commission was marked by controversy since he was named in 1981 by President Reagan to become the first black to head the board, which was established in the 1950s as an advisory body for Congress.

A former president of the San Diego Urban League, Pendleton quickly forged a conservative reputation in Washington, displaying staunch support for Reagan’s efforts to limit the scope of affirmative action, which he labeled a “bankrupt policy.” Pendleton also opposed desegregation through busing.

Under his leadership, the commission conducted a study that Pendleton said indicated no gains in minority status could be attributed to the passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

Such stands brought Pendleton into conflict with many blacks and with liberal lawmakers. Some responded by urging that funding for the Civil Rights Commission be canceled, an effort Pendleton labeled as foolhardy because it would sever whatever links blacks had to the Reagan Administration.

Exercised at Club

Employees at the club where Pendleton died said he fell face down near exercise bicycles in the facility’s weight room. Club director Gary Lingley applied cardiopulmonary resuscitation until paramedics arrived about 15 minutes later.

The medics were able to “get a weak pulse and some breathing” before Pendleton was rushed to AMI Mission Bay Hospital, Lingley said.

Despite “aggressive resuscitation” efforts by doctors, Pendleton died at 11:13 a.m., Deputy Coroner William Leard said.

Lingley said Pendleton, a La Jolla resident, joined the club about two months ago and worked out three or four times a week. A one-time champion swimmer, Pendleton suffered a heart attack in 1976 and had a history of high blood pressure.

In addition to his wife Margrit and young daughter Paula, Pendleton is survived by two grown children from a previous marriage, George and Suan Pendleton, who live in Washington.

Kentucky Native

Born Clarence McLane Pendleton Jr. on Nov. 10, 1930, in Louisville, Ky., he grew up in Washington, where his father was the first swimming coach at Howard University and an assistant community recreation director.

Pendleton went on to Howard, where he excelled as a swimmer and football player while earning his degree. After serving in the Army, he returned to the university in 1957 as a physical education instructor and swimming coach.

Although long a self-described “bleeding-heart liberal,” Pendleton tilted toward conservatism after he moved to San Diego in 1972 to head the Model Cities program. Influenced by then-Mayor Pete Wilson, now a Republican U.S. senator, and longtime Reagan confidant Edwin Meese III, now U.S. attorney general, Pendleton became a Republican in the mid-1970s.

After more than three years with the Model Cities program, Pendleton became executive director for the San Diego Urban League, a spot once held by Vernon E. Jordan before he became head of the National Urban League.

Pendleton earned both criticism and praise in the post. Under his leadership, Pendleton said, the league negotiated $24 million in business loans, created 8,000 nonsubsidized jobs and returned $17 for every $1 invested in it by the city.

Spending Questioned

He resigned from the post in 1982 after being ordered to rehire the former league controller, who had alleged that Pendleton had misspent $94,000 of a federal grant.

Charges of fiscal impropriety continued to dog Pendleton during his years with the civil rights panel. In 1986, Pendleton came under fire from congressional critics armed with a new government audit they said showed irregularities in hiring, questionable travel, poor record-keeping and failure to account for $175,000 budgeted to the commission.

But it was Pendleton’s outspoken comments about civil rights that prompted perhaps the greatest furor. In 1984, he called the concept of comparable worth, a controversial proposal aimed at reducing the gap between women’s and men’s earnings, “the looniest idea since Looney Tunes came on the screen.”

He belittled black leaders in some speeches, calling them “new racists” for supporting affirmative action and breaking America into competing racial classes. In a 1984 speech, Pendleton sarcastically suggested that blacks should petition Congress to pay “reparations” instead of continuing to support affirmative-action regulations.

Active on Boards

Although his role as chairman of the commission took him often to the nation’s capital, Pendleton kept his home in San Diego and continued to serve on several boards for local businesses and charitable organizations.

At various times he served as chairman of San Diego Transit, as a trustee of the Scripps Clinic and Research Foundation and on the boards of the Great American First Savings Bank and of the San Diego Coalition for Economic and Environmental Balance. Pendleton also served as president of a San Diego-based business development and investment firm, Pendleton & Associates.

A White House spokesman said there would be no comment on Pendleton’s death until this morning.

Democratic presidential candidate Jesse Jackson, campaigning in California, said Pendleton “was an outstanding public servant and, like any American, he had the right to express his point of view, which may not have been a mainstream point of view.”