Agnew publicly supported civil rights, but deplored the militant tactics used by some black leaders. During the 1966 election, his record had won him the endorsement of Roy Wilkins, leader of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). In mid-1967, racial tension was rising nationally, fueled by black discontent and an increasingly assertive civil rights leadership. Several cities exploded in violence, and there were riots in Cambridge, Maryland, after an incendiary speech there on July 24, 1967, by radical student leader H. Rap Brown. Agnew's principal concern was to maintain law and order, and he denounced Brown as a professional agitator, saying, "I hope they put him away and throw away the key." When the Kerner Commission, appointed by President Johnson to investigate the causes of the unrest, reported that the principal factor was institutional white racism, Agnew dismissed these findings, blaming the "permissive climate and misguided compassion" and adding: "It is not the centuries of racism and deprivation that have built to an explosive crescendo, but ... that lawbreaking has become a socially acceptable and occasionally stylish form of dissent". In March 1968, when faced with a student boycott at Bowie State College, a historically black institution, Agnew again blamed outside agitators and refused to negotiate with the students. When a student committee came to Annapolis and demanded a meeting, Agnew closed the college and ordered more than 200 arrests.
