Amos C. Brown

Amos Cleophilus Brown (born February 20, 1941) is an African American pastor and civil rights activist. He is the president of the San Francisco branch of the NAACP, and was head pastor of the Third Baptist Church of San Francisco from 1976 through 2025. Brown was one of only eight students who took the only college class ever taught by Martin Luther King Jr. He serves on the board of the California Reparations Task Force.

Early life and education Brown was born in Jackson, Mississippi, in 1941. His great-grandfather was born a slave in Franklin County, Mississippi. Brown's father worked as a rural church pastor and janitor. Medgar Evers, then field secretary of the NAACP, intervened, Martin Luther King wrote one of Brown's recommendation letters. J. Pius Barbour acted as the "unofficial dean" of the black students at the school, his own alma mater.

Career and activism Brown became senior pastor of the Third Baptist Church of San Francisco in 1976. He has served as national chairman for the NAACP Youth and College Division and the National Baptist Commission on Civil Rights.

In 1991, Brown testified at the Clarence Thomas Supreme Court nomination hearings on behalf of the National Baptist Convention of America, the National Baptist Convention, USA, Inc., and the Progressive National Baptist Convention. He stated that the votes of the conventions were virtually unanimous in their opposition to the nomination of Thomas. Amos C. Brown was a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1998. Brown served on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors from 1996 to 2001. He was originally appointed by Mayor Willie Brown in 1996, then elected to a two-year term in 1999. He failed to win re-election to the board in the year 2000.

After the September 11 attacks, Brown attracted attention for comments he made during a September 17, 2001 memorial service at Bill Graham Civic Auditorium for victims of the attack. U.S. Representative Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat representing San Francisco in Congress, was the only politician to condemn Brown, stating: "the act of terrorism on Sept. 11 put those people outside the order of civilized behavior, and we will not take responsibility for that." In 2012, he joined the NAACP National Board in voting overwhelmingly in favor of supporting marriage equality. Brown supports the legalization of marijuana, and has called for more African Americans to have a voice in the medical cannabis industry.

Brown has called for reparations to be paid to black people, to aid in economic empowerment and compensate for deficiencies in education. Brown denied that he had threatened Chuan, but later apologized for his actions.

In June 2025, Brown announced he would be stepping down from his position as head pastor of Third Baptist Church, in a move he referred to as "repositioning" rather than retirement.