The NAACP's litigation cites the Fair Housing Act, the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, and the Civil Rights Act. The group's basic demand is for the companies to stop abusive practices and make efforts to fully inform prospective borrowers of their rights.

Though subprime lending and foreclosures disproportionately impact communities of color, the housing meltdown is now, of course, rocking the entire economy. The Center for Responsible Lending recently projected 2.2 million homes lost by the end of 2009 and $352 billion in lost value. The impact on rental properties, especially for the poor and people of of color, may be even more devastating.

The NAACP suit won't correct fundamental inequities in the housing system, but it does help illuminate the convergence of civil rights and economic justice in this crisis.

In a recent interview for an upcoming issue of Colorlines, George Goehl, executive director of the community organizing network National People's Action, said advocates in communities of color have for years been dealing with, and warning about, the looming the mortgage crisis:

"We think that this whole situation really builds the case that racial justice benefits us all. In the 1990s, when these predatory loans started hitting communities of color, which is where it really started, if we would have said, 'Hey, this isn't working for all of us, we have to stop it, we have to outlaw this... put these brokers in jail'--the economy wouldn't have melted down, we wouldn't have had this foreclosure crisis, we wouldn't have needed a stimulus bill. But people looked the other way and only got interested once their mutual funds started to get hit.”

Now that virtually no one can afford to ignore the economic maelstrom, maybe those in a position to prevent future disaster will start to grasp the true cost of the lending industry's excess.

Image: National Training and Information Center Foreclosure Photo Project