An open supporter of the "one world movement," Dees derides those who believe the federal government has grown too  large and far beyond its constitutional mandate as "dangerous psychos."  Like the '50s red baiters who exploited the  country's legitimate fears of Communism to attack democrats, Morris Dees exploits fears of racism to smear anyone who  owns guns, opposes racial preferences, dislikes homosexuality, fears excessive federal government, or opposes excessive  immigration. 

Dees continually blames the nation's militia groups for the Oklahoma City bombing despite the fact federal prosecutors 
concluded that there is no evidence that Timothy McVeigh or Terry Nichols were ever members of a militia group. Dees has actively campaigned for laws in which "associations of two or more persons" who train in the use of forearms for defensive purposes are declared illegal militias. 

Despite his image as the moral guardian of the nation, his ex-wife cited in divorce documents at least one homosexual encounter, and numerous mistresses including his daughter-in-law and underage stepdaughter. 

The Montgomery-Advertiser won a journalism award for a series of investigative articles exposing Dees' unethical 
fundraising. Chief Justice Warren Burger refused to overturn a federal trial judge's ruling that Dees had suborned a witness to commit perjury in the Joan Little case in North Carolina. Dees' attempted lawsuit against the Nationalist Movement was a miserable failure. 

Dees launched the rumor in April 1996 about a racist conspiracy to burn Black churches in the South. After subsequent investigation revealed there was no rash of Black church burnings, many newspapers, including The Charlotte Observer, concluded that Dees "misinformed" the press. 

USA Today reported in 1996 that Dees's Southern Poverty Law Center was "the nation's richest civil rights organization" with $68 million in assets. Stephen Bright, one of Dees's numerous former associates, told a reporter that Dees is "a fraud who has milked a lot of very wonderful, well-intentioned people." 

While Dees and his Center purport to fight prejudice and racism, 12 of 13 former Black employees interviewed by The Montgomery Advertiser complained they experienced or observed racial problems during their employment. Several said the law center was, "more like a plantation." Former intern Christine Lee said she was nicknamed, "little girl" by a White supervisor.  "As I was told (at the SPLC), they don't need Black people telling them how to handle Black issues.", Lee said. 

Dees has come under fire for not hiring Blacks to fill authoritative positions in his Center. In 1994 the Center had no Black attorneys on staff.  Rep. John Rogers (D-Birmingham) criticized the so-called civil rights group, saying, "The lack of Blacks draws into question whether the center is really committed to every Black person or whether it has been a money making thing. . . They are using poor Black folks to make money off of.  I'm appalled." 

"They're drowning in their own affluence," Pamela Summers, a former Center legal fellow told The Montgomery Advertiser,"What they are doing in the legal department is not done for the best interest of everybody [but] is done as though the sole, overriding goal is to make money."