Because of his personal experience, Cameron dedicated his life to promoting civil rights, racial unity, and equality. While he worked in a variety of jobs in Indiana during the 1940s, he founded three chapters of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). This was a period when the Ku Klux Klan was still active in the Midwest, although its numbers had decreased since its peak in the 1920s. Cameron established and became the first president of the NAACP Madison County chapter in Anderson, Indiana.