- Mayor in Africa: The mayor's spokesman says C. Jack Ellis is in Elmira, Ghana. Elmira is Macon's "sister city". Maybe he'll come back with a new assortment of dashikis, similar to the one he wore at Chester Wheeler's retirement party. During the roast... a few joked about his unusual attire at a black tie event.
- Hurricane Dennis: It looks like the center of the storm is going to head away from Middle Georgia and more towards Memphis, eventually. The storm has been wobbling in the last few hours and is expect to hit the gulf coast during midday on Sunday. It will be the first weekend I've worked in a while... just in case there's any major storm damage in our area, which I don't expect (I'll probably be wrong). Nonetheless, hopefully there will be something I can shoot, that's not too far away.
- FVSU Interim Prez: Maybe alumni and students will be happier now that Dr. Kofi Lomotey (fmr. Leroy Jackson?) is OUT and Dr. William Harris is in at least for now. It definitely seems that there is more optimism about the school's troubled education program. And one wonders if the African Studies program is in trouble now that Lomotey is no longer there to protect it.
Walking Out...
I covered the city council meeting Tuesday, which I don't get to do too often. And aside from the business that was handled, I noticed how many of the city council members decided to leave before the meeting was adjourned. Perhaps, they all had a pressing family emergency, but no look of concern covered their faces as they were leaving. Well, actually, that's not totally accurate. Henry Ficklin left the meeting after taking questions about an ordinance coming out of the appropriations committee concerning professional fees for people working in the city. He and Councilwomen Brenda Youmas engaged in an informative and entertaining exchange, during which Ficklin became so annoyed, that after he finished with his committee report, he abruptly left the meeting-- missing several key votes that evening, including ones to increase business and occupational taxes. Alveno Ross and James Timley dipped out early also; I think they stayed for the business tax votes. By the end of the meeting Ward 3 only had one council member to represent them, Council President Anita Ponder.
Independence Day: A Slap in the Face?
FREDERICK DOUGLASS, Independence Day Speech at Rochester, 1841 (A former slave himself, Frederick Douglass became a leader in the 19th Century Abolitionist Movement)
Fellow citizens, pardon me, allow me to ask, why am I called upon to speak here today? What have I, or those I represent, to do with your national independence? Are the great principles of political freedom and of natural justice, embodied in that Declaration of Independence, extended to us? and am I, therefore, called upon to bring our humble offering to the national altar, and to confess the benefits and express devout gratitude for the blessings resulting from your independence to us?
But such is not the state of the case. I say it with a sad sense of the disparity between us. am not included within the pale of this glorious anniversary! Your high independence only reveals the immeasurable distance between us. The blessings in which you, this day, rejoice are not enjoyed in common. The rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity, and independence bequeathed by your fathers is shared by you, not by me. The sunlight that brought light and healing to you has brought stripes and death to me. This Fourth of July is yours, not mine. You may rejoice, I must mourn. To drag a man in fetters into the grand illuminated temple of liberty, and call upon him to join you in joyous anthems, were inhuman mockery and sacrilegious irony. Do you mean, citizens, to mock me by asking me to speak today? If so, there is a parallel to your conduct. And let me warn that it is dangerous to copy the example of nation whose crimes, towering up to heaven, were thrown down by the breath of the Almighty, burying that nation in irrevocable ruin! I can today take up the plaintive lament of a peeled and woe-smitten people.
Fellow citizens, above your national, tumultuous joy, I hear the mournful wail of millions! Whose chains, heavy and grievous yesterday, are, today, rendered more intolerable by the jubilee shouts that reach them. If I do forget, if I do not faithfully remember those bleeding children of sorry this day, "may my right hand cleave to the roof of my mouth"! To forget them, to pass lightly over their wrongs, and to chime in with the popular theme would be treason most scandalous and shocking, and would make me a reproach before God and the world. My subject, then, fellow citizens, is American slavery. I shall see this day and its popular characteristics from the slave's point of view. Standing there identified with the American bondman, making his wrongs mine. I do not hesitate to declare with all my soul that the character and conduct of this nation never looked blacker to me than on this Fourth of July! Whether we turn to the declarations of the past or to the professions of the present, the conduct of the nation seems equally hideous and revolting. America is false to the past, false to the present, and solemnly binds herself to be false to the future. Standing with God and the crushed and bleeding slave on this occasion, I will, in the name of humanity which is outraged, in the name of liberty which is fettered, in the name of the Constitution and the Bible which are disregarded and trampled upon, dare to call in question and to denounce, with all the emphasis I can command, everything that serves to perpetuate slavery-the great sin and shame of America! "I will not equivocate, I will not excuse"; I will use the severest language I can command; and yet not one word shall escape me that any man, whose judgment is not blinded by prejudice, shall not confess to be right and just....
What, am I to argue that it is wrong to make men brutes, to rob them of their liberty, to work them without wages, to keep them ignorant of their relations to their fellow men, to beat them with sticks, to flay their flesh with the lash, to load their limbs with irons, to hunt them with dogs, to sell them at auction, to sunder their families, to knock out their teeth, to burn their flesh, to starve them into obedience and submission to their masters? Must I argue that a system thus marked with blood, and stained with pollution, is wrong? No! I will not. I have better employment for my time and strength than such arguments would imply....
What, to the American slave, is your Fourth of July? I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciation of tyrants, brass-fronted impudence; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade and solemnity, are, to Him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy-a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. There is not a nation of savages. There is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices more shocking and bloody than are the people of the United States at this very hour.
Go where you may, search where you will, roam through all the monarchies and despotisms- of the Old World, travel through South America, search out every abuse, and when you have found the last, lay your facts by the side of the everyday practices of this nation, and you will say with me that, for revolting barbarity and shameless hypocrisy, America reigns without a rival.
(Thanks Bro. Eddie Hollingsworth for sending this to me.)
Fellow citizens, pardon me, allow me to ask, why am I called upon to speak here today? What have I, or those I represent, to do with your national independence? Are the great principles of political freedom and of natural justice, embodied in that Declaration of Independence, extended to us? and am I, therefore, called upon to bring our humble offering to the national altar, and to confess the benefits and express devout gratitude for the blessings resulting from your independence to us?
But such is not the state of the case. I say it with a sad sense of the disparity between us. am not included within the pale of this glorious anniversary! Your high independence only reveals the immeasurable distance between us. The blessings in which you, this day, rejoice are not enjoyed in common. The rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity, and independence bequeathed by your fathers is shared by you, not by me. The sunlight that brought light and healing to you has brought stripes and death to me. This Fourth of July is yours, not mine. You may rejoice, I must mourn. To drag a man in fetters into the grand illuminated temple of liberty, and call upon him to join you in joyous anthems, were inhuman mockery and sacrilegious irony. Do you mean, citizens, to mock me by asking me to speak today? If so, there is a parallel to your conduct. And let me warn that it is dangerous to copy the example of nation whose crimes, towering up to heaven, were thrown down by the breath of the Almighty, burying that nation in irrevocable ruin! I can today take up the plaintive lament of a peeled and woe-smitten people.
Fellow citizens, above your national, tumultuous joy, I hear the mournful wail of millions! Whose chains, heavy and grievous yesterday, are, today, rendered more intolerable by the jubilee shouts that reach them. If I do forget, if I do not faithfully remember those bleeding children of sorry this day, "may my right hand cleave to the roof of my mouth"! To forget them, to pass lightly over their wrongs, and to chime in with the popular theme would be treason most scandalous and shocking, and would make me a reproach before God and the world. My subject, then, fellow citizens, is American slavery. I shall see this day and its popular characteristics from the slave's point of view. Standing there identified with the American bondman, making his wrongs mine. I do not hesitate to declare with all my soul that the character and conduct of this nation never looked blacker to me than on this Fourth of July! Whether we turn to the declarations of the past or to the professions of the present, the conduct of the nation seems equally hideous and revolting. America is false to the past, false to the present, and solemnly binds herself to be false to the future. Standing with God and the crushed and bleeding slave on this occasion, I will, in the name of humanity which is outraged, in the name of liberty which is fettered, in the name of the Constitution and the Bible which are disregarded and trampled upon, dare to call in question and to denounce, with all the emphasis I can command, everything that serves to perpetuate slavery-the great sin and shame of America! "I will not equivocate, I will not excuse"; I will use the severest language I can command; and yet not one word shall escape me that any man, whose judgment is not blinded by prejudice, shall not confess to be right and just....
What, am I to argue that it is wrong to make men brutes, to rob them of their liberty, to work them without wages, to keep them ignorant of their relations to their fellow men, to beat them with sticks, to flay their flesh with the lash, to load their limbs with irons, to hunt them with dogs, to sell them at auction, to sunder their families, to knock out their teeth, to burn their flesh, to starve them into obedience and submission to their masters? Must I argue that a system thus marked with blood, and stained with pollution, is wrong? No! I will not. I have better employment for my time and strength than such arguments would imply....
What, to the American slave, is your Fourth of July? I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciation of tyrants, brass-fronted impudence; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade and solemnity, are, to Him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy-a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. There is not a nation of savages. There is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices more shocking and bloody than are the people of the United States at this very hour.
Go where you may, search where you will, roam through all the monarchies and despotisms- of the Old World, travel through South America, search out every abuse, and when you have found the last, lay your facts by the side of the everyday practices of this nation, and you will say with me that, for revolting barbarity and shameless hypocrisy, America reigns without a rival.
(Thanks Bro. Eddie Hollingsworth for sending this to me.)
What's another penny?
Voters in Bibb County voted overwhelmingly to approve a special sales tax designed to pay off more than $87 million in city and county debt. It seems now that another special tax to pay for school and technology upgrades and improvements to the school's transportation infrastructure is imminent. Tonight, at the school board meeting one of the last items to discussed was to add a new "bus barn" in the ELOST proposal. The necessity of a new bus barn was validated, but the idea was shot down because the majority of the board wanted to stick with the proposal, as it was, and didn't want to make any changes this late in the process. I thought it was interesting when one of the school system administrators was questioned about finding funding for such a project. He suggested that finding money might not be impossible. I say show me the money... I missed that item in the budget. Maybe there's some extra in the bank.
Note: ELOST= Education Local Option Sales Tax
Note: ELOST= Education Local Option Sales Tax
A Penny More?
The voters of Bibb County will have to decide Tuesday if they want to impose a penny tax on purchases made in the county. The goal is to raise $87,125,000 to pay for several projects throughout the county, which includes the city of Macon. I haven't been able to find the exact wording of the ballot online-- but I am familiar with it.
This is my estimation... NOT THE OFFICIAL NUMBERS.
If passed the SPLOST will last a maximum of 3.5 years, not raising more than $87,125,000.
According to the ballot, the special tax will be used to pay for the retirement of indebtedness and the acquisition of capital outlay projects within the county. The money received from the SPLOST will be divided between the city and county governments. The county will receive the funds from the state and distribute them accordingly. The city will receive 35 percent of the money taken in from the SPLOST, while county will retain 65 percent. Here's the Breakdown:
Total: $87,125,000
City: $30,493,750
County: $56,631,250
The city of Macon will be accountable for $30,493,750 or 35 percent for the following projects...
The city will pay off revenue bonds for the Macon Coliseum and the Macon Centreplex.
The city will pay for equipment and other property leased by the city of Macon from the Georgia Municipal Association.
The city will retire general obligation debt from the General Obligation Bond Series 1976.
The city will pay for improvements to the stormwater management system.
Bibb County will be accountable for $56,631,250 or 65 percent for the following projects...
The county will retire general obligation bond indebtedness from the Bibb County General Obligation School Refunding Bond, Series 2003.
The county will pay for equipment leased through the Georgia Municipal Association.
The county will pay for buses and vans currently leased by the Macon-Bibb County Transit Authority.
The county will pay for the Bibb County Law Enforcement Center and for improvements to the facility through the prepayment of leases intergovernmentaltal contract obligations between the county and the Macon-Bibb County Urban Development Authority which will allow for tpaymentnet or redemption of outstanding revenue bonds of the Macon-Bibb County Urban Development Authority.
When SPLOSTs come up or talk of raising the sales tax discussions about it being a regressive tax intrigue me. Who will pay the most and who will be hit hardest are two questions that both cause me to sit on the fence about the issue. Those who spend more will pay more, but those who will be hit hardest are those whose percentage of income will take a bigger hit. The fairness in both situations can be argued.
Charles Bishop, the county commission chairman for Bibb County, insists that property owners can benefit from passing the SPLOST because they will avoid a property tax increase and allow people from who live in or visit from surrounding areas to share the burden in paying off debt for the county. Anti-SPLOST advocates argue that the county should shave more from the budget to pay off the debt and insist that cuts can be made. Macon Mayor C. Jack Ellis takes an opposing view from most of the city council saying that he supports an expected special sales tax for education that will likely be put before voters in the fall. So who is right in all of this?
Bishop?: Get help from outside the county to help pay our bills.
Anti-SPLOST People?: Don't pass a SPLOST; save that penny. Cut more from the budget to pay off debt.
Ellis?: Save that penny for schools... stop giving your money to the county to build a jail.
Vote is June 21.
This is my estimation... NOT THE OFFICIAL NUMBERS.
If passed the SPLOST will last a maximum of 3.5 years, not raising more than $87,125,000.
According to the ballot, the special tax will be used to pay for the retirement of indebtedness and the acquisition of capital outlay projects within the county. The money received from the SPLOST will be divided between the city and county governments. The county will receive the funds from the state and distribute them accordingly. The city will receive 35 percent of the money taken in from the SPLOST, while county will retain 65 percent. Here's the Breakdown:
Total: $87,125,000
City: $30,493,750
County: $56,631,250
The city of Macon will be accountable for $30,493,750 or 35 percent for the following projects...
The city will pay off revenue bonds for the Macon Coliseum and the Macon Centreplex.
The city will pay for equipment and other property leased by the city of Macon from the Georgia Municipal Association.
The city will retire general obligation debt from the General Obligation Bond Series 1976.
The city will pay for improvements to the stormwater management system.
Bibb County will be accountable for $56,631,250 or 65 percent for the following projects...
The county will retire general obligation bond indebtedness from the Bibb County General Obligation School Refunding Bond, Series 2003.
The county will pay for equipment leased through the Georgia Municipal Association.
The county will pay for buses and vans currently leased by the Macon-Bibb County Transit Authority.
The county will pay for the Bibb County Law Enforcement Center and for improvements to the facility through the prepayment of leases intergovernmentaltal contract obligations between the county and the Macon-Bibb County Urban Development Authority which will allow for tpaymentnet or redemption of outstanding revenue bonds of the Macon-Bibb County Urban Development Authority.
When SPLOSTs come up or talk of raising the sales tax discussions about it being a regressive tax intrigue me. Who will pay the most and who will be hit hardest are two questions that both cause me to sit on the fence about the issue. Those who spend more will pay more, but those who will be hit hardest are those whose percentage of income will take a bigger hit. The fairness in both situations can be argued.
Charles Bishop, the county commission chairman for Bibb County, insists that property owners can benefit from passing the SPLOST because they will avoid a property tax increase and allow people from who live in or visit from surrounding areas to share the burden in paying off debt for the county. Anti-SPLOST advocates argue that the county should shave more from the budget to pay off the debt and insist that cuts can be made. Macon Mayor C. Jack Ellis takes an opposing view from most of the city council saying that he supports an expected special sales tax for education that will likely be put before voters in the fall. So who is right in all of this?
Bishop?: Get help from outside the county to help pay our bills.
Anti-SPLOST People?: Don't pass a SPLOST; save that penny. Cut more from the budget to pay off debt.
Ellis?: Save that penny for schools... stop giving your money to the county to build a jail.
Vote is June 21.
Most of the Senate Aplogizes for Lynchings
The Senate--
(1) apologizes to the victims of lynching for the failure of the Senate to enact anti-lynching legislation;
(2) expresses the deepest sympathies and most solemn regrets of the Senate to the descendants of victims of lynching , the ancestors of whom were deprived of life, human dignity, and the constitutional protections accorded all citizens of the United States; and
(3) remembers the history of lynching , to ensure that these tragedies will be neither forgotten nor repeated.
----------
Remarks from the Senate Majority Leader Dr. Bill Frist
June 13th, 2005
For over 60 years, the United States Senate refused to act against lynching – against vigilante … mob murder. This was one of the worst failings of the Senate in its entire history. It was a shame on the institution. And it was a shame on the senators who didn’t just fail to act -- but deliberately kept the Senate and the whole of the federal government from acting. Though deep scars will always remain, I’m hopeful we will begin to heal and help close the wounds caused by lynching. Four out of five lynch mob victims were African-American.
The practice followed slavery as an ugly expression of racism and prejudice in our country. In the history of lynching, mobs murdered more than 4,700 people. Nearly 250 of those victims were from Tennessee, Very few had committed any sort of crime.
Lynching was a way to humiliate … to repress ... to dehumanize.
The Senate, disgracefully, bears some of the responsibility for this. Between 1890 and 1952, 7 presidents petitioned Congress to ban lynching. And, in those same 62 years, the House of Representatives passed three anti-lynching bills.
Each bill died in the Senate.
The Senate made a terrible, terrible mistake.
The tyranny of lynch mobs created an environment of fear throughout the American South.
Lynching took innocent lives. It divided society. And it thwarted the aspirations of African-Americans.
Lynching was nothing less than a form of racial terrorism.
It took the vision and courage of men and women like Mary White Ovington, W.E.B. DuBois, George H. White, Jane Adams and, of course, fellow Tennessean Ida Wells-Barnett to pass federal laws against lynching and put an end to this despicable practice. Ida Wells-Barnett, indeed, may have done more than any other person to expose the terrible evils of lynching. A school teacher in Memphis who put herself through college, she became one of the nation’s first female newspaper editors.
A civil rights crusader from her teens, Ida Wells committed herself to the fight against lynching after a mob murdered her friends -- Thomas Moss, Calvin McDowell, and Henry Stewart. These three men, driven by their entrepreneurial energy, opened a small grocery store that catered primarily to African-Americans. They took business away from nearby white business owners. Driven by hatred, jealousy, rage, and prejudice, an angry white mob stormed their store. Acting in self defense, Wells’ three friends fired on the rioters. The police arrested the grocers for defending themselves.
The mob kidnapped all three from jail. And all three were murdered in Memphis’ streets. These brutal murders galvanized Wells’ into action. Her righteous anger, blistering editorials, and strong sense of justice further enraged Memphis’ bigots. They burned her newspaper presses and threatened to murder her. Wells moved to Chicago and became one of that city’s leading social crusaders. Wells’ book Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases and her dogged investigative reporting exposed millions of Americans to the brutality of lynching.
In a nation rife with racism and prejudice, Ida Wells and her colleagues began the Civil Rights Movement. They helped bring us integration. They paved the way for equality. And they taught all of us that racism is a terrible evil. After many years of struggle … after many setbacks … after much heartache … they won.
From President Truman’s Executive Order ending segregation in the armed forces to the 1964 Civil Rights Act, a series of civil rights laws moved the nation towards legal equality. But no civil rights law is as important to our nation’s political process as the 1965 Voting Rights Act. It enfranchised millions of African-American voters and it brought many black politicians into office. Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act will be up for reauthorization in 2007. President Reagan signed into law a 25 year reauthorization in 1982.
Section 4 contains a temporary pre-clearance provision that applies to Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, Texas, Virginia, and parts of Alaska, Arizona, Hawaii, Idaho, and North Carolina.
These states must submit any voting changes to the United States Department of Justice for pre-clearance. If the Department of Justice concludes that the change weakens the voting strength of minority voters, it can refuse to approve the change. While I recognize that this can impose a bureaucratic burden on states acting in good faith, we must continue our nation’s work to protect voting rights. And that is why we need to extend the Voting Rights Act.
Quite simply, we owe civil rights pioneers like Ida Wells nothing less. I hope the day will come when racism and prejudice are relegated completely to our past. This resolution is a positive step in the right direction. Transforming our nation requires that we recall our history – all of it. We can become a better people by celebrating the glories of our past – but also our imperfections. That includes continuing to do our utmost to protect voting rights for all Americans.
----------
The other Senator from Tennessee, a former governor of Tennessee, a former president of MY Alma Mater, The University of Tennessee would have nothing to do with this legislation. I guess, he, like others, doesn't see why an official apology is important.
(1) apologizes to the victims of lynching for the failure of the Senate to enact anti-lynching legislation;
(2) expresses the deepest sympathies and most solemn regrets of the Senate to the descendants of victims of lynching , the ancestors of whom were deprived of life, human dignity, and the constitutional protections accorded all citizens of the United States; and
(3) remembers the history of lynching , to ensure that these tragedies will be neither forgotten nor repeated.
----------
Remarks from the Senate Majority Leader Dr. Bill Frist
June 13th, 2005
For over 60 years, the United States Senate refused to act against lynching – against vigilante … mob murder. This was one of the worst failings of the Senate in its entire history. It was a shame on the institution. And it was a shame on the senators who didn’t just fail to act -- but deliberately kept the Senate and the whole of the federal government from acting. Though deep scars will always remain, I’m hopeful we will begin to heal and help close the wounds caused by lynching. Four out of five lynch mob victims were African-American.
The practice followed slavery as an ugly expression of racism and prejudice in our country. In the history of lynching, mobs murdered more than 4,700 people. Nearly 250 of those victims were from Tennessee, Very few had committed any sort of crime.
Lynching was a way to humiliate … to repress ... to dehumanize.
The Senate, disgracefully, bears some of the responsibility for this. Between 1890 and 1952, 7 presidents petitioned Congress to ban lynching. And, in those same 62 years, the House of Representatives passed three anti-lynching bills.
Each bill died in the Senate.
The Senate made a terrible, terrible mistake.
The tyranny of lynch mobs created an environment of fear throughout the American South.
Lynching took innocent lives. It divided society. And it thwarted the aspirations of African-Americans.
Lynching was nothing less than a form of racial terrorism.
It took the vision and courage of men and women like Mary White Ovington, W.E.B. DuBois, George H. White, Jane Adams and, of course, fellow Tennessean Ida Wells-Barnett to pass federal laws against lynching and put an end to this despicable practice. Ida Wells-Barnett, indeed, may have done more than any other person to expose the terrible evils of lynching. A school teacher in Memphis who put herself through college, she became one of the nation’s first female newspaper editors.
A civil rights crusader from her teens, Ida Wells committed herself to the fight against lynching after a mob murdered her friends -- Thomas Moss, Calvin McDowell, and Henry Stewart. These three men, driven by their entrepreneurial energy, opened a small grocery store that catered primarily to African-Americans. They took business away from nearby white business owners. Driven by hatred, jealousy, rage, and prejudice, an angry white mob stormed their store. Acting in self defense, Wells’ three friends fired on the rioters. The police arrested the grocers for defending themselves.
The mob kidnapped all three from jail. And all three were murdered in Memphis’ streets. These brutal murders galvanized Wells’ into action. Her righteous anger, blistering editorials, and strong sense of justice further enraged Memphis’ bigots. They burned her newspaper presses and threatened to murder her. Wells moved to Chicago and became one of that city’s leading social crusaders. Wells’ book Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases and her dogged investigative reporting exposed millions of Americans to the brutality of lynching.
In a nation rife with racism and prejudice, Ida Wells and her colleagues began the Civil Rights Movement. They helped bring us integration. They paved the way for equality. And they taught all of us that racism is a terrible evil. After many years of struggle … after many setbacks … after much heartache … they won.
From President Truman’s Executive Order ending segregation in the armed forces to the 1964 Civil Rights Act, a series of civil rights laws moved the nation towards legal equality. But no civil rights law is as important to our nation’s political process as the 1965 Voting Rights Act. It enfranchised millions of African-American voters and it brought many black politicians into office. Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act will be up for reauthorization in 2007. President Reagan signed into law a 25 year reauthorization in 1982.
Section 4 contains a temporary pre-clearance provision that applies to Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, Texas, Virginia, and parts of Alaska, Arizona, Hawaii, Idaho, and North Carolina.
These states must submit any voting changes to the United States Department of Justice for pre-clearance. If the Department of Justice concludes that the change weakens the voting strength of minority voters, it can refuse to approve the change. While I recognize that this can impose a bureaucratic burden on states acting in good faith, we must continue our nation’s work to protect voting rights. And that is why we need to extend the Voting Rights Act.
Quite simply, we owe civil rights pioneers like Ida Wells nothing less. I hope the day will come when racism and prejudice are relegated completely to our past. This resolution is a positive step in the right direction. Transforming our nation requires that we recall our history – all of it. We can become a better people by celebrating the glories of our past – but also our imperfections. That includes continuing to do our utmost to protect voting rights for all Americans.
----------
The other Senator from Tennessee, a former governor of Tennessee, a former president of MY Alma Mater, The University of Tennessee would have nothing to do with this legislation. I guess, he, like others, doesn't see why an official apology is important.
Scholarship!!!
I had the chance to present scholarships to some students at Northeast High School. Four awards to be exact. It was nice to see so many students graduating and being recognized. The awards I presented, on behalf of The Epsilon Beta Lambda Chapter of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Incorporated, were a few of many given away that night. Some of the students should have just pulled up a chair on stage because their name was called so many times.
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