Black Americans outnumbered white Americans among the 29,500 people who lived in Selma, Alabama, in the 1960s, but the city’s voting rolls were 99% white. So, in 1963, Black organizers in the Dallas County Voters League launched a drive to get Black voters in Selma registered. The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, a prominent civil rights organization, joined them.
In 1967 several of my college classmates and I formed a local chapter of the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) chapter in the community in Pennsylvania where our college was located. Among our first activities was to open an after-school tutoring program for struggling high school students located in the public housing projects near our off-campus apartment complex. We felt we needed a way to connect with the local community in order to politically activate them and helping their kids was a good way to make that connection. In time we commenced conducting voter registration drives and politically activating the community for a number of causes. By the time my class graduated we had even placed several members of the local neighborhood on the school board, City Council, and in several municipal boards and commissions.
That community activism during my college years caused me to become engaged in advocating for voting rights and various social justice causes. Now 50 plus years later I find the same causes for which I advocated then still denied to too many. I cannot believe that we are still engaged in this struggle which to me seems so righteous and just. I find the denial of voting rights to be among the most insidious forms of suppression of basic human rights and dignity. It disgusted me over 50 years ago and angers me today. To think I am still engaged in this struggle without a final victory yet more than 50 years after the passage of the Voting Rights Act saddens me greatly.
I remind myself, though in frustration, that the national activation and mobilization of literally millions of demonstrators in the streets of our nation and our legislative halls have always been required to achieve progress in social justice. We cannot simply depend on our legislators to do the right and moral thing. It seems they must be pushed and pushed again. It is again time to activate and mobilize millions in this cause again, as our legislators once more seem to be ignoring the will of the people. Time to rise up yet and demand the will of the people is represented in our legislatures. Let the peoples' voices be heard.
This is such a powerful and moving piece about this day in history. Our history. A story of Alabama. I wonder how to change this story. Together, we must make a new story.
“You must be the change you would like to see in this world”
This quote is attributed to Mahatma Gandhi. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., drew inspiration from Gandhi, and studied his principles of non-violence. imho, these principles involve all aspects on one’s life, including speech and action, thinking and intention.
I feel I need to bring to the community our speech and intention, with people with whom we disagreeing views.
* I want to apologize to the community and take back my biting words that I have written on this board, about conservatives and people who follow Donald Trump. I feel shame that I have fallen into the violence of the Pettis Bridge, with my own hateful speech. I have long admired Gandhi, King and Rosa Parks, and all who have fought a far greater struggle in life than I, in the journeyfor a kind and gentle heart, let alone peace in their world and the world we share.
How can we ever expect to have a less violent world - and in our own personal life - if we cannot stop the violence that comes from our own pen, and therefore our mind. We simply will not cross the bridge to the world we desire if we cannot accept and welcome the stranger.
In the spirit of free speech, I welcome anyone to express themselves in the manner one chooses. However, there is ample evidence in history that free speech does NOT lead to freedom. Liberation comes from within. I feel this requires courage, and support from others.
I ask you to join me in gently reminding others in our community to reach within for words that welcome, and acknowledge our habitual speech of aggression.
I ask for your support in our journey across our own Pettis bridge.
I remember well those days. Remember the opinions of people who were convinced that’s black marchers were simply lawbreakers. I remember gas stations with three bathrooms: “Men, Women, Colored”. I remember the freedom riders coming through town and escorted right on out of town. And I remember Bloody Sunday, and attack dogs, and four little girls who didn’t make it home from Sunday School. I remember, and I’m a white southerner. I saw what happened and I saw change — then backsliding when the Voting Rights bill was gutted. How could anyone NOT remember or better yet forget or let the monsters back out in the light of day and say well, they’re very fine people on both sides? God help us!
Thank you Dr. Richardson for providing historical background for Bloody Sunday and connecting it with President Biden's act today. I watched Oprah's interview with Meghan and Harry revealing the racism towards her and their son Archie. In the interview Meghan reveals that she wanted to end her own life because of the racism. I know that white Americans have got to stand in black peoples' shoes to be with them in their suffering, historically and now. We have to. We have to personally take responsibility for our whiteness and educate ourselves about the continuous stressors that black (and all ethnically diverse) people endure daily, to the point that they have racial physical and mental health disparities. I am sick to my stomach everyday reading, watching, hearing about another atrocity towards black people that is simply genocide.
So thank you for telling us about another freedom that African Americans have had to fight to the death for. The freedom to vote. And may we all ask ourselves why is this still happening?
Honor Amelia Boynton, John Lewis, Dr. King, Jimmie Lee Jackson, James Reeb, Viola Liuzzo, and all those who have shed blood for the foundational right to vote. Honor them by taking action on behalf of voting rights.
The wave of voter suppression laws making their way through state legislatures is 253 bills in 43 states. What is your state doing?
Learn the basics of H.R.1/S.1 For the People Act, which addresses 3 issues:
1. Voting rights
2. Campaign finance
3. Ethics and accountability of public officials
What resonates with you the most? Talk about it to friends and family, contact the politicians, post on social media, and as Heather says, "take up oxygen!"
Also, when I think back to this, I remember Harlan Ellison, with whom I was friends in the 80s (before he did to me what he did to every friend he ever had), telling me about going down to Selma and marching in that big march. He went down as a writer to cover it, there were two other prominent white Hollywood notables there too, Paul Newman and Charleton Heston (!). I once met Newman in the business, and remarked to him about respecting him for doing that, to which he said he went so that if the cops did it again, if they beat him up there would be at least one white guy the country knew, which would be sure to have the papers cover it. As honorable a guy personally as he was publicly.
Dr. Richardson’s Letter from and American for today, March 7, 2021, must rank among her most important contributions to the survival of our nation. It addresses one of the most corrosive agents eroding the core of our democracy. The caustic nature of white supremacy, or anti-blackness, is the key component of the danger our society faces today.
The creation of a “white” race and the invention of its necessary opposite “black” race, laid the groundwork for a “superior” race and an “inferior” one. It was on this corrupt foundation that America was raised.
This is the fundamental rationalization for that detestable institution: slavery; it is the justification used to excuse the rape of the indigenous cultures found on this continent, the pillaging of their wealth, and the near extinction of their populations. It is the root cause of the virulent misogyny that poisons our family and community life.
The malodorous rot that we have recently discovered in our society has been festering for centuries. It is now visible and undeniable to all but the unfortunate, brainwashed, deluded millions who have based their existence in this Big Lie!
Those of us who have not succumbed to this odious and detestable fairy tale are now faced with the enormous responsibility to recreate this nation in its own image. American exceptionalism has yet to exist—except in a demented and thoroughly corrupt form—so we must put on our big boy pants, gather our tools, and get to work building it right this time.
Also: I recommend this article and the book that is its subject:
Thank you, Dr Heather, for another informative detailed history of events from "Bloody Sunday" on its 56th anniversary. It was before my time and I do not recall it being discussed at all in any of my history classes when I was growing up. But it is horrifying to read.
Present-day events seem to point to a return to those terrible times in some states. This sentence jumped out at me: "Among the things Georgia wants to outlaw is giving water to voters as they wait for hours in line to get to the polls." The depth of inhumanity is disturbing. I hope such laws will not get passed! It is sad to know that all over the country more restrictive laws are being passed to prevent ordinary people from voting.
I remember today like it was yesterday. I was still in the Navy over in Vietnam. I remember a friend saying "What are those people doing?" He was speaking of the whites. I looked at him and said "You're on *this* ship withy *this* crew, and you have to ask?" I was referring to the southern whites we served alongside. For me as a relatively naive white boy from Colorado in 1962, the most shocking thing that happened to me in the Navy was meeting southern whites. My recruit company was 1/3 us Colorado boys, 1/3 Californians and 1/3 from South Carolina. There were some black guys among the Californians (who all ended up in leadership positions in the company) and I had no trouble seeing from the first who they thought the enemy was. Those South Carolinians were the strangest people I'd ever met. Half of them scored under 20 on teh AFQT (I scored 97) I'd never been around people I thought were too stupid to be morons. I never met a white southerner in the Navy who wasn't a mean sonofabitch, and dumber than shit. It wasn't till I went down to the South myself in the later 60s as a left activist and ran across good Southerners that I believed such critters existed. Good southern whites are amazing people, because it's hard to be a good southern white, with so many evil morons around, And sadly, 56 years later it doesn't seem much has changed, other than the fact I also thought half the northern whites I knew back in the Navy were also morons turns out to have been generous on my part. The problem isn't just southern. You met great people in the service, but the truth is, looking back, they were notable for being the minority they were.
It's sad to know I could go down there today and meet the exact same types I did before. Now they all wear red baseball hats, so at least they're easy to recognize.
Morning, all!! Morning, Dr. R!! In response to Dr. R's post today, I am copying Ellie's post. We've got a lot of work to do. Let's get busy:
Ellie Kona4 hr ago
Honor Amelia Boynton, John Lewis, Dr. King, Jimmie Lee Jackson, James Reeb, Viola Liuzzo, and all those who have shed blood for the foundational right to vote. Honor them by taking action on behalf of voting rights.
The wave of voter suppression laws making their way through state legislatures is 253 bills in 43 states. What is your state doing?
Learn the basics of H.R.1/S.1 For the People Act, which addresses 3 issues:
1. Voting rights
2. Campaign finance
3. Ethics and accountability of public officials
What resonates with you the most? Talk about it to friends and family, contact the politicians, post on social media, and as Heather says, "take up oxygen!"
Today's "Letter" is as eloquent and powerful a succinct history of voting rights legislation in the U.S. as I've ever seen. It should be widely syndicated in newspapers, newsletters, and online publications.
Thanks, Heather. I needed that. I grew up in the shadow of that event, but for a turn of fate could have been part of it, and yet never knew the whole story until you told it in its historical context. Of all the gifts of your service, this contextualizing is the greatest.
Where is our party? Where is the political party that will make it unnecessary to march on Washington? Where is the political party that will make it unnecessary to march in the streets of Birmingham?
Huge thanks for underlining Biden’s executive order regarding essential voting rights—and for describing the details of civil rights 60 years ago. The context of Bloody Sunday (hopefully) inspires all of us to help move voting rights onward and forward.
In 1967 several of my college classmates and I formed a local chapter of the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) chapter in the community in Pennsylvania where our college was located. Among our first activities was to open an after-school tutoring program for struggling high school students located in the public housing projects near our off-campus apartment complex. We felt we needed a way to connect with the local community in order to politically activate them and helping their kids was a good way to make that connection. In time we commenced conducting voter registration drives and politically activating the community for a number of causes. By the time my class graduated we had even placed several members of the local neighborhood on the school board, City Council, and in several municipal boards and commissions.
That community activism during my college years caused me to become engaged in advocating for voting rights and various social justice causes. Now 50 plus years later I find the same causes for which I advocated then still denied to too many. I cannot believe that we are still engaged in this struggle which to me seems so righteous and just. I find the denial of voting rights to be among the most insidious forms of suppression of basic human rights and dignity. It disgusted me over 50 years ago and angers me today. To think I am still engaged in this struggle without a final victory yet more than 50 years after the passage of the Voting Rights Act saddens me greatly.
I remind myself, though in frustration, that the national activation and mobilization of literally millions of demonstrators in the streets of our nation and our legislative halls have always been required to achieve progress in social justice. We cannot simply depend on our legislators to do the right and moral thing. It seems they must be pushed and pushed again. It is again time to activate and mobilize millions in this cause again, as our legislators once more seem to be ignoring the will of the people. Time to rise up yet and demand the will of the people is represented in our legislatures. Let the peoples' voices be heard.
This is such a powerful and moving piece about this day in history. Our history. A story of Alabama. I wonder how to change this story. Together, we must make a new story.
“You must be the change you would like to see in this world”
This quote is attributed to Mahatma Gandhi. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., drew inspiration from Gandhi, and studied his principles of non-violence. imho, these principles involve all aspects on one’s life, including speech and action, thinking and intention.
I feel I need to bring to the community our speech and intention, with people with whom we disagreeing views.
* I want to apologize to the community and take back my biting words that I have written on this board, about conservatives and people who follow Donald Trump. I feel shame that I have fallen into the violence of the Pettis Bridge, with my own hateful speech. I have long admired Gandhi, King and Rosa Parks, and all who have fought a far greater struggle in life than I, in the journeyfor a kind and gentle heart, let alone peace in their world and the world we share.
How can we ever expect to have a less violent world - and in our own personal life - if we cannot stop the violence that comes from our own pen, and therefore our mind. We simply will not cross the bridge to the world we desire if we cannot accept and welcome the stranger.
In the spirit of free speech, I welcome anyone to express themselves in the manner one chooses. However, there is ample evidence in history that free speech does NOT lead to freedom. Liberation comes from within. I feel this requires courage, and support from others.
I ask you to join me in gently reminding others in our community to reach within for words that welcome, and acknowledge our habitual speech of aggression.
I ask for your support in our journey across our own Pettis bridge.
I remember well those days. Remember the opinions of people who were convinced that’s black marchers were simply lawbreakers. I remember gas stations with three bathrooms: “Men, Women, Colored”. I remember the freedom riders coming through town and escorted right on out of town. And I remember Bloody Sunday, and attack dogs, and four little girls who didn’t make it home from Sunday School. I remember, and I’m a white southerner. I saw what happened and I saw change — then backsliding when the Voting Rights bill was gutted. How could anyone NOT remember or better yet forget or let the monsters back out in the light of day and say well, they’re very fine people on both sides? God help us!
Thank you Dr. Richardson for providing historical background for Bloody Sunday and connecting it with President Biden's act today. I watched Oprah's interview with Meghan and Harry revealing the racism towards her and their son Archie. In the interview Meghan reveals that she wanted to end her own life because of the racism. I know that white Americans have got to stand in black peoples' shoes to be with them in their suffering, historically and now. We have to. We have to personally take responsibility for our whiteness and educate ourselves about the continuous stressors that black (and all ethnically diverse) people endure daily, to the point that they have racial physical and mental health disparities. I am sick to my stomach everyday reading, watching, hearing about another atrocity towards black people that is simply genocide.
So thank you for telling us about another freedom that African Americans have had to fight to the death for. The freedom to vote. And may we all ask ourselves why is this still happening?
Honor Amelia Boynton, John Lewis, Dr. King, Jimmie Lee Jackson, James Reeb, Viola Liuzzo, and all those who have shed blood for the foundational right to vote. Honor them by taking action on behalf of voting rights.
The wave of voter suppression laws making their way through state legislatures is 253 bills in 43 states. What is your state doing?
Learn the basics of H.R.1/S.1 For the People Act, which addresses 3 issues:
1. Voting rights
2. Campaign finance
3. Ethics and accountability of public officials
What resonates with you the most? Talk about it to friends and family, contact the politicians, post on social media, and as Heather says, "take up oxygen!"
Declaration for American Democracy: https://dfadcoalition.org/
Connect with an organization that is already mobilized. Get the most bang for your buck. Places to start:
https://democracyreform-sarbanes.house.gov/newsroom/press-releases/leading-grassroots-advocacy-organizations-endorse-house-democrats-once-in-a
https://campaignlegal.org/democracyu
https://indivisible.org/
League of Women Voters: https://www.lwv.org/
(Did you know the name means "for women voters" from the Women's Suffrage era?)
Stacey Abrams' Fair Fight: https://fairfight.com/
(Fair Fight is taking their Georgia playbook to other states.)
Additional organizations suggested by HCR Reader Joan on March 5 (in case you missed it):
https://www.commoncause.org/
(click "Join the Action Team" or Volunteer to learn more)
https://www.sierraclubindependentaction.org/
(volunteers needed to write letters to register new voters)
https://front.moveon.org/volunteer-with-moveon/
(they have texting opportunities)
https://newgeorgiaproject.org/about/
(In addition to Fair Fight, New Georgia Project has been very active in registering new voters and fighting back against voter suppression.)
We must work together to protect Voting Rights. Otherwise there is no freedom or democracy.
Also, when I think back to this, I remember Harlan Ellison, with whom I was friends in the 80s (before he did to me what he did to every friend he ever had), telling me about going down to Selma and marching in that big march. He went down as a writer to cover it, there were two other prominent white Hollywood notables there too, Paul Newman and Charleton Heston (!). I once met Newman in the business, and remarked to him about respecting him for doing that, to which he said he went so that if the cops did it again, if they beat him up there would be at least one white guy the country knew, which would be sure to have the papers cover it. As honorable a guy personally as he was publicly.
Dr. Richardson’s Letter from and American for today, March 7, 2021, must rank among her most important contributions to the survival of our nation. It addresses one of the most corrosive agents eroding the core of our democracy. The caustic nature of white supremacy, or anti-blackness, is the key component of the danger our society faces today.
The creation of a “white” race and the invention of its necessary opposite “black” race, laid the groundwork for a “superior” race and an “inferior” one. It was on this corrupt foundation that America was raised.
This is the fundamental rationalization for that detestable institution: slavery; it is the justification used to excuse the rape of the indigenous cultures found on this continent, the pillaging of their wealth, and the near extinction of their populations. It is the root cause of the virulent misogyny that poisons our family and community life.
The malodorous rot that we have recently discovered in our society has been festering for centuries. It is now visible and undeniable to all but the unfortunate, brainwashed, deluded millions who have based their existence in this Big Lie!
Those of us who have not succumbed to this odious and detestable fairy tale are now faced with the enormous responsibility to recreate this nation in its own image. American exceptionalism has yet to exist—except in a demented and thoroughly corrupt form—so we must put on our big boy pants, gather our tools, and get to work building it right this time.
Also: I recommend this article and the book that is its subject:
https://www.cnn.com/2021/03/05/us/heather-mcghee-racism-white-people-blake/index.html
God bless America!
Thank you, Dr Heather, for another informative detailed history of events from "Bloody Sunday" on its 56th anniversary. It was before my time and I do not recall it being discussed at all in any of my history classes when I was growing up. But it is horrifying to read.
Present-day events seem to point to a return to those terrible times in some states. This sentence jumped out at me: "Among the things Georgia wants to outlaw is giving water to voters as they wait for hours in line to get to the polls." The depth of inhumanity is disturbing. I hope such laws will not get passed! It is sad to know that all over the country more restrictive laws are being passed to prevent ordinary people from voting.
I remember today like it was yesterday. I was still in the Navy over in Vietnam. I remember a friend saying "What are those people doing?" He was speaking of the whites. I looked at him and said "You're on *this* ship withy *this* crew, and you have to ask?" I was referring to the southern whites we served alongside. For me as a relatively naive white boy from Colorado in 1962, the most shocking thing that happened to me in the Navy was meeting southern whites. My recruit company was 1/3 us Colorado boys, 1/3 Californians and 1/3 from South Carolina. There were some black guys among the Californians (who all ended up in leadership positions in the company) and I had no trouble seeing from the first who they thought the enemy was. Those South Carolinians were the strangest people I'd ever met. Half of them scored under 20 on teh AFQT (I scored 97) I'd never been around people I thought were too stupid to be morons. I never met a white southerner in the Navy who wasn't a mean sonofabitch, and dumber than shit. It wasn't till I went down to the South myself in the later 60s as a left activist and ran across good Southerners that I believed such critters existed. Good southern whites are amazing people, because it's hard to be a good southern white, with so many evil morons around, And sadly, 56 years later it doesn't seem much has changed, other than the fact I also thought half the northern whites I knew back in the Navy were also morons turns out to have been generous on my part. The problem isn't just southern. You met great people in the service, but the truth is, looking back, they were notable for being the minority they were.
It's sad to know I could go down there today and meet the exact same types I did before. Now they all wear red baseball hats, so at least they're easy to recognize.
Morning, all!! Morning, Dr. R!! In response to Dr. R's post today, I am copying Ellie's post. We've got a lot of work to do. Let's get busy:
Ellie Kona4 hr ago
Honor Amelia Boynton, John Lewis, Dr. King, Jimmie Lee Jackson, James Reeb, Viola Liuzzo, and all those who have shed blood for the foundational right to vote. Honor them by taking action on behalf of voting rights.
The wave of voter suppression laws making their way through state legislatures is 253 bills in 43 states. What is your state doing?
Learn the basics of H.R.1/S.1 For the People Act, which addresses 3 issues:
1. Voting rights
2. Campaign finance
3. Ethics and accountability of public officials
What resonates with you the most? Talk about it to friends and family, contact the politicians, post on social media, and as Heather says, "take up oxygen!"
Declaration for American Democracy: https://dfadcoalition.org/
Connect with an organization that is already mobilized. Get the most bang for your buck. Places to start:
https://democracyreform-sarbanes.house.gov/newsroom/press-releases/leading-grassroots-advocacy-organizations-endorse-house-democrats-once-in-a
https://campaignlegal.org/democracyu
https://indivisible.org/
League of Women Voters: https://www.lwv.org/
(Did you know the name means "for women voters" from the Women's Suffrage era?)
Stacey Abrams' Fair Fight: https://fairfight.com/
(Fair Fight is taking their Georgia playbook to other states.)
Additional organizations suggested by HCR Reader Joan on March 5 (in case you missed it):
https://www.commoncause.org/
(click "Join the Action Team" or Volunteer to learn more)
https://www.sierraclubindependentaction.org/
(volunteers needed to write letters to register new voters)
https://front.moveon.org/volunteer-with-moveon/
(they have texting opportunities)
https://newgeorgiaproject.org/about/
(In addition to Fair Fight, New Georgia Project has been very active in registering new voters and fighting back against voter suppression.)
Ellie Kona1 hr ago
and how could I forget the NAACP with its action link in support of the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Act of 2020:
https://naacp.org/latest/john-r-lewis-voting-rights-act-2020/
Today's "Letter" is as eloquent and powerful a succinct history of voting rights legislation in the U.S. as I've ever seen. It should be widely syndicated in newspapers, newsletters, and online publications.
Thanks, Heather. I needed that. I grew up in the shadow of that event, but for a turn of fate could have been part of it, and yet never knew the whole story until you told it in its historical context. Of all the gifts of your service, this contextualizing is the greatest.
Where is our party? Where is the political party that will make it unnecessary to march on Washington? Where is the political party that will make it unnecessary to march in the streets of Birmingham?
John Lewis
Speech at the March on Washington 1963
Thanks, Dr. Richardson, for reminding us of the details of this vital piece of American history.
Huge thanks for underlining Biden’s executive order regarding essential voting rights—and for describing the details of civil rights 60 years ago. The context of Bloody Sunday (hopefully) inspires all of us to help move voting rights onward and forward.