The racial bias of too many elected white judges and state legislators continues to undermine America’s promise of fair courts and representative government. The opening of the Martin Luther King Jr. National Memorial is the occasion of a series of essays by the American Constitution Society, including one by Sherrilyn Ifill about elected judges in Alabama preserving the ways of the Old South. The judges are routinely overriding the decisions of juries in their courtrooms by handing down death sentences, most often in cases involving a black defendant and white victim. The essay points out that in 1957, King proclaimed, “Give us the ballot and we will place judges on the benches of the South who will do justly and love mercy.” But old biases among voters, mostly whites, have yet to be overcome – and society suffers as a result. State legislators across the country, mostly whites engaging in race-tinged fear mongering, are creating new barriers to voting that also have a discriminatory effect and weaken democracy overall. South Carolina recently passed its harsh version of a photo ID requirement for voters, stirring protests and legal complaints. The US Justice Department is at least asking lots of questions before it “preclears” South Carolina’s new law. Strong organizing in the state has put a face on those who will be cheated out of their constitutional right to vote by the guardians of reactionary values – more than 50 years after King’s call to end ballot barriers.
1-888-OUR-VOTE|info@democracy-nc.org
Dr King would not consider a photo ID a barrier to vote. Everybody has one and nobody is prevented from having a photo ID. Dr King would not endorse voter fraud that we have seen in NC where voters vote twice or more. Dr King would not cherrry pick facts either. Of the 98 over rides in the story from life to death, 45 of them were white.
Frank,
It’s time for you to get your own blog. Your weird misuse of Dr. King and trying to suggest that 53 is not “most” of 98, along with a pattern of well-worn repetitive comments, mean you’re just wasting everybody’s time.
Bob Hall
Allow me to print your mission.
Democracy North Carolina is a nonpartisan organization that uses research, organizing, and advocacy to increase voter participation, reduce the influence of big money in politics and achieve a government that is truly of the people, for the people and by the people.
Key word is nonpartisan. The implication is that Conservative viewpoints are welcome too.
Burns is obviously a troll from the right, and a bigot to boot, perhaps a Klucker. The rightwing tea party idiots (all Republicans) have invented a stack of lies about voter fraud going back to when little Billy Rehnquist was persecuting voters (darker ones) in Phoenix Arizona in 1962 – almost got disrarred over it. And before that we had multiple barriers to voting to poor and black citizens. No Burns, not everyone has an ID – you simply think, as do your masters, that having the minimum number of people vote is good for the Republicans, your masters have said that repeatedly. The impediments to voting which the Republican Rightwing legislature have adopted simply force fewer people to vote, particularly the elderly, students, the disabled and minorities. You resent any efforts to make voting easier and simpler to drive off folks who work for a living, which you obviously do not.
As Bob says, crawl off into your dark hole and die somewhere.
This is the kind of hatred this site allows and foments. Without a valid argument, they resort to name calling and hates the fact that other people don’t sing with their choir. No I will nolt crawl into a dark hole but will continue to speak the truth boldly in the light.