The Right to Vote: “It is wrong – deadly wrong…”

The Creation of Adam, The Sistine Chapel, by Michelangelo

Michelangelo Buonarotti (6 March 1475 – 18 February 1564)  Photo credit: Wikipedia

It is wrong – deadly wrong – to deny any of your fellow Americans the right to vote in this country.  (Lyndon Baines Johnson on the 1965 Voting Rights Act.) 

In a speech related to the 1965 Voting Rights Act, President (1963-1969) Lyndon Baines Johnson, LBJ, (August 27, 1908 – January 22, 1973) stated that:

“Rarely are we met with a challenge…. to the values and the purposes and the meaning of our beloved Nation.  The issue of equal rights for American Negroes is such as an issue…. the command of the Constitution is plain.  It is wrong – deadly wrong – to deny any of your fellow Americans the right to vote in this country.” LBJ on the 1965 Voting Rights Act

1)  Yet, after the 1965 Voting Rights Act, which followed the 1964 Civil Rights Act, Democrats ceased to be elected into office in the southern states where there is a greater concentration of African Americans than in the northern states.  Since 1965, in these southern states, Republicans have been elected into office.

2)  Mr George Zimmerman, who stands accused of the fatal shooting of Trayvon Martin, has received donations that will give him a better chance of being found not guilty of the afore-mentioned crime.  Why was Troy Davis executed when all pointed to his innocence?

Related blog: Troy Davis: the Lex Talionis

3)  In 2000, Al Gore won the Presidential elections.

Let’s go back in time: “Shortly before 8 p.m. EST, all of the major television networks estimate that Gore has beaten Texas Gov. George W. Bush in the key state of Florida — but as the night goes on and results come in from the state’s Panhandle region, networks are forced to retract the estimate.” (CNN, December 13, 2000)

What happened is as follows.  When the time came to close the doors on voters, Jed Bush, then Governor of Florida, “worked to rule” and closed the doors to voting facilities even if many among one’s “fellow Americans,” in this case persons of colour, had yet to vote.  There was queue of persons still waiting to vote.  It appears that the Florida recount was not altogether the Florida recount.

There is the letter of the law, but then there is its spirit.  In a just society, the spirit overrides the letter.

4) And now I hear that a voter purge is presently taking place in the State of Florida, under the direction of Republican Governor Rick Scott which could eliminate persons of colour from the list of voters.  Consequently, I am inclined to take seriously the comments contained in the following video.  This is perturbing.