Race-Baiting at It's Best

In a column, Rose Russell, an associate editor at The (Toledo) Blade, takes race-baiting to a new level:

CONGRESSIONAL Republicans' actions Wednesday on the issue of renewing the Voting Rights Act of 1965 were scornful.

However, the Republicans' whammy raises questions about that commitment.

Southern House Republicans' refusal to remain under federal oversight that ensures no voter is subjected to barriers led them to cancel a vote to extend the law scheduled the other day. Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert of Illinois insists that his Republican colleagues are "committed to passing the Voting Rights Act legislation as soon as possible." From that vantage point then, it doesn't appear there is a threat to the need to extend the law for another 25 years.

Oh it does, why? It was not a Republican who stood in that school house door demanding segregation. It was not a Republican who invented the poll tax. It was not a Republican who created the literacy test. What in the previous 30 years would give any rational onlooker the notion that it was Republicans who stood in the way of racial equality? I have indeed had to spank the GOP recently for racial shenanigans, but unfortunately they were doing just as the Congressional Black Caucus had requested -- they again gave the OK to congressional districts created for the sole purpose of electing black and Latino representatives. The slimy insinuation that racism is the cause of the delay is the product of a small mind which has no other recourse but name-calling.

The voting rights law requires the Justice Department to give approval before changes are permitted in voting practices in nine southern states that have been documented to bully black voters.

The purpose of the law is to prevent the return of scare tactics that whites used to hinder black voters from exercising their right.

An accurate statement -- 40 years ago. Though I have no doubt that I could produce for you several (well-hidden) incidents of voter intimidation, the 60s are long gone that fight has already been won. Leftists like Miss Russell keep the specter of this wide-spread racism alive for only one purpose: to keep the black vote in the Democrat's pocket through fear. Bull Conner must be rolling over in his grave at the sight of the theft of his greatest weapon!

After all, African-Americans have become full members in the political process. Black southerners enjoy both voting in elections and holding public office at every level of government - although none of the Republicans seemed to point out that there is no black senator from the South yet.

That's one explanation the rebellious southern Republican congressmen gave as to why they don't need federal oversight of voting practices anymore.

But they are wrong, and what they did Wednesday by stopping the vote proves it.

Wade Henderson, the executive director of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, put it succinctly when he said, "Those members who held up today's vote represent retrogressive forces that America hasn't seen at this level since the 1960s."

The southern states are not as squeaky clean as they want the public to believe. A bipartisan commission found proof of voting rights violations recently in Georgia, Texas, and in other southern communities, according to Barbara Arnwine, executive director of the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law.

With polls of Americans showing that over 35% believe in flying saucers, I have no doubt that the engineers of the race industry can produce anecdotal evidence of anything that they desire, but color me unconvinced (pun unintended). After the 2000 election, I watched nearly the entire proceedings of the US Commission on Civil Rights hearings held to investigate reports of racial shenanigans after that election and I witnessed rampant racism alright. Unfortunately, most of it came from the then-head of the commission itself -- Mary Francis Berry.

I will give Miss Russell credit for noting the major stumbling block to the bill's renewal (though she does not give it the credit it deserves):

Meanwhile, the Republicans also disagreed on whether to require bilingual ballots where at least 5 percent of the citizens speak a different language.

Iowa Republican Rep. Steve King's sensible amendment would end the requirement. Printing ballots in several languages or providing interpreters for regions with large immigrant populations isn't what a country with one national language does.

If you don't understand a document, don't sign it. If you can't read a ballot, don't vote. In an English-speaking nation like this one, expect to read, speak, and write English.

Callous? No.

Immigrants who become citizens must learn enough of the language to become citizens. If they want to vote, then they should learn enough English to vote intelligently.

Though I wish it were not necessary, I am not pollyannaish enough to believe that we have outlived the Voting Rights Act's usefulness and I call for the act's renewal, but not before the law requires that all citizens be treated without regard to race, gender and religion as the spirit of the legislation requires. The time has come for the racial spoils system to end -- a fact that Miss Russell curiously fails to recognize. Racism? I will not be so bold as to accuse Miss Russell of the crime of which she so slyly insinuates motivates the Republicans.

If only she had the same compunction.