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Praise of Voting Rights Act Passage

Date: July 28, 2006
Location: Washington, DC
Issues: Civil Liberties and Civil Rights


PRAISE OF VOTING RIGHTS ACT PASSAGE -- (Extensions of Remarks - July 28, 2006)

SPEECH OF
HON. SANFORD D. BISHOP, JR.
OF GEORGIA
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
FRIDAY, JULY 28, 2006

* Mr. BISHOP of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in praise of the hard work of our colleagues here in the House and the Senate for extending for another twenty-five years the Fannie Lou Hamer, Rosa Parks, and Coretta Scott King Voting Rights Act Reauthorization and Amendments Act. I thank the President for signing the bill into law yesterday. In addition, I would also like to acknowledge the efforts of those individuals whose work has ensured that the tradition of its creators is not forgotten.

* It was the combined efforts of civil rights leaders--activists like Fannie Lou Hamer, Rosa Parks and both Coretta Scott King and Martin Luther King Jr.; political leaders in the Kennedy and Johnson Administrations; and our esteemed colleague, John Lewis, who put his life on the line when he crossed the Edmund Pettis Bridge in Selma, Alabama on Bloody Sunday--these are some of the people who made the Voting Rights Act a reality. It is in the memory of their political courage and stewardship of democracy that I joined with my colleagues to ensure its continuation.

* What we have seen in the past months is another pivotal step toward the realization of Dr. King's dream for an equal America. From my own work with the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, I understand many of the obstacles Dr. King faced in overcoming adversity for the disenfranchised. I am honored and humbled to be one of many to continue what he worked so hard to begin.

* The right to vote is among the most sacred of freedoms. Dr. King is just one of many Americans who paid the ultimate price, so that all can have a voice. The Voting Rights Act honors that tradition by ensuring that all Americans have equal access to the ballot box and refusing to allow discrimination of the past to be a part of our future.

* Mr. Speaker, the Congress has made its will and that of the country known. We have ensured that all Americans will continue to have a voice and generations to come will go on to make Dr. King's dream of an equal America a reality.

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