THE ATTEMPT TO SUPPRESS THE VOTE

September 20, 2012, on CSPAN, the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) held a forum on "Voter Rights Suppression". But it is more than just suppressing the vote, it is your freedom that's at stake, your life is at stake. If you allow this to happen, what is next? ROCK THE VOTE!

The topic was centered around these new voting laws popping up in states with Republican held governorships, as well as state legislations. Their main goal is to suppress the votes of what they call the minority vote, those that are disabled and the elderly. Over 8 million votes are at stake around the country, due to these draconian type laws... these slave mentality type laws. An African American in the White House has brought the evilness out, of those that would still appreciate a slave-nation.

The disenfranchisement of U.S. citizens should have ended with the Voting Rights Act of 1964. It should also shock the senses of progressive, open-minded and modern day thinking Americans. There is no place for a separate/segregated America, we are one people, and we will either rise or fall as one people. Yet, here we are in 2012, still dealing with racial and discriminatory type policies and behavior, by a few that have not caught up to the change that is the reflection of what America truly is, now.

Not just the 2012 elections but all elections are very important. Your voice must be heard and should be heard, but the only way to do that is to vote. See, when you don't vote they win, even if you do a write vote, vote for somebody! If you don't vote then you cannot complain about what is wrong with America, because you are part of the problem, not the solution. If you do what you've always did, you'll get what you've always got.

..."We have come over a path that with tears have been watered. We have come treading our way through the blood of the slaughtered..."

That quote was from the "Destruction of a Black Civilization", that passage was talking about the transportation of African slaves, and how sharks learned that from following these slave ships, they would feed well on the flesh of Africans.

From as early as the 1500s, thru the 1800s, over 60 million plus slaves died on the voyage from Africa to the many ports around the world, due to the slave trade. From the 1860s up to and thru the 1970s, millions of African American men, women and children died due to Jim Crow laws, and other similar laws, on the books all over the U.S. From the 1970s to the present, African Americans are still dying at alarming rates, at the hands of trigger happy cops, unfair sentencing laws, on plantations that have been PC'd... Prisons; and let's keep it real... at the hands of other African Americans.

We are mentally dead and disenfranchised, not due to anything other than our own laziness and stupidity. The reason why we are still looked upon as second class citizens, is because that is how we see ourselves, as a class, as a race, instead of as human beings and United States Citizens. Even with an African American in the White House we still look down on ourselves. We are beautiful, our history is the oldest in the world, we are mighty and strong - now all we have to do is believe it.

But we are just one race in this melting pot, that is America. And not the only ones being disenfranchised. However, voting should be very sacred to the African American, because millions of us have died for this inalienable right, to vote.

There is much at stake in this election, health care, education, Wall Street reform, a comprehensive immigration law, and several Supreme Court nominations; and that is just to name a few of the really important issues at stake.

You must have the courage to stand up and fight oppression. Courage doesn't happen in the absence of fear, but in the face of fear - with the will to go on. Understand that no price is too high for the privilege of owning oneself. We must all invest together for the things we cannot build alone. Because failure isn't the worst thing in the world, the very worst thing is not to even try. When you get to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on, a little longer.

Martin Luther King once said that, "A PERSON THAT IS NOT WILLING TO DIE FOR A CAUSE IS NOT FIT TO LIVE."

Change is not easy. Change is the hardest thing you'll ever do in your lifetime - but you must be willing to embrace change. And you must also have unyielding patience and fortitude. Know that it will always get dirtier before it gets clean.

There is about 40 days until the election and you must get out and rock the vote. For African Americans, you must remember those that came before you, that fought and died so that you could have this opportunity. Now that you have this right, you don't let it go to waste.

Respectfully,

Teze

Marteze Harris #161543
Waupun Correctional Institution
Post Office Box 351
Waupun, Wisconsin
53963