When you think of the trials and tribulations of the civil rights era, we generally say this or that happened in the 60s and 70s. Well the fight for equality hasn't been won yet and that means there are plenty of incredible stories that have happened within the last thirty years with more to come in the future. Just yesterday the students at Prairie View A&M got tired of the way their county seat did business down in Texas so they decided to make a statement.
From The Houston Chronicle:
PRAIRIE VIEW — More than 1,000 Prairie View A&M students turned out on Tuesday to march in support of their voting rights.
The marchers said Prairie View student voting rights have been suppressed for decades in Waller County.
The protesters carried "Register to Vote" signs and wore black shirts with the slogan, "It is 2008 and we will vote.
"I was angry after registering to vote in the 2006 election only to be turned away at the voting booth," said sophomore Dee Dee Williams.
The march began at 9 a.m. as the protesters left the campus on the seven-mile journey to the Waller County Courthouse in Hempstead.
Students, local leaders, civil rights activists and elected officials took part in the march. Police estimated the total crowd at about 2,000 people.
"These are wonderful kids. They are making a statement, until they spoke up there was only one early voting place in the entire county. They spoke up but everyone is benefiting from what they are doing,'' said Prairie View Mayor Frank Johnson.
Last week, under pressure from the federal government, Waller County officials added three temporary polling places for early voting, ditching plans to open only one voting site in advance of the March 4 primary.
The Justice Department questioned the county's January decision to cut early-voting sites from a half dozen throughout the county to just one in Hempstead. The county's about-face came on the same day that critics announced a mass march to the polls next week.
Of course this wasn't going to have the violence to resemble some of the skirmishes that were prominent back in the day. Though the reasons for the march remain the same. Similar attitudes from the county leaders still reek up the air in this part of Texas. Disenfranchising these students stem from the same motives that the racists and bigots had thirty or forty years ago. It really is all about power for them but fortunately for us, power travels on a two-way street and a huge march through this rural area makes a big difference.
|