As I watched election night 2000 turn into this controversy over counts and recounts, my mind went back to that day on the bridge. What’s happening in Florida and in Washington is more than a game for pundits. The whole mess reminds African-Americans of an era when we had to pass literacy tests, pay poll taxes and cross every t and dot every i to get to be able to vote. You had black men and women, graduates of the best universities in the country, failing literacy tests. A man was once asked how many bubbles were in a bar of soap. For all the political maneuvering and legal wrangling, many people have missed an important point: the story of the 2000 election is about more than George W. Bush and Al Gore. It’s about the right to vote. And you cannot understand the true implications of this campaign and the subsequent litigation without grasping how deeply many minorities feel about the seemingly simple matter of the sanctity of the ballot box.
There is a lot of troubling new talk of “political profiling”–allegations that officials tried to suppress the black vote on Election Day and may be maneuvering now to make sure it isn’t counted. There are reports that officials put new voting machines in white areas but not black ones, and that African-Americans were asked to present two, not just one, forms of identification to be allowed to vote. These charges should be looked into. But I like to believe that no one met in some smoke-filled room and said, “We’re going to keep black voters out, we’re going to keep Jewish voters out.” Still, I remember the same kinds of tactics in the old days, when whites would write down blacks’ license-plate numbers when we drove to courthouses to try to register.
My greatest fear today is that the perception our votes were not counted may usher in a period of great cynicism. On the other hand–and I bet this is more likely–it may give people a greater sense of the importance of voting and of vigilance. The vote, after all, is the real heart of the movement. Younger people shouldn’t think civil rights was just about water fountains or stirring speeches on TV. Late in the summer of 1961, after the Freedom Rides, we realized it was not enough to integrate lunch counters and buses. We had to get the vote.
Today there is some talk in black leadership circles that we shouldn’t make too much of an issue of the disproportionately high number of controversial or partially marked ballots in African-American precincts. According to this line of argument, we should be embarrassed that our folks didn’t know enough to punch a ballot correctly. I reject this thinking. Anybody can make a mistake in the booth; some machines don’t work; some ballots are confusing. And blacks just recently got into the habit of voting. Meanwhile, it was not just African-American voters who slipped up; the confused voters in West Palm Beach, by and large, were older Jewish voters.
It will make a mockery of the memory of the martyrs if all of the people’s votes are not counted, and I think a lot of people realize that, at least in the back of their minds. I was at home in Atlanta last weekend, and I’d go into a grocery store, or to city hall, or just walk down the street, and folks would say, “Congressman, they’re trying to steal the election.” Rank-and-file, middle-class people, white, black, Hispanic–not partisans.
If George W. Bush makes it to the White House, there will be a new rallying cry in many parts of America: never, ever again. We must learn how to vote, and have those votes counted. If there’s a perception that this is not a legitimate presidency, the political climate will not be orderly and peaceful. I’m not making a threat; I just think it’s so. There will be tension. In minority circles a Bush win is going to instill a feeling that people have to organize better and become politically sophisticated. We’ve overcome more dangerous obstacles than clever Republican lawyers. And be assured we will overcome again.
