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BLACK VOTES MATTER
We Can’t Take “No” For An Answer on Voting Rights
Our rights are too precious to compromise over
Right now, white conservatives around the country are trying to disenfranchise Black voters. They just cannot get over the colossal loss they suffered last November, and they want to do everything in their power to make sure that never happens again, even if it means taking Black people’s rights away. This is nothing new. They are using strategies straight from their Jim Crow playbook.
White moderates are waiting for the other shoe to drop, but it already fell, kicking Black people in the face. If you are waiting for Republicans to write a bill that says “Black people can’t vote,” you are missing the point. They do not have to be that explicit to get the same result. Conservatives study the numbers and pass laws that target particular groups of people without explicitly naming them. Just because someone is racist doesn’t mean they are stupid. We’re playing chess, not checkers.
Remember, discriminatory laws in the South required Black people to pay poll taxes. They knew that they could not afford them — the cruelty was the point all along. And yet, they never had to say it explicitly. The same can be said about literacy tests and voting applications. I fear that in…
