12 JANUARY 20, 2022 RIDGEWOOD TIMES WWW.QNS.COM
MLK and today’s democracy
As we celebrate his legacy in 2022,
we can only imagine what Dr.
Martin Luther King Jr. would
say were he to look upon America in the
present day and see its political fracture.
We would think that Dr. King, a man
of unwavering courage, determination
and peace who devoted his life to
the pursuit of equal rights for every
American, would shudder at the voter
suppression eff orts happening across
this country.
Dr. King was on the front lines of the
Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s,
and his eff orts helped pave the way for
not only the passage of the Civil Rights
Act and the Voting Rights Act, but
also the ratifi cation of the 24th Amendment,
which abolished poll taxes that
Southern states used to prevent Black
Americans from voting.
Today, voter suppression has taken
on numerous other forms. States controlled
by Republican governments are
now closing poll sites, restricting their
hours of operation and even imposing
restrictions for people waiting to stand
in line to vote.
Trump-loving Republicans are even
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Were he with us today, we know that Dr. King would be the loudest of voices in America countering the fl ood
of lies and anti-Americanism with truth and a devout love of country. Photo via Wikimedia Commons
trying to control who counts the votes,
with some states fl irting with allowing
state legislatures to override the results
of a presidential election by appointing
their own electors for the candidates of
their choice, not the voters’.
And there’s further evidence,
through an indictment of 11 members
of the right-wing militant group the
Oath Keepers last week, that the Jan.
6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol was
a “seditious conspiracy” aimed at forcibly
overturning the results of the 2020
presidential election.
Democracy is under attack in
America, from within, like never before.
We believe Dr. King would undoubtedly
feel the despair many Americans feel
these days in witnessing such an orchestrated
eff ort to suppress the right
to vote — something that generations
of freedom fi ghters and freedom riders
fought so hard to defend, risking their
own lives in the process.
But were he with us today, we know
that Dr. King would be the loudest of
voices in America countering the fl ood
of lies and anti-Americanism with truth
and a devout love of country.
He would want not just the
government to act, but all freedomloving,
truly patriotic Americans to
take a stand against the autocracy in our
midst — and to do so peacefully.
Regardless of our backgrounds, we
must recognize the threats to our democracy
and the right to vote and act,
as Dr. King would have, to oppose them
wherever they arise.
As he said in February 1968, just
months before his assassination, “There
comes a time when one must take a position
that is neither safe, nor politic, nor
popular, but he must take it because
conscience tells him it is right.”
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