Kendrick Meek: “To my esteemed chairwoman and to my good colleague, the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Stokes], we owe both of you a debt of…”

“To my esteemed chairwoman and to my good colleague, the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Stokes], we owe both of you a debt of gratitude for giving us this opportunity. I want to thank you, and I want to thank everyone in this great country of ours, especially black Americans who helped to build this country and are now waiting and hoping that justice and freedom will come to everyone. Certainly the history of people of African descent is interwoven, Mr. Speaker, with the history of America. Since the first Americans arrived on what is now American soil, black Americans have played an important part in the development of this great Nation. I want to limit my remarks this afternoon to selective passages from historic speeches from black Americans, and I have chosen quite a few. I will mention them to you, but because of time constraints I will only quote two or three of them. First is a Congressman, Robert B. Elliott, who came to this Congress, Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm, Frederick Douglass, Malcolm X, and the Reverend Jesse Jackson. They are some of my heroes; I have many of them, but they are included, and I want to, as I stand here this afternoon, think about Congressman Robert Elliott. He was one of the 22 African-Americans to serve in Congress during Reconstruction. His last term in Congress was highlighted by his eloquent support of a civil rights bill designed to secure equality for and prohibit discrimination against African-Americans in all public places.”