Political Quotes

“We are here tonight to have an important conversation, a conversation that is long overdue, a conversation that is crucial to healing America's deep racial wounds, our topic being the Confederate battle flag and why racial symbols matter. The Charleston 9 killings focused many of our attention on the significant appropriateness and bigoted history of this flag. In 2015, why do so many still revere a flag that tolerated the shackling of people because of their skin, a flag that allowed human beings to be counted as three-fifths of a person, a flag that was flown during lynchings, the holding of children, and one that symbolized a movement to deny education and equal treatment under our laws? Fifty years since Selma, we think of the Freedom Riders, marchers, boycotters, protesters, and policymakers who pointed our Nation in a more positive direction. They knew it was time to reject the traditions of the past. The civil rights movement symbolized the quest of equality and a change in mood for America. Thousands from all backgrounds had the courage to join in peaceful protests, lunch counter sit-ins, and boycotts at the expense of being jailed, beaten, or killed. They did this for one Nation and one flag. And in the way of these Americans stood those who believed in the perseverance of inequality, who believed in an America of White and colored, an America of two flags, and the Confederate battle flag represented their America.…”