Elijah Cummings: “It would be legislative malpractice for me not to.”

It is only recently in the last 50 years or so that many of these laws have changed.

On my mother's dying bed, 92 years old, former sharecropper, her last words were, 'Do not let them take our votes away from us.' She had fought and seen people harmed, beaten, trying to vote. Talk about inalienable rights. Voting is…

And I don't give a damn how you look at it; there are efforts to stop people from voting. That is not right. This is not Russia. This is the United States of America.

That year, Bayou La Batre did elect its first Asian-American city council member.