Keith Ellison: “Well, you know, Mr. Speaker, these are important facts you bring up. I kind of think of that period after World War II…”

“Well, you know, Mr. Speaker, these are important facts you bring up. I kind of think of that period after World War II, up until about 1973, as the almost, almost golden age of America. I say ``almost'' because it was marked by Jim Crow and other things like that, very important, serious issues. And we've come a long way. Our country's come a long way. But you cannot ignore the fact that after World War II, you had the GI Bill. You had FHA. We had already established Social Security to make sure that no seniors had to live out their retirement in an undignified way. And we also had tax rates for the very wealthy that were much, much higher than they are now, and we also had a higher rate of unionization. I know some folks don't understand how important that is, but the fact is, in 1957, 33 percent of all workers were in a union. Another 33 percent were paid like they were, and folks were living relatively well. We all look back at those old TV shows and kind of chuckle now at how corny they were, but they actually were doing pretty well economically in the 1950s. And the fact is that some of these kind of policies are things we need today, but we have the advantage today to have greater equality which is so great, you know. It's a great honor of America that we have overcome some of those things of the past, those lack of equality issues.”