On the recordFebruary 12, 2003
I am honored and, indeed, I am right proud that in the middle of a month that has been set aside as Black History Month to stand in the well of the House of Representatives of the United States of America representing 619,000 citizens of rural, poor, eastern North Carolina, known as the first congressional district. It is amazing that princes and kings and clowns that caper in sawdust rings, and ordinary people like a young boy who grew up on a tenant farm in Bertie County under civil rights, the 13th and 14th amendments to the United States Constitution, the Voting Rights Act, the Civil Rights Act, all of the great decisions of the United States Supreme Court guaranteeing that we hold these truths to be self-evident; that all men, including Africans in America, are created equal and that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, among them life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
Source
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