Melvin Watt: “I am delighted to be here and participate in the Black History Month celebration and take this opportunity to do…”

“I am delighted to be here and participate in the Black History Month celebration and take this opportunity to do something that I have wanted to do for a long time. I thought it would be fitting today to read some of the words of George H. White, our last Representative in the last century from North Carolina. This is from his final speech, January 29, 1901, and I wish I had the opportunity to read it all. I keep threatening to do my own special order to come to read the entire speech, but I would not dare try to even do that tonight. But I do want to read two particular parts which seem to have particular bearing on where we are today. One has to do with the commitment of black people to move forward. George H. White had these words to say on June 29, 1901: You may tie us, and then taunt us for a lack of bravery, but one day we will break the bonds. You may use our labor for two and a half centuries and then taunt us for our poverty, but let me remind you that we will not always remain poor. You may withhold even the knowledge of how to read God's word and learn the way from earth to glory and then taunt us for our ignorance, but we would remind you that there is plenty of room at the top, and we are climbing.”