Transcripts For CSPAN Capitol Hill Hearings 20130826 : vimar

CSPAN Capitol Hill Hearings August 26, 2013

Live pictures from the in washington dc were reour continuing our live coverage celebrating the 50th anniversary of the march on washington. Have a new panel on the Civil Rights Movement hosted by the w. K. Kellogg foundation. We will be joined by marc morial who is the president of the National Urban league. Good morning. Saying goodr morning in a way that i would hear, and with that sort of energy. Thank you all. This is such a joy to be here in this historic week about to celebrate our history and to envision and move forward toward creating the future that we all want, and certainly the future that our children deserve. Christopher, the Vice President of the Program Strategy at the w. K. Kellogg foundation. You on like to welcome behalf of our staff and our over theon all nation. Solidarity behind this idea that no light can live forever, and we must heal for our childrens sake. When mr. Kellogg built the foundation he said do what you will with the money, so long as it benefits the children. During his lifetime he worked to help vulnerable children. When we sit back and look at the changing demographic of this country am a and we lick cou ntry, and we realize that most of the children being born today are children of color, and we in them growing up and impoverished situations, we must help them. E w. K. Kellogg foundation, one of the largest philanthropic organizations in the world has made this their focus. That most people are uncomfortable with, and are in denial about. We launched this work in 2010 and here we are today, on the anniversary of what is perhaps toricost the store his galvanizing of human will to eradicate racism in this country. Only held a vision and a dream for us, but we , made inn his remarks montgomery, on the capital steps, when he asked winwood freedom, when asked when he answeredm come, that no lie can live forever. We must eradicate the absurd notion of the hierarchy of the human family. That is the notion that gave permission for the enslavement of millions. Belief, iton, that is antiquated, it is absurd, it came about in the 1700s, when the time of the Printing Press came about. It was proliferated throughout the world, it was embedded in all of our systems, that somehow value chy of Immanuel Kant said that people who looked like him should be at hierarchy. The the was the foundation of understanding and ignorance of those times. We have fought to eradicate racism, but we have not talked about the effects of racism. We fought a civil war, but imagine if we, the abolitionists, had shed that belief instead of the blood of hundreds of thousands of people. Imagine how the world would be if there had been a concerted andrt to set things right asserted truly the equality of humankind. We will submit to you that the work of the 21st century is that work. That we didtools not happen the 20th century did not have in the 20th century. We understand how the brain works now, how and by the how as get embedded in the human conscious. It is time to my wise mob ilize those technologies, to change the fundamental construct on on which our nation was built. We asserted a quality equality, but we built this on inequality. As we go forward into the 21st century, we ask, as the w. K. Kellogg foundation, to move beyond rhetoric and beyond denial. Publication last week that suggested that we are contrary to a postracial less than half of whites actually believe we have made a lot of ryegrass toward toward dr. Kings dream. That means that some of us are moving past denial of the work that remains to be done. And a lot of us are moving past denial. Once we passed the dial of fact fact, we must move past the denial of fact, of the consequences, of the feelings. I want to tell you a buried brief story of when i was 13 a very brief story of when i was about 13 rate 13. I lived in an area that was all white, and they brought in colored kids from all over the country. It was my first exposure to different backgrounds. My roommate was another young woman from my town. We got along famously. At the end of the summer i came home to our house, and there wasnt ambulance in front of the door. They brought her out on a stretcher. They were taking her to the hospital, because she had attempted to commit suicide. They showed me the letter that she had written. It was almost time for us to go home, and she was afraid to go soe, because her father had convinced and indoctrinated her as to the inhumanity of blacks. That she should hate black people. Her experience over that summer had been a complete contradiction to what she had been raised to believe, and as a young white, she was so confused. The irony . Her father was a police officer. My next story speaks volumes. That story speaks volumes. It shows theause immense progress we have made over the years. The human brain is wired to accept stories. If we keep telling story, we will accept the same thing. Television on the and see another story that steep valley rises the people of that indeed our uis as the people of color, say no. Our panelists here today represent amazing organizations that represent millions of people all over the country who have been working to eradicate the scourge of the belief in hierarch or he hierarchy. To make right the injustice to this work. Largere also part of a network of hundreds of Community Organizations all over this nation that the w. K. Kellogg foundation has founded to do this work. Theyre going to share with you their perceptions of what we need to do to bring about change. Most importantly, they reflect the diversity, they reflect the inclusion, they reflect the power that is embodied in this charge. Which is, we have to Work Together as a nation to heal this nation. Not for those people, or those people, or those people, but for all of us. Raise the average income of the people of color to the average income of whites, we would increase our gdp by 1. 8 trillion, and that would translate into billions of dollars in corporate revenues. The blessings that would flow into this country will flow into we haventry when eradicated racism. Those blessings are immeasurable. That is where our focus has to be. Experiment that is what democracy is, a great experiment , a great experiment in human empowerment. Survive without human equality and human equity. This is our work, it is the work we must do, and like the work of the Civil Rights Movement, that work will be looked upon an , and embraced by other countries around the world. If we heal our legacies of racial division, imagine what it will kneel in will mean for the rest of htthe world. Are blessed today to have a great coanchor to our panel. Were very happy that she has agreed to join us today. Moderate with a great deal of courage and trepidation, because it is going to take some energy to moderate this panel. But she join me please and joy in welcoming carolyn sawyer. [applause] aint you so much. Thank you so much,. It is an honor to be here. Familiar with this organization earlier this year, i hope you will also become addicted. I have a distinguished panel, and about an hour and 10 minutes to cover a large number of topics. We are looking at the 50th anniversary of the march on washington. Let me introduce the panel, give you their names, organization, and you can hear more about their work as we continue this discussion. Morningelcome this miles rapaport. Ext in him is rinku sen Judith Browne dainis. Her is marc morial. Is alvin haring. Herring. Please welcome Gordon Whitman who is the director of policy for the pico National Network. Next in him is philip tegeler, who is the executive director for of the poverty and Race Research action council. The president and chief executive officer of the naacp. Welcome to all of our panelists, and to the audience. We will begin our discussion coming off a big weekend here in washington dc. The historic 50th anniversary of the march on washington. I know we talked about it earlier, but can you call us about your reflections from the weekend . It was a powerful weekend, a great crowd, a glorious and beautiful day. There was a tremendous amount of energy. Inse of us who were involved the mobilization, got grounded in a couple of ideas. It was a collaborative effort by civil rights labor and civic organizations who came together under the leadership of a philip randolph. Was aear the mobilization collaborative effort. Speaking from the lincoln memorial, what you saw was a broad array from all walks of life. We needed to focus on the new america, the new Civil Rights Movement. The new equity in the backdrop of the Supreme Courts karen this decision of section four of the Voting Rights act. Systemsce insufficiencies and disparities and need for reform shown by the Trayvon Martin case. What i was struck by is the large number of young people, including children. The fact thaty everyone had a phone, everyone had a camera, so there should be an ample record of this. It is a game changer for those of us who are here on this stage. It is a time for us to use the Energy Created by the historic 50th anniversary to look ahead. Not to simply be commemorative and the style object nm andlgic, but to look ahead be inspired. Needs to be framed by what i would call the go forward issues. It is a powerful day, a wonderful day, and i just deal religious that the National Urban league, which was there in 1953 was there in 2013. Mcarc waslike struck by the energy there on saturday. Ofwas for me, a time reflection, having grown up in south carolina. Remembering how far we have come. During thisinded of march was the energy and the young folks, how much work we still had to do, but it felt really good the number of people that were there. Folks, so ioung just gave me new hope that the new generation will be able to tackle all the problems that we still have existing. Really pushing, the crowd that day was pushing on those two core decisions. Decisions. The first second was the decision in florida on the George Zimmerman case. The crowd was reflected in the diversity of speakers. Of aso down in one one of the most diverse marches in washington. As the tea party has risen up, and government becomes more aggressively extremely , all of us in labor civilrights and rights, and other communities need to recognize that this is , inmoment to come together the model of the three musketeers, and say all for one, and one for all. Past year we have passed marriage equality, and abolished the death penalty. In a state that is as drenched , it islegacy of slavery the state that Harriet Tubman escaped from, the 18th state in the confederacy if president lincoln had not taken extreme action to keep that from happening. What the civil rights and human rights communities have been able to compete achieve there in the last year should be a beacon for the entire country as we move deeper into the century. Just peoples color as our demographic, they are getting more inclusive than we have seen before. The Hispanic Community was engaged in the 1963 march in ways that we do not think about. Galvanized to do all that he could for the poor Hispanic Community because of dr. Martin luther king. He was a medic at the march in 1953 and went on to do great things. Hed went on to do great things inspired by that day. That march was about jobs and justice, and we have made a lot rights,d in the area of and wealth for our communities. What struck me about the march is how all of the communities came together. Gives us great hope as we look at the young people and demographics of today about Going Forward together and shading this country for the better. One thing that i will remember from this march, deftly, is that women were on the stage, and speaking. This is womens equality day, folks should know. Planning being in a meeting for this march, and i marcember remember saying look at the sisters in the room, sisters will be on the stage. I think that is important because women have played such an Important Role in the Civil Rights Movement. We continued to play an Important Role, and i think about all of the women like a baker, who ella were the nominal women, phenomenal sisters to the movement. I think it is great to see the spectrum of women, from young latina sisters. We really did have the mix of do hard work. Young people were there because they know what happens to trayvon could happen to them. They all know a trayvon. Have hadut of this, we a lot of progress. Young people already for more. That is where the energy are now, this is really been the summer of discontent. Verys, we are working in a big dream defender, and they were there in numbers. There are a number of people saying we are going to make that happen. Moments really stood out for me, speaking of women. One of my favorite moments was when i was walking class that planned parenthood banner. I tweeted most of the march, and as i was watching class that land parenthood i heard a couple behind me, and one of the woman was talking about the banner. One said to the other, girl, you know they are trying to use take away our birth control. Clearly on the agenda. [laughter] the other thing that struck me was that i did interviews with lots of people. One of the questions i asked them was when do you think we are going to achieve Racial Justice in this country . When is it going to happen . There were three responses that i got that really ran the spectrum. One was, i dont think we will ever achieve it fully, but we have to keep working toward it. , i think we will only achieve after more time has passed after slavery then we spent in slippery. Another 250, 300 years or so. What ard response was lot of people think because there is a paradigm shifting. I think it is very difficult to hold those three realities. It is going to take hundreds of years, because we have spent spent hundreds of years with slavery as the main show in our history. Not a show, and a vent. An event. But we are making progress, we are winning things. Endingon the verge of practice, no matter how much mayor bloomberg defends it. The womens agenda really needs inbe a part of the agenda, preparing for Racial Justice to be here tomorrow, and for it to never be here. Speaking to the diversity of the march, and really the purpose of the american healing program, we have seen the growth and diversity of the population, especially with immigrant communities. Expanding the population in the United States for the past 30 the 2012d really elections were a wakeup call to both parties. The overwhelming response from both let you know and Asian American communities for the president was a wakeup call for how important immigrant rights are and how much this group works together around immigrants rights. Around justice, and a whole range of civil rights issues that are recorded to the whole country importance to the whole country. It is important, not only to the smart, but to the work that weve been doing over the past many years. Brought forward a key issue that was on the minds of many people this weekend. The question i would would out is where would we go next, what is next . The folks right now are bigsed on three or four things. We have to get comprehensive Immigration Reform through. We had to get section four of the Voting Rights act restored. We have to raise the minimum wage higher than we ever have before. And then, bullocks are also focusedon folks are racial profiling that has come out in the racial trials, like the Trayvon Martin trial. There is a wider range of issues that we need to support. Rious moments va movements are pushing forward. We can hope, that in our lifetime we will see a renaissance of ideas. We are seeing that happen now, because we are winning more statelevel battles. The problem is that we are going webe winning a state where are winning, and losing in the state where we are being challenged. Spent to hear each perspective from each organization. What do you see as next now that weve gotten the Supreme Court ruling on the Voting Rights . I think we are going to see a great pushback against the negative ruling. Theye same time, i think have an Incredible Opportunity to see if advancement has really advanced us to open up the voting process and get millions and millions of people registered. Whether it is through state legislative changes, or whether its through battles on the courts to really expand or to utilize National Tool that we have like the Voter Registration act. I see the opportunity over the next several years to really expand the voting. You shared with me this morning a tactic to use the portal care act, can you share that with us briefly . Sure. That medicare, medicaid, and Childrens Health benefits are all covered. They are required to be asked whether they wanted to register to vote. If people take advantage of that up atunity, it will open Huge Community that would otherwise be missed. Vermont, North Carolina, and maryland have all said they will include the Voter Registration question with their health benefits. It is a big deal. Legalization, regularization for our 11 Million Immigrants have been here for years. That, and handinhand with that is the origination. Getting more hispanics registered to vote. Highly, getting hispanics who are registered to vote to vote in off year elections and to change the conference. If we can do that, this country

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