In 1964, President Lyndon Johnson spoke these words as he brought forward a bill, the bill that became the Civil Rights Act of 1964: “I speak … for the dignity of man and the destiny of democracy. At times history and fate meet at a single time… So it was last week in Selma, Alabama. There is no Negro problem. There is no Southern problem. There is only an American problem. And we are met here tonight as Americans – not as Democrats or Republicans – … to solve that problem.

“There is no issue of states’ rights or national rights. There is only the issue of human rights. But even if we pass this bill the battle will not be over… (this) is part of a far larger movement which reaches into every section and State of America. … Their cause must be our cause too. Because it is not just Negroes, bur really it is all of us, who must overcome the crippling legacy of bigotry and injustice.”

Fifty-six years later we are still engaged in this battle. Videos of black citizens being killed by police are seen and we have knowledge of numerous other injustices. Citizens marching, speaking up and saying, “Enough, no more, black lives matter.” Demanding change now. We pledge “liberty and justice for all”; we sing “o’er the land of the free and the home of the brave.” Yet there is not liberty and justice for all, not freedom for all. Are we the home of the brave?

Each of us has to answer that both collectively and individually. Each decides how to respond to this American problem, this human rights problem, this crippling legacy of bigotry and injustice. Whatever you choose, know that you are impacting the dignity of man and the destiny of democracy.

 

Susan Gross

Winthrop