Activists, CWA Allies Mark Historic America's Journey for Justice with North Carolina Rally

CWA District 6 Vice President Claude Cummings and former CWA President Larry Cohen joined NAACP President Cornell Brooks and the Rev. William Barber at a huge National Voting Rights rally today in North Carolina, the latest leg in the history-making America's Journey for Justice to Washington, D.C.

Union members, civil rights, environmental justice, and educational activists, and members of faith-based communities embarked on the 860-mile march, starting in Selma, AL, on August 1. The destination is Washington, D.C., for Advocacy Day and a huge rally on Wednesday, Sept. 16.

Terrific videos of the Journey for Justice and rallies are available here.

"We are on this Journey for Justice, because, 50 years after passage of the Voting Rights Act, there are forces that want to take us backward, not forward," Cummings, who is leading CWA's participation, said. "Since the U.S. Supreme Court stripped important safeguards for citizens, we have seen too many states and jurisdictions enact restrictive and unfair impediments to the right to vote. We must expand the right to vote, and ensure that this important part of our democracy is available to all."

Cummings, Brooks and Cohen – who is now chairman of the Democracy Initiative, one of the partners that put together the America's Journey for Justice with the NAACP – joined the march in Fayetteville and marched into Raleigh. The march features teach-ins in almost 40 locations. The latest teach-in, organized by CWA with the North Carolina Chapter of the NAACP, took place In Raleigh at the Pullem Baptist Church. CWAers were among the 160 people who packed the church, CWA senior campaign lead Angie Wells said.

The Rev. William Barber, executive director of the state's NAACP, in issuing the call to action, left no doubt that powerful forces have led the effort to undermine voting rights.

"We stand here today, 25 days after the 50th anniversary of the passage of the Voting Rights Act, less than one week after the death of Amelia Boynton who was 54 years old when she was beaten on Bloody Sunday and we have less voting rights protection right now than we had 50 years ago," Barber said.

Barber traced a long arc of history from passage of the Voting Rights Act to the U.S. Supreme Court's Shelby County v. Holder decision that gutted it. Southern states dusted off laws that they had at the ready to suppress the votes of African Americans, Latinos, seniors, low income citizens and young people. North Carolina's new voting law is among the most restrictive in the country.

CWA Director of Democracy Programs Tova Wang moderated the teach-in. Participants included Anita Earls of the Southern Coalition for Social Justice, who spoke on redistricting that dilutes the voting power of African Americans. Bob Hall of Democracy North Carolina gave the audience the background on North Carolina's law to suppress the vote and Allison Riggs of the Southern Coalition for Social Justice and Donita Judge of the Advancement Project talked about the fight against that law.

At the teach-in, CWA senior campaign lead Angie Wells joins Rev. William Barber.