[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 28 (Tuesday, February 23, 1999)]
[Senate]
[Page S1832]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 HONORING OUR AFRICAN-AMERICAN LEADERS

 Mr. KERRY. Mr. President. February 23rd is an important day 
not just in Black History Month, but in the history of Massachusetts. 
Today is the birthday of one of the most significant leaders ever to 
call Massachusetts home, one of the brave leaders of the early civil 
rights movement whose words still stir us today.
  131 years ago, W.E.B. DuBois was born in Great Barrington, 
Massachusetts. He studied at Harvard University in Cambridge, where he 
earned his doctorate and published his landmark book ``Souls of Black 
Folk,'' through the Harvard University press.
  On college campuses around the country, in our high schools, in our 
cities, and on our village greens, we are still reading that pioneering 
text--and we remember the way it touched off a movement and challenged 
a nation to consider the issue of race in a more honest and personal 
light.
  DuBois's prophetic words about the age in which he was living still 
ring true. ``The problem of the twentieth century,'' he wrote, ``is the 
problem of the color line.''
  DuBois was right. We look back this month and honor the struggles and 
the perseverance of so many courageous trailblazers in the civil rights 
movement, so many leaders whose sacrifices paved the way for a society 
more attune to the guarantees of equal opportunity under God and under 
the law--ideas as fundamental to the promise of America as the 
Declaration of Independence itself.
  This month we remember Dr. King, Medgar Evers, James Meredith, Julian 
Bond, the late Rep. Barbara Jordan, and my distinguished colleague from 
Georgia, Rep. John Lewis. We honor their efforts to remove the barriers 
of race that kept America from knowing the full measure of its own 
greatness--and we look towards their legacy as a polestar to guide us 
towards the future.
  There could be no more appropriate time to reflect on the future of 
the Civil Rights Movement and the future of our nation itself than 
today--in this historic month, in this, the last year of the twentieth 
century.
  No one can deny that ``the problem of the color line'' was indeed the 
great problem of the twentieth century. But no one can deny that 
America made strides in putting that problem to rest, in healing our 
wounds--and in moving forward towards a brighter day in American 
history. African American family income, college admissions, and home 
ownership have hit an all-time high. African American poverty is down 
to near-record levels. African Americans have written some of the 
pivotal decisions of our Supreme Court, written the laws of our land in 
the Congress, and written their own inspiring stories into the fabric 
of our history.
  But still more must be done before we can say the problem of the 
color line has been eradicated.
  The question before us today is simple--to paraphrase the words of 
the late Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in his last book, ``where do 
we go from here?''
  The violence in Jasper, Texas; the conditions of too many of our 
nation's inner city schools; the subtler forms of discrimination still 
prevalent in so many of our top corporations; all these problems 
require our attention if we are to make good on the promise that 
never--never again--will an American century be defined by our 
struggles over race and our encounters with an intransigent crisis.
  With open hearts and open minds--and with the commitment and 
determination of W.E.B. DuBois or Rosa Parks, who forty years ago sat 
down on a bus and said she `would not be moved'--we too can tell those 
who stand against equality that America will not be moved from an 
unshakable belief in the fundamental rights of every American--no 
matter their race, creed, or color--to life, liberty, and the pursuit 
of happiness.
  The challenge before us today is to summon the leadership in the 
twenty-first century--at the highest levels of government, and in our 
daily lives--to wipe away hatred, bigotry, and intolerance--and to make 
America in the image of the African Americans we honor this month: the 
land of the free, the proud, and the brave. I urge the United States 
Senate to contemplate that challenge on this special day, in this 
important month for the United States of America.

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