[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 37 (Tuesday, February 25, 2020)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1143-S1144]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          BLACK HISTORY MONTH

  Mr. CARDIN. Madam President, in 1619, Africans were first brought to 
Virginia, against their will, to be enslaved. From that moment on, 
White Americans systematically and violently denied the rights of 
citizenship to Black Americans. The adoption of the 15th Amendment, 
ratified in February 1870, was a historic effort to correct course. It 
recognized the right of all male citizens, including Black men, to 
vote. This amendment was the first time that we promised to protect the 
right of African Americans to full and equal participation in our 
democracy.
  In the 150 years since then, we have tried to expand on that promise 
many times, like when women of all races and ethnicities finally won 
the right to vote in 1920. Yet our promise remains elusively 
unfulfilled. Today, in honor of Black History Month, I would like to 
take a moment to discuss the trajectory of that broken promise, as well 
as its impact on our character as a nation.
  We began to break our promise shortly after we made it. During the 
Reconstruction and Jim Crow eras, White men and women across the 
country developed a number of techniques--some obvious and brutal, some 
subtle and pernicious--to keep African Americans away from the polls 
and out of government.
  The broader goal of these tactics was to hamper the Black 
population's ability to recover from slavery by blocking their access 
to education and the economic means of building wealth.
  I believe that it is important to acknowledge that Maryland partook 
in these pernicious behaviors right alongside other States. Maryland 
residents and government officials engaged in ballot tampering, imposed 
literacy and property restrictions, stoked racist fears to galvanize 
the White vote, and intimidated Black voters using outright violence.

[[Page S1144]]

  My intention here is not to condemn my home State. To the contrary, I 
am exceedingly proud of the struggles for justice that have bloomed in 
Maryland through abolitionists like Harriet Tubman and Frederick 
Douglas and civil rights leaders like Thurgood Marshall. I draw 
inspiration from the lineage of African-American public servants in 
Maryland who overcame enormous obstacles in order to amplify the voices 
of their brothers and sisters.
  These public servants include Verda Welcome, the first Black woman 
ever elected to any State's senate, as well as Adrienne Jones, the 
current speaker of the Maryland House of Delegates, who is the first 
African American and first woman to serve in that position.
  They also include my friend and hero, Congressman Elijah Cummings, 
the son of sharecroppers who devoted his life to fighting for equality 
and fairness and lifting up our beloved community of Baltimore.
  I am likewise grateful for all of the Marylanders whose names we 
might not know, but who nevertheless work every day to expand 
educational equity, reform our justice system, shrink the wealth gap, 
deliver healthcare, and otherwise make our society better. Thanks to 
brave and dedicated people like these in Maryland and across the 
country, we have made significant strides toward racial justice.
  I began my remarks by discussing Maryland's bleaker moments in 
history for two reasons. First, to demonstrate that we must never take 
progress for granted--Maryland has not always been a tolerant, 
inclusive State, it did not become one by accident, and it will not 
continue to be one unless we work to make it so. Democracy and the rule 
of law do not just happen; we need to protect and nourish them every 
day.
  Second, to illuminate how those injustices that still exist, of which 
there are many, are not new and are not incidental--they are not just 
disparate effects of forces beyond our control. They are deeply rooted 
in policies and systems intentionally designed to subjugate African 
Americans.
  One of the strongest, most disheartening examples of this phenomenon 
is the ongoing assault on the right to vote. This is not ancient 
history. States all over the country continue to ``modernize'' 
strategies developed a century ago to suppress African-American voting 
power. Some of these strategies are blatant and recognizable, like mass 
purges of voter rolls; the gerrymandering of districts with ``surgical 
precision,'' according to one court; and intimidation of Black voters. 
Some of the strategies are disguised behind excuses or fear tactics, 
like obstructive voter ID laws and felony disenfranchisement.
  Regardless, these tools of oppression are alive and operating as 
intended.
  One in every 13 African Americans has lost his or her right to vote 
because of felony disenfranchisement. Seventy percent of the voters 
purged from one State's roll in 2018 were African Americans. Studies 
reveal that implementing strict voter ID laws widens the Black-White 
turnout gap by more than 400 percent.
  So long as we allow these sorts of practices to continue under the 
exaggeration of voter ``fraud,'' we are denying African Americans their 
full right to vote and breaking the promise we made 150 years ago. This 
is a problem on principle, of course, but also for practical reasons; 
when we exclude people from fully participating in our democracy, we 
prevent them from achieving the social, economic, and civic reforms 
they need to strengthen their families and communities.
  So what are we going to do about that? I know what I will do; I will 
fight for laws that will guarantee every American a voice in our 
democracy. That is why I have introduced bills to restore the Federal 
right to vote to ex-offenders and to penalize the voter intimidation 
and deception efforts so frequently aimed at people of color. These 
measures alone will not eliminate suppression of the Black vote, but 
they are steps in the right direction.
  The racism that we vowed to root out a long time ago is still here. 
We may have reined it in, or it may have taken new forms that we do not 
recognize yet, but it is still here.
  The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. remarked, ``It may be true 
that the law cannot make a man love me, but it can keep him from 
lynching me.'' It is true that we cannot legislate love, but we can and 
must legislate equality.
  Until we guarantee the right to vote regardless of race, we fall 
short of the unique promise and potential of the United States of 
America. How can we be, at last, the Shining City on the Hill, while we 
continue to deny people their right to vote because of the color of 
their skin?
  For the sake of our democracy and our common humanity, for the sake 
of those who have suffered and died, for the sake of those living and 
those yet to come, let us make good on our 150-year-old promise.
  Let us build on the progress we have achieved, and let us stay 
vigilant about the threats that remain. Let us fulfill the right to 
vote.

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