[Congressional Record Volume 170, Number 86 (Friday, May 17, 2024)]
[House]
[Pages H3351-H3353]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]





                  SEGREGATION IS STILL ALIVE AND WELL

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 9, 2023, the Chair recognizes the gentleman from Texas (Mr. 
Green) for 30 minutes.
  Mr. GREEN of Texas. Madam Speaker, and still I rise.
  I am honored to have this preeminent privilege to speak on the floor, 
if you will, or in the Chamber of the House of Representatives. It is a 
unique experience to be here. I never take it for granted, and I always 
appreciate the leadership for affording me the opportunity to speak.
  I rise today as a person of color, a person who understands the need 
for Brown v. Board of Education. We needed it then and still need 
Brown. We needed it when we enshrined it into law in this country, and 
we still need it today.
  This is the day that marks the 70th anniversary of Brown v. Board of 
Education, a lawsuit that has impacted the lives of all Americans but 
has had a greater impact, I believe, on persons of color because it 
eliminated the notion that we could have separate but equal 
institutions in the country, especially in the area of education.
  Yes, we still need Brown v. Board of Education. There is an article 
in today's USA Today. It is styled ``School segregation is still alive 
and well.'' ``Seventy years after Brown, funding drives divide.'' 
Segregation is still alive and well.
  I would like to explain why we needed Brown before delving a little 
bit more into this topic of funding. We needed Brown because of 335 
years of slavery, convict leasing, and lawful segregation--335 years. 
It started on August 20, 1619, when the ship White Lion docked at a 
place called Point Comfort, near what we now call Norfolk, Virginia.
  When the White Lion docked, it had some 20 persons of African 
ancestry. These 20 persons were traded to the Colonies, the persons who 
were here to form the Colonies, if you will. They were traded. They 
became the first enslaved persons to be introduced into what would 
become the United States of America.
  These 20 persons marked the beginning of something that still haunts 
the United States of America, and that is invidious discrimination, but 
these 20 persons became a part of millions of persons who would 
traverse the ocean, who would be treated as cargo, not as passengers; 
persons who would be raped, robbed, murdered, incarcerated; persons who 
would be brought to this country because there was a desire to have in 
this country people who would be subjugated. They would be persons who 
could be immediately identified because of color.
  They would be persons who would not be a part of a class because 
class is a socioeconomic circumstance. They were not a part of a class, 
Madam Speaker. They were a part of a caste, not a class. A class is 
socioeconomic. You can move in and out of a class, but a caste is 
associated with your heredity. If you were born into this caste, you 
would live in it, you would work in it, and you would die as a part of 
the caste.
  America had a caste system. Persons of African ancestry were a part 
of the caste. They were persons who were immediately identifiable, who 
were subjugated, and made a part of a caste. This caste system in the 
United States of America lasted for some 246 years.
  A good many people assumed that slavery only lasted for 20 or 30 
years. No, 246 years. People were born into slavery. Babies were 
enslaved. People lived their lives enslaved, and they died as slaves. 
There were 246 years of it.
  These persons became the economic foundational mothers and fathers of 
the country. They planted the seeds. They harvested the crops. They fed 
the Nation. They built the Capitol, this very building that we are in 
now. Their hands were a part of the construction of this facility. 
Their hands were a part of the construction of the White House. They 
built the roads and the bridges. They were the economic foundational 
mothers and fathers, and every person in the United States of America 
is standing on their shoulders.

                              {time}  1230

  Yes, they have not been respected. They have not been respected since 
they were brought to this country. They have not been respected while 
they were here in the institution known as slavery.
  It moved from slavery to an institution called convict leasing. These 
are persons who were charged with violating what were called Black 
codes. They were charged with some offense. It could be a minor 
offense.
  After having been charged, they would be leased to some plantation. 
They would work on this plantation just outside of Houston, Texas, a 
place called Sugar Land, Texas.
  We have a gravesite with 95 bodies in it. They are called the Sugar 
Land 95. These were persons, human beings, people who were leased and 
died as convicts, convicts who were leased.
  It is a shame that the story of America contains these facts, but it 
is the truth, and we ought not be ashamed to tell the truth because 
only by dealing with the truth can we get to a point wherein we are 
able to communicate fairly and properly with each other and span the 
chasms that divide us.
  These convicts, persons who were leased is what I will call them for 
now, this lasted for 76 years. Madam Speaker, 76 years of convict 
leasing; 246 years of slavery followed by 76 years of convict leasing.
  I am making the point for why we needed Brown v. Board of Education, 
for those who may be tuning in a bit late.
  We needed Brown v. Board of Education because of the 246 years of 
slavery and 76 years of convict leasing, but it didn't end there. It 
did not end with the convict leasing.
  We suffered nearly 100 years of lawful segregation, lawful 
segregation wherein persons of color were separated.
  Persons of color had to go to the back door in this country. In my 
lifetime, I was relegated to going to the back door. Persons of color 
had to drink from separate water fountains.
  In my lifetime, I have been forced to drink from a colored water 
fountain, and I might add, a filthy water fountain.
  They were never maintained to the same extent that White water 
fountains were maintained. Persons of color were required to sit in the 
back of buses. In my lifetime, I sat in the back of a bus.
  The laws that were enshrined in the Constitution to protect me and 
give me equality under the law as explained and extolled in the 14th 
Amendment, my friends and neighbors took those rights away from me. 
They denied me those rights.
  The Constitution said they were there for me, but my friends and 
neighbors decided they would deny me those rights.
  I know what segregation is about. I have lived it. Yes, we needed 
Brown v. Board of Education then, and we still need it now.
  Segregation for nearly a hundred years, 246 years of slavery, 76 
years of convict leasing, and nearly a hundred years of lawful 
segregation. We needed Brown v. Board of Education.
  In the process of suffering these some 335 years, we had a Chief 
Justice of the Supreme Court in a case styled Dred Scott where Chief 
Justice Taney, in his infinite wisdom, indicated that the Negroes or 
African Americans, as we would call ourselves now, persons of African 
ancestry, if you will, that they had no rights which a White man was 
bound to respect and that the Negro might justly and lawfully be 
reduced to slavery for his benefit, not for his benefit meaning the 
benefit of the Negro, but for his benefit meaning the benefit of the 
White man. That is what the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court said.
  It might be interesting to note that most scholars conclude that this 
is one of the worst decisions ever made by the Supreme Court of the 
United States of America.
  Yes, we needed Brown v. Board of Education. However, but for some 
quirks in history, we might not have the same decision that Chief 
Justice Warren arrived at. We might not have it but for some quirks in 
history.
  I want to talk about a couple of these quirks in history. Thurgood 
Marshall was the lead counsel for the NAACP, an organization that I 
belong to. I was the president of the Houston branch of the NAACP for 
nearly a decade.
  Thurgood Marshall, the lead counsel for the NAACP, when he decided to 
go

[[Page H3352]]

to law school, he tried to get into the University of Maryland. He 
couldn't get in.
  He then decided to go to Howard University. At Howard University, he 
had the superlative pleasure of meeting a man who introduced him to a 
concept, and that concept was use the Constitution to right these 
wrongs associated with segregation. That is my paraphrasing of it. That 
concept was something that he would take to the courts.
  I believe that but for the University of Maryland, Thurgood Marshall 
may not have developed the philosophy that he did.
  In a strange sort of way, I have to say thank God for the University 
of Maryland because had he gone there, he may have developed a 
different philosophy, and, as such, would not have taken the case to 
the Supreme Court as he did.
  Thurgood Marshall won many cases before the Supreme Court, but not 
one of them surpassed what he did with Brown v. Board of Education.
  Thurgood Marshall takes the case to the Supreme Court, but when the 
case gets to the Supreme Court, the Justice who was there at the time 
was a person that was unable to pull the Court together to get a 
decision by June of 1953.
  Because he could not do so, the case was then to be reheard in 
December of 1953. Between that time, the June date and the December 
date, the Chief Justice died. Then it became the duty of President 
Eisenhower to appoint another Chief Justice to the Supreme Court.
  President Eisenhower looked to California. There in California was a 
Governor, a Governor who was unique in history for many ways, but this 
one I find worthy of mentioning.

  He ran for Governor as a Democrat and as a Republican, imagine trying 
to do that today, and was elected Governor. He ran on the Democratic 
ticket and the Republican ticket. Never happen today. We are so divided 
here that neither party would tolerate it. The divide is so evident.
  The public wants us to span the chasm. We can't span the chasm 
because the public is divided. The same people who want Members of 
Congress to compromise don't want to see compromise on the issues that 
are important to them.
  Compromise is about give and take. Compromise is not winner take all, 
my way or the highway. The public itself has to understand that they 
are part of the reason there is a divide.
  Back to the case, Brown v. Board of Education. Chief Justice Warren 
became the Chief Justice by virtue of President Eisenhower having 
appointed him as such.
  President Eisenhower thought he did the country a great service when 
he appointed him, but he later said it was one of his greatest 
mistakes.
  He said he made two mistakes, they were both on the Supreme Court, 
and one of those was Chief Justice Warren because it was Chief Justice 
Warren who pulled the Court together.
  It was Chief Justice Warren who was able to get a unanimous decision 
in the Brown case. I don't know that anybody else could have done it.
  He was a unique personality. He understood the politics of the 
judiciary. He was a Governor. He understood people, what motivated 
people and moved people, and he pulled together the Court such that 
there was a unanimous decision.
  That unanimous decision was not, as one might think, a decision that 
would be immediately embraced by the country. It was not embraced 
immediately by the country.
  There were persons who still wanted separate but equal or separate 
but unequal because that is what it was.
  You can call it equal, but when you have inferior schools for people 
of color, which is what I attended, and then you have superior schools, 
not in the sense that the minds in the schools are inferior or 
superior, but in the sense that the facilities, the books that I 
received were hand-me-down books from another school system.
  You could see the names of children who had the books before I 
acquired them. Hand-me-downs. The school systems were segregated in 
that fashion.
  This segregation did not end with May 17, 1954, and the Brown 
decision. In fact, a Nobel Laureate, Milton Friedman, he had a very 
clever idea.
  He was of the opinion, Nobel Laureate Milton Friedman, that we ought 
to just give the public dollars to the parents, and they could have 
these vouchers, and they could use these vouchers to send their 
children to private schools, maintain segregation but under a different 
name. What a world. What a world. Milton Friedman, Nobel Laureate.
  If you believe that that was the end of vouchers, you are imminently 
incorrect. The Governor of Texas is still pushing for vouchers, still 
wants to take public dollars and give them to parents and let them take 
their children and put their children in private schools.
  That would have maintained segregation if it had been done, and there 
is a good likelihood I wouldn't be standing here now.
  Do not believe that slavery had to end. It ended because of the will 
of Abraham Lincoln.

                              {time}  1245

  It didn't have to end. It could have continued. The caste system 
could have continued. To this day, I could be a part of a caste but for 
brave people who took a stance and but for the Civil War that was 
fought--for all the politicians who are listening--because of slavery.
  We could easily find that the caste system exists today if not for 
some brave people. So this notion that we integrated, and it was about 
desegregation, it wasn't about integration. The Brown decision said 
that there should be desegregation with the term ``all deliberate 
speed,'' but it didn't happen immediately.
  Milton Friedman tried his best to thwart it. In fact, in Prince 
Edward County, Virginia, the White elite of that county defied the 
Brown decision by closing the entire school system. They closed the 
school system, and they diverted public education funds into vouchers 
to be used at segregated private academies that were for Whites only. 
It would have still been segregation just by another name.
  So, yes, we needed the Brown decision, but do not be deceived into 
believing that the decision was immediately implemented. We are still 
implementing it, by the way. We needed it then. We need Brown now.
  Brown has made a difference, but Brown hasn't brought us to the 
promised land. We are not there yet.
  The Senate of the United States of America disrespects African 
Americans on a daily basis. Now, some people don't believe I said that, 
so I probably should say it again: The Senate of the United States of 
America disrespects African Americans on a daily basis. The Senate of 
the United States of America is a place of shame.
  The Richard Russell Office Building is a national disgrace. Richard 
Russell was a self-proclaimed white supremacist. Richard Russell fought 
antilynching legislation. Richard Russell fought civil rights 
legislation. Richard Russell coauthored the Southern Manifesto.
  His name is on the Senate Russell Office Building. That is the 
Richard Russell. The Senate will not take Richard Russell's name off 
the building.
  You are a place of national shame, Senate. You ought to be ashamed of 
yourselves, every one of you. Every one of you. What is wrong with you? 
You know you are disrespecting African Americans, yet you leave the 
name of Richard Russell on a building being paid for with taxpayer 
dollars.
  If that name was associated with the Third Reich, it would come down 
tonight. We are disrespected, people of color who happen to be of 
African ancestry.
  The rationale given for not changing the name is that the Senators 
can't agree on a new name. Well, I solved that problem. Pardon me for 
using a personal pronoun. My mother taught me to say ``we'' whenever 
possible, but in my business, if you don't say ``I,'' other people 
will. We have solved that problem. Here is the solution: Let the name 
revert back to the name it had before it became the Russell Senate 
Office Building. Let it revert back.
  What was that name, Al Green? It was the Old Senate Office Building. 
Just take Russell's name off. Let it revert to Old Senate Office 
Building, and then take as much time as you want, ad infinitum, if you 
will, and let it become the name of your choice.
  I have no name. I am not doing this because I want a name. I am doing 
this

[[Page H3353]]

and saying this because it is not just the right thing to do; it is the 
righteous thing to do. His name needs to come off of that building.
  Brown v. Board of Education didn't bring us to the promised land. We 
still have problems here in the Congress of the United States of 
America. This one is so obvious. It is intuitively obvious to the most 
casual observer. The name ought to come off.
  I will say to every Senator: You ought to be ashamed. You made the 
Senate a place of national shame.
  By the way, the news media ought to be equally ashamed because, in 
the rotunda where Richard Russell's statue is, you have the news media 
right there above Richard Russell. He has a rotunda devoted to him. 
Above him is CNN, MSNBC, FOX. You ought to be ashamed, all of you. You 
are perpetuating this. It has been perpetrated by the Senate, and you 
are perpetuating it.
  Well, Al, you will probably not get back on those stations or 
networks again. Do you think that matters to me, that someone would 
keep me off because I speak the truth not only to power but about 
power?
  Speaking truth to power is fairly easy. You say power is a problem we 
need to solve. Speaking truth about power is to say, power, there is a 
problem, and you are it.
  You are it, CNN. You are it, FOX, MSNBC. You are it, Senate. You 
don't have the courage to do the right thing. You ought to be 
denouncing what the Senate is doing, but you are right there in the 
building where it is happening. You ought to be ashamed of yourselves. 
You are perpetuating this insult to African Americans.
  So Brown v. Board of Education did a lot, make no mistake about it. 
It has made a difference in the lives of people of color, especially 
African Americans. It has made a difference. It has made a difference 
in job opportunities. It has made a difference in opportunities for 
education, opportunities to hold public office. It has made a 
difference, but we are still not there.
  We aren't because people of color are disproportionately poverty-
stricken. People of color are not--let me close with this. I am being 
told my time is up. This is a to-be-continued.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Ms. De La Cruz). The time of the gentleman 
has expired.
  Mr. GREEN of Texas. Madam Speaker, I appreciate you calling it to my 
attention. We have much work to do.

                          ____________________