Op-Ed
Gay Marriage in Alabama
By Lee A. Daniels
NNPA Columnist
It’s entirely appropriate that the bigoted antics of Alabama’s conservative, publicity-hound Chief Justice Roy S. Moore in unsuccessfully trying to block the right of same-sex couples to marry there erupted in February – Black History Month.
For his actions that briefly led some of the state’s 68 probate judges to not issue licenses to same-sex couples while other state judges did so underscore an enduring dynamic of American history as a whole and one of the central lessons of Black Americans’ centuries-long freedom struggle.
First, Moore’s ploy reminds us—as do such things as the controversy surrounding America’s crisis of undocumented immigration; and the continued rejection by some of Muslim Americans as American citizens; and the Republican Party’s efforts to suppress Blacks’ right to vote—how controversial issues of citizenship have always been.
And they again cast into sharp relief a central lesson of the civil rights turmoil of the 1960s—and of Barack Obama’s election and re-election to the presidency: Just because you achieve significant victories does not mean the forces of bigotry will disappear. It does not mean the struggle is over.
Indeed, the turmoil of America’s post-1960s decades, and especially the last ten years, point to just the opposite reality: That is that even as the victories expand the “space” for tolerance, the forces of bigotry work even harder to maintain the barriers of exclusion.
The most dramatic example of that dynamic over the past decade has been conservatives’ furious and in many instances deranged reaction to the Obama presidency. Close behind has been their opposition to the increased support of the right of gays and lesbians to marry as other American do. The advance of that latter sentiment has been nothing short of extraordinary since the ruling of Massachusetts’ highest state court legalizing same-sex marriage there provoked numerous conservative-dominated states to approve constitutional amendments banning it.
In 2003, only 40 percent of Americans approved of same-sex marriage. By last May, however, support for same-sex marriage reached a high-water mark of 55 percent. Even more stunning were the advances made in legalizing same-sex marriage. In 2013 gays and lesbians could be legally married in only 17 states and the District of Columbia. However, by late 2014, propelled by a flurry of federal court orders striking down states’ constitutional bans against it, same-sex marriage had become legal in an additional 20 states.
Now, it’s widely expected that this June the U.S. Supreme Court will affirm those federal court decisions in a landmark case it accepted for review last fall. Even though oral arguments in that case won’t be heard until the spring, the High Court sent a strong signal of its intent last week in rebuffing Moore’s gambit in Alabama and allowing marriage licenses to be issued to same-sex couples there.
So, one might say a complete victory for legalizing same-sex marriage is at hand. Of course, that will not be a happy moment for those Black Americans who oppose legalizing such unions—just as it won’t be for opponents of other backgrounds. And, it must be said, as several polls have shown, that Black opposition to homosexuality and lesbianism is qualitatively different from that of the White opposition. That’s the reason anti-gay and lesbian sentiment has no significant impact on Black political activity.
But it will be a happy moment for the Black freedom struggle overall, because that struggle has been immeasurably aided over the last decade by the coalescing of the debate about the rights due those one may call “outsider Americans”—not just gays and lesbians and the groups mentioned above, but white women, too. This is the debate over America’s future as a multiracial, multicultural nation, one whose “outsiders” are demanding “in” on terms satisfactory to them.
The rise of this new American society—which, of course, is still very much in formation—has underscored a fundamental point about bigotry. It’s almost always all-inclusive: Those who express bigotry against one group of people “different” from them are likely to be bigoted against others who are different in different ways as well.
That means that “outsider Americans” must pledge allegiance to a fundamental principle: full citizenship and equal rights for all.
Author’s Note: In a recent column on the film “Selma,” I mistakenly stated that two Black teenagers, Virgil Ware and Johnny Robinson, were murdered by Whites in the aftermath of the Selma-to-Montgomery March in March 1965. In fact, they were murdered by Whites in Birmingham, Alabama on Sunday, September 15, 1963 in the turmoil in that city that followed the infamous bombing of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church.
Lee A. Daniels is a longtime journalist based in New York City. His essay, “Martin Luther King, Jr.: The Great Provocateur,” appears in Africa’s Peacemakers: Nobel Peace Laureates of African Descent (2014), published by Zed Books. His new collection of columns, Race Forward: Facing America’s Racial Divide in 2014, is available at www.amazon.com.
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Commentary
California Respects the Power of Your Vote
As California Secretary of State, I do not take the progress we have made over the years lightly. My staff and I hold sacred the obligation to ensure that our elections are safe, free, fair, and accessible to all. Therefore, before certifying the results for this year’s election on Dec. 13, we have taken a number of steps to ensure that every vote is counted. We have also made sure that our ballot counting process is credible and free from interference.
By Shirley N. Weber, Ph.D.,
California Secretary of State
Californians can confidently claim this: California has made more significant reforms to our election laws and expanded voting rights than any other state.
The relevance of this accomplishment deepens as we prepare to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act next year. This landmark legislation began to undo our country’s long history of voter suppression, intimidation, and disenfranchisement that far too many Americans experienced at the polls for decades.
My own parents, who were sharecroppers, were denied their right to vote in the Jim Crow era South. Before moving to Los Angeles from Hope, Arkansas, my parents, David and Mildred Nash, could not vote. My father was an adult with six children before he registered to vote and was only able to exercise that constitutional right for the first time here in California.
As California Secretary of State, I do not take the progress we have made over the years lightly. My staff and I hold sacred the obligation to ensure that our elections are safe, free, fair, and accessible to all.
Therefore, before certifying the results for this year’s election on Dec. 13, we have taken a number of steps to ensure that every vote is counted. We have also made sure that our ballot counting process is credible and free from interference.
To meet that deadline without a hitch, California requires elections officials in all 58 counties to turn in their official results by a certain date. This year, that date was Dec. 6.
By law, every eligible voter in our state receives a vote-by-mail ballot. This ensures all registered voters can exercise their right to vote.
Whether you placed your ballot in a designated drop-off box, voted by mail, or cast your ballot at a polling center, votes are safe and secure. And we allow voters to sign up to receive text message, email, or voice call notifications about the status of their own ballots by using the Where’s My Ballot? tool. To learn more or to sign up, paste this URL in your web browser: https://california.ballottrax.net/voter/
The ballots of Californians who voted by mail are also protected. The United States Postal Service partners with the State to make sure ballots are delivered on time. All mailed-in ballots are sent by First Class mail with a postage paid envelope provided to every eligible registered voter.
Election Security is our No. 1 priority. That’s why my office designed and implemented a program to back up that commitment. For more information, visit this URL: https://www.sos.ca.gov/elections/election-cybersecurity
Additionally, California takes preventive actions to make sure our voting technology keeps our elections safe and protects everyone’s votes.
For example, county voting systems are not connected to the internet, which protects them from cyberthreats. The State also performs regular and rigorous testing to make sure the voting systems are working optimally, and only authorized personnel are granted access.
Staff members are also given phishing and cybersecurity training.
VoteCal, the state’s centralized voter registration system, is also key. The system is regularly updated, and it is used as a resource for counties to verify voter signatures.
California also provides security at all counting locations and makes sure ballot drop-off boxes are secured and monitored.
And all election processes are open to observation during specified hours.
In my role as Secretary of State of California, there is nothing more important to me than defending our democracy.
I am committed to safeguarding voting rights, and to leading our state in upholding the highest democratic standards by implementing policies and practices that Californians and all Americans can trust and look to for instruction and hope.
You can contact the California Office of the Secretary of State at 1-800-345-Vote or elections@sos.ca.gov with inquiries or to report suspected incidents or irregularities. Additional information can be found at www.sos.ca.gov and the office’s social media platforms:
Instagram: @californiasos_
Facebook: Facebook.com/CaliforniaSOS
X: @CASOSVote
Activism
COMMENTARY: PEN Oakland Entices: When the News is Bad, Try Poetry
Strongman politics is not for the weak. Here in the U.S., Donald Trump is testing how strongman politics could work in the world’s model democracy.
By Emil Guillermo
As the world falls apart, you need more poetry in your life.
I was convinced on Tuesday when a weak and unpopular president of South Korea — a free nation U.S. ally — tried to save himself by declaring martial law.
Was it a stunt? Maybe. But indicative of the South Korean president’s weakness, almost immediately, the parliament there voted down his declaration.
The takeaway: in politics, nothing quite works like it used to.
Strongman politics is not for the weak. Here in the U.S., Donald Trump is testing how strongman politics could work in the world’s model democracy.
Right now, we need more than a prayer.
NEWS ANTIDOTE? LITERATURE
As we prepare for another Trump administration, my advice: Take a deep breath, and read more poetry, essays and novels.
From “Poetry, Essays and Novels,” the acronym PEN is derived.
Which ones to read?
Register (tickets are limited) to join Tennessee Reed and myself as we host PEN OAKLAND’s award ceremony this Saturday on Zoom, in association with the Oakland Public Library.
Find out about what’s worth a read from local artists and writers like Cheryl Fabio, Jack Foley, Maw Shein Win, and Lucille Lang Day.
Hear from award winning writers like Henry Threadgill, Brent Hayes Edwards and Airea D. Matthews.
PEN Oakland is the local branch of the national PEN. Co-founded by the renowned Oakland writer, playwright, poet and novelist Ishmael Reed, Oakland PEN is special because it is a leader in fighting to include multicultural voices.
Reed is still writing. So is his wife Carla Blank, whose title essay in the new book, “A Jew in Ramallah, And Other Essays,” (Baraka Books), provides an artist’s perspective on the conflict in Gaza.
Of all Reed’s work, it’s his poetry that I’ve found the most musical and inspiring.
It’s made me start writing and enjoying poetry more intentionally. This year, I was named poet laureate of my small San Joaquin rural town.
Now as a member of Oakland PEN, I can say, yes, I have written poetry and essays, but not a novel. One man shows I’ve written, so I have my own sub-group. My acronym: Oakland PEOMS.
Reed’s most recent book of poetry, “Why the Black Hole Sings the Blues, Poems 2007-2020” is one of my favorites. One poem especially captures the emerging xenophobia of the day. I offer you the first stanza of “The Banishment.”
We don’t want you here
Your crops grow better than ours
We don’t want you here
You’re not one of our kind
We’ll drive you out
As thou you were never here
Your names, family, and history
We’ll make them all disappear.
There’s more. But that stanza captures the anxiety many of us feel from the threat of mass deportations. The poem was written more than four years ago during the first Trump administration.
We’ve lived through all this before. And survived.
The news sometimes lulls us into acquiescence, but poetry strikes at the heart and forces us to see and feel more clearly.
About the Author
Emil Guillermo is a journalist and commentator. Join him at www.patreon.com/emilamok
Bay Area
In the City Attorney Race, Ryan Richardson Is Better for Oakland
It’s been two years since negotiations broke down between the City of Oakland and a developer who wants to build a coal terminal here, and the issue has reappeared, quietly, in the upcoming race for Oakland City attorney. Two candidates are running for the position of Oakland City Attorney in November: current Assistant Chief City Attorney Ryan Richardson and retired judge Brenda Harbin-Forte.
By Margaret Rossoff
Special to The Post
OPINION
It’s been two years since negotiations broke down between the City of Oakland and a developer who wants to build a coal terminal here, and the issue has reappeared, quietly, in the upcoming race for Oakland City attorney.
Two candidates are running for the position of Oakland City Attorney in November: current Assistant Chief City Attorney Ryan Richardson and retired judge Brenda Harbin-Forte.
Richardson has worked in the Office of the City Attorney since 2014 and is likely to continue current City Attorney Barbara Parker’s policies managing the department. He has committed not to accept campaign contributions from developers who want to store and handle coal at a proposed marine terminal in Oakland.
Retired Judge Harbin-Forte launched and has played a leading role in the campaign to recall Mayor Sheng Thao, which is also on the November ballot. She has stepped back from the recall campaign to focus on her candidacy. The East Bay Times noted, “Harbin-Forte’s decision to lead the recall campaign against a potential future client is … troubling — and is likely to undermine her ability, if she were to win, to work effectively.”
Harbin-Forte has refused to rule out accepting campaign support from coal terminal interests or their agents. Coal terminal lobbyist Greg McConnell’s Independent Expenditure Committee “SOS Oakland” is backing her campaign.
In the 2022 mayor’s race, parties hoping to build a coal terminal made $600,000 in contributions to another of McConnell’s Independent Expenditure Committees.
In a recent interview, Harbin-Forte said she is open to “listening to both sides” and will be “fair.” However, the City Attorney’s job is not to judge fairly between the City and its legal opponents – it is to represent the City against its opponents.
She thought that the 2022 settlement negotiations ended because the City “rejected a ‘no coal’ settlement.” This is lobbyist McConnell’s narrative, in contrast to the report by City Attorney Barbara Parker. Parker has explained that the City continued to negotiate in good faith for a settlement with no “loopholes” that could have allowed coal to ship through Oakland – until would-be coal developer Phil Tagami broke off negotiations.
One of Harbin-Forte’s main priorities, listed on her website, is “reducing reliance on outside law firms,” and instead use the lawyers working in the City Attorney’s office.
However, sometimes this office doesn’t have the extensive expertise available that outside firms can provide in major litigation. In the ongoing, high stakes coal litigation, the City has benefited from collaborating with experienced, specialized attorneys who could take on the nationally prominent firms representing the City’s opponents.
The City will continue to need this expertise as it pursues an appeal of the judge’s decision that restored the developer’s lease and defends against a billion-dollar lawsuit brought by the hedge fund operator who holds the sublease on the property.
Harbin-Forte’s unwillingness to refuse campaign contributions from coal terminal interests, her opposition to using outside resources when needed, as well as her uncritical repetition of coal lobbyist McConnell’s claim that the City sabotaged the settlement talks of 2022 all raise serious concerns about how well she would represent the best interests of Oakland and Oaklanders if she is elected City Attorney.
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