In 1959 public schools in Prince Edward County, Virginia, closed for five years rather than integrate as the federal government had mandated. The state government looked on passively and even provided vouchers for the private educations of white students. My great grandfather became superintendent of the county in 1965 to oversee the integration process begun in 1964. According to my grandmother, it was a battle her father would aver “ruined me among my peers.”
Last night the Commonwealth of Virginia offered its 13 electoral votes in support of a black man as president of the United States. When Barack Obama was born, Virginians would have pulled their children out of school rather than have them go to school with a black boy. Yesterday Virginians affirmed their confidence to hand responsibility for their education, economy, security, and general wellbeing over to a black man of the same generation to which they denied an education fifty years ago. I couldn’t be prouder to be a Virginian today.
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And I couldn't be prouder of my association with North Carolina, even if it isn't affirmed for the blue column yet. The truth is that Obama won't be able to actually change anything substantively until we get our economy back on track but the changes in perceptions and attitudes could go a long a way. I had been feeling pretty disheartened by politics this year, but it's hard to not feel a little lighter today.
As a Viginian by birth and a Carolinian by choice.. I think back to when I was nine years old livng in Harrisonburg, VA when the first attempt at the dream died. The town I grew up in was segregated with seperate pools and seperate schools. There were no black Doctors, no black lawyers and no black members of the country club or Elks club where elite white males met to ponder our future. I never shared a classroom with an African American until Jr. High School and there were no black residents in my neighborhood. In the heart of this ignorance, even as a child I saw hope ... in the voice of the Reverend Martin Luther King when he told us about his Dream and even when he let us know he had "no fear .. because he had been to the Mountain Top". However, sadly, the next day, he was was gone...the victim of a gunman's ignorance...and bullet. Months later I still remember the excitement I felt sitting on my grandfathers bed watching the brilliant young Senator from New York on TV telling us from a Los Angeles hotel suite that there was hope and "on to Chicago and Let's win there to" only to wake the next day to find out from my grandmother that Robert Kennedy had been shot down also. I can remember the tears as if they were yesterday.... I thought the dream died with him that night.
Well yesterday I cried again, like I hadn't in 40 years, but these tears were tears of JOY!! Both of the states that I call home, along with a strong majority of these United States, finally judged a man...not by the color of his skin...but by the content of his character. 40 years later the DREAM has been realized and mountain has been climbed. I never thought I would live to see this day and I could not be prouder. The torch has been passed to a new generation...of young men like you who do not carry the burden of the America that was .. but the hope of the America that is. Although we have a long way to go, we have come a long way. Today is my proudest moment as an American and as a Virginian who now lives in North Carolina, and I look forward to the next 40 years with more hope and confidence then I have ever felt. Yes We Can...and Yes We Did!!
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