U.S. Commission on Civil Rights

What is the "U.S. Commission on Civil Rights" and what is it up to?

The first popular elections were held in 1789 under he new constitution and George Washington won every state. He repeated the victory in 1792. There were no political parties but jealousies between North and South provided a mild contest. There were no rules... The procedures were loose and subject to instant change with only white male property owners allowed to vote at meeting places like churches or taverns. Votes were cast by voice, standing, or raised hand. Results weren't recorded until the election of 1824.

Partisans promoted the virtues of their man at voting places by plying their neighbors with a taste of shine made right on site, a practice Washington disliked but not out of ethical remorse. He believed that the cost of providing free liquor was more than the job was worth.

Constitutional Amendments have settled the question of who can vote; local laws eliminated free liquor; population growth and evolving practices have changed precinct procedures; voter registration has reduced voter fraud; but today, VOTING is still managed in the precincts, mostly by volunteers. ELECTIONS ARE MANAGED AT THE COUNTY LEVEL THROUGHOUT THE UNITED STATES. State officials oversee conformity to state constitutions and state laws. All that is as it should be.

The law throughout the land is clear... Citizens have a right to vote. White, Black, male, female, any citizen over 18 who is not a convicted felon may vote. Also, anyone illegally denying another the right to vote is committing a felony and must be prosecuted.

Yet, our federal government has taken another approach and we Americans sit by ignoring the outrageous practice.

The federal government uses the "U.S. Commission on Civil Rights" to deny equal voting rights to MOST Americans -- except Blacks. The name of the Commission sounds like motherhood and apple pie... Who can argue with such a noble and decent thing as assuring Americans their civil rights, especially to vote? The Commission was constituted to oversee practices of federal, state, and local governmental entities to assure everyone's right to vote. But look what the Commission is doing in the case of elections. The Commission, backed by the full power and money of the federal government, files lawsuits against communities, towns, and counties, accusing them of civil rights violations based on totally unsubstantiated charges. The Commission knows the accused county cannot afford the cost of extensive litigation and will agree to settlements. The Commission then makes sure that the agreements ALWAYS give Blacks advantages over all other voters. These agreements are called "consent decrees" and have the effect of federal law. Who decides which communities to sue? None other than the Rev. Jesse Jackson and Kweisi Mfume. Who approves settlements even before federal judges see the agreements? Of course, Jesse and Kweisi.

Anyone who watched the Commission's follow up on the Florida election debacle will never witness anything more un-American, more egregious, more outrageous, than what happened at the Commission's "hearings" in Florida and the Commissions conduct is NEVER challenged or questioned.

The Commission consists of about a dozen members, mostly minority, mostly Democrats, mostly ultra-liberal, and many of them operatives of the Democratic National Committee, including "Madam Chair," Mary Frances Berry. They were in Florida ostensibly to learn what had happened during the election of 2000 and to take corrective action. What the Commission actually did was to provide an official setting for Democrats to set forth all manner of claptrap complaints, ridiculous whining, silly suggestions, insipid remarks, banal commentary, rank accusations, flagrant lies, paltering fabrications, and all other matter of deceitful, mendacious "testimony."

For days, the Commission held the "hearings," often allowing especially good liars to return for another shot at those dastardly Republicans, Independents, Ralph Nader, Pat Buchanan, and anyone else who had the temerity, gall, and audacity, to have run against their man, Al Gore.

This Commission made the 1950's McCarthy Senate hearing's search for Communist seem like reasonable conduct.

The Commission used its federal clout to order Florida Secretary of State, Katherine Harris, to appear, but not for testimony... They never gave her a chance to speak. Right out of the box the members lit into her with accusations of malfeasance, partisanship, bad judgement, poor planning, etc., all supported by rounds of applause from the mostly Black audience. On several occasions Harris attempted to explain that she was Secretary of State, with seven important departments to run, including foreign and interstate commerce, oversight of corporations doing business in Florida, and other highly critical agencies. She wanted the Commission to understand that she provided only a ministerial role -- certification of election results -- as a Florida constitutional (elected) official. She tried to explain that the Florida Supervisor of Elections was head of the Department of Elections, and that he should be allowed to answer questions about what happened before, during, and after the election. But Madam Chair continuously and rudely interrupted her with condescending remarks, insults, and other statements, suggesting that Harris had personally rigged the Florida election to deny Blacks the right to vote. Madam Chair laid every error, mistake, complaint, criticism of any sort, right in the lap of Secretary Harris.

Many "witnesses" were not very sophisticated, admittedly had been rounded up and bussed in, and did not understand how words might be taken by the general public. But the Commission was ready for the situation... ready to interrupt whenever a speaker's words didn't sound just right for their purposes. The Commissioners, especially Madam Chair and the Commission's attorney, carefully led each "witness" through the desired words to produce the right "testimony."

Each new group of witnesses had a well spoken lead person who would make a formal statement (hearsay) to summarize information gleaned previously from the others in the group. The Commissioners then questioned individuals in the group.

Some examples of "testimony" (responses to Commissioner's questions) from our notes made during the "hearings:"

PERSON 1:
Q: "Did see you anybody turned away from voting?"

A: "I spent two hours there and saw three people told that they couldn't vote and all of 'em was Black. Nobody told any whites they couldn't vote."

Q: "What reason were they given?"

A: "They was told that they wasn't registered but they all said they was."

Q: "What else did you see?"

A: "I saw every white person allowed to vote. They would just come in and vote."

The Commissioners would look at each other, nod knowingly, adjust their faces to a forlorn look over such a tragic story, and go to the next "witness."

PERSON 2:
Q: "Can you tell the Commission what happened when you went to vote?"

A: "Yeah. When I got there the clerk was not very accommodating to voters. It was an experience you wouldn't believe unless you was there and seen it."

Q: "What happened?"

A: "They was just plain rude because we was Black. They didn't want us to vote."

Q: "Did you ask for help?"

A: "There wasn't nobody to help. They all acted like they was busy and wouldn't pay no attention. I asked three times but they just said that I wasn't registered and was at the wrong place but I know I wasn't."

And on, and on, and on. It lasted for days. Some "witnesses" said they saw Sheriff's Deputies parked by the road leading to the polling place so they didn't go ahead "because it was plain that they was there to stop us."

We have page after page of notes of this crap.

The "testimony" was recorded, just like a courtroom, to be compiled and summarized. It will be published and presented as FACT to federal judges, Congress, and news outlets. -- NO ONE at the "hearings" suggested that it might be possible that people who were told they were not registered, may not have been registered. --- NO ONE suggested that perhaps the Deputy Sheriffs were there to PROTECT voters instead of to stop them from voting. -- NO ONE asked why people on their way to vote would be scared off by the site of police cars. NO ONE asked if the "witnesses" were U.S. citizens and qualified to vote. In short, there was no cross-examination of "witnesses:" their utterances were final.

Naturally, much of the "testimony" included the story of the butterfly ballots in Palm Beach County. No one placed in the record that Palm Beach County is a very affluent Democrat county where politics are controlled by Democrats, and that it was a Democrat election official that designed the butterfly ballot. In fact, all of the complaints were from predominately Democrat counties: Miami-Dade, Palm Beach, Broward, and Vulosia. If the complaints are true, why would Democrats in those counties allow such conduct? -- Yet, the Commission accepted the "testimony" at face value and blamed everything, including butterfly ballots, on Secretary of State Harris!

Commissioners are clearly Democrat activist. The Commission serves no legitimate purpose and should be abolished or re-constituted. It would be just as bad if Commissioners were activist Republicans, Libertarians, Independents, or activist for other political interest.

We are four-square FOR EVERY citizen in this country to have an EQUAL opportunity to vote and to be heard... But this is utterly ridiculous and must be stopped. The Commission is funded by taxpayers and must be accountable to the public. What the members are doing is using taxpayer money to thwart legitimate and legal activity of constitutional state officials. The Commission also sues other federal departments, state governments, and local governments, for the most trivial activity, for the purpose of implementing quotas under the guise of Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action.

The Commission DOES NOT hold such "hearings" on issues concerning Hispanics, Jews, women, whites, Irish, Scots, American Indians, Eskimos, Samoans, Aleuts, Hindus, Japanese Americans, Chinese Americans, Koreans, Vietnamese, Poles, Italians, Russians, Armenian, Slavs, etc. Its a one way street and a single race Commission.

Something is seriously wrong.

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I have a statement:

My brother lives in Tennessee where 'motor voter' registration went into effect a few years ago. He had voted in TN several times but while renewing his Driver's License he also changed his street address for voting. When he went to vote in the 2000 election he was told that his county and two adjacent counties had screwed up registrations and he could not vote. Those who had registered (or made a change) at the DMV in the three-county area could not vote because the computers had wiped out their records. They were allowed to cast a provisional ballot but it will not be counted unless it mattered in the results. -- BUT there was no screaming, yelling, pouting, whining, crying, or any other obscene behavior. Just as in Florida, the people most upset by the snafu were the officials involved. The public understood that sometimes s--- happens. They'll get to vote next time.

The Miami Herald, with the consortia of news organizations dedicated to "recounting" ALL of the Al Gore challenged ballots in Florida, finished their "recount" last week (Spring, 2001). Using the most liberal standards of "counting" each dimple, pimple, chad, hanging chad, swinging chad, prick mark, pencil mark, etc., the group reviewed the 10,500 ballots in Miami-Dade, plus the "questionable" ballots from Broward and Palm Beach Counties. These are the ballots that Democrats, Blacks, and media, have insisted would have proved that Al Gore won the election if Judge Samuel Sauls had reviewed them. FROM THIS FARCE, AL GORE GAINED A TOTAL OF 49 VOTES, well short of the more then 500 he needed. George W. Bush still won. We know this because it was in a back section of The Charlotte Observer, A Knight-Ridder "Newspaper." It was a little side-bar piece about three inches long. To paraphrase Paul Harvey -- now we know the rest of the story.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Frank Laughter

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