March on Washington was a step in history for local group

St. Louis and the state of Missouri were well represented at the 2021 March on Washington, Aug. 28 – exactly 58 years to the day after the march and Dr. Martin Luther King’s famous speech in which he thundered “I have a dream!”

“We cannot underestimate the seriousness of these attacks on voter rights and voter suppression laws being passed by many states,” said John Bowman, president of the St. Louis County NAACP.

“We must protect the most fundamental of rights, and that is exercising the right to vote.

Bowman was part of a group of about 40 people who traveled from St. Louis to Washington on a bus to take part in the march, workshops and rally in conjunction with the Missouri Voter Protection Coalition.

U.S. Rep Cori Bush, who met the group in Washington, told USA TODAY that voting rights are integral to progressive political success.

“I believe that there has been a deliberate attack against Black and brown and indigenous communities for so long, because our votes prevail, because our votes speak, and because our votes shake the ground," she said.

“America is at a crossroad,” said Denise Lieberman, Missouri Voter Protection Coalition director.

“Democracy is in peril. We have the potential in coming weeks to protect voting rights, particularly for people of color. States are passing laws that are purposely making it harder for people of color to vote, while they should be doing the opposite.”

At least six bills in Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Iowa, Kentucky and Oklahoma shorten windows to apply for mail-in ballots, according to the Brennan Center for Justice, a public policy nonprofit that tracks voter suppression legislation.

Bills in Iowa and Montana call for reducing polling place availability. Georgia and Iowa bills seek to limit voting days and hours. Other bills, many of which have already been signed into law, ban ballot drop boxes and mail-in voting, impose harsher voter ID requirements and prohibit giving water to voters in line.

Speakers also pleaded for passage of the John Lewis Voting Rights Enhancement Act.

It would establish a process for reviewing voting changes in jurisdictions nationwide, focused on measures that have historically been used to discriminate against voters. It also requires reasonable public notice for voting changes.

It also calls on the U.S. Attorney General to request federal observers be present anywhere in the country where there is a serious threat of racial discrimination in voting; and allowing federal courts to intervene when the effect of a voting measure (including voter ID laws) is to lead to racial discrimination in voting and to deny citizens their right to vote.

“Fifty-eight years ago today, a preacher from Georgia stood on these steps and declared, in the face of racism and economic justice, a nightmare — a nightmare that was lengthened by congressional and state filibustering,” said Rev. Dr. William 

Voting rights activists have been putting pressure on Congress to end the filibuster and make it harder for state legislators to change voting laws that place barriers in front of the ballot box.

Participants included family members of both King and Lewis, the youngest organizer of the 1963 March on Washington, and the brothers of George Floyd whose murder by Minneapolis police in 2020 sparked global protests. 

Bowman said he was impressed that many organizations have come together to protect voting rights.

“We have to stop working in silos,” he said.

While he called the Biden Administration “light years ahead of Trump,” he said, “we can’t be soft-pedaling these issues.”

“There are people, many Democrats, that are hiding. We have to call them out.”

The NNPA and Howard University News Service contributed to this report