Biden scrambles to court Black voters

 By William Haupt III

AP Photo/Andrew Harnik

“It takes considerable knowledge just to realize the extent of your own ignorance.” – Thomas Sowell

Those of us who know our history continue to be baffled how well the progressives have turned the Party of Lincoln (Republican), founded for the purpose of ending American slavery, into the party of scorn and hate for Blacks and Hispanics. Progressives can only succeed by rewriting history.

Since they took control of public education, there is little or no mention that northern Republicans crossed the Mason-Dixon Line to fight the mother of all Civil Wars to free people of color from the evils of southern democratic slavery. The efforts of those northern dedicated men and women are lost in the archives of U.S. history and have been replaced with token events by identity groups.

Historian Matthew Wasniewski said. “All 22 Black members of Congress during Reconstruction were from reconstructed southern states. All were Republican. By 1901 there was a three-decade gap where no African American served in either chamber because of the rise of southern democratic segregationist Jim Crow laws. They diminished the voting power of Black Americans.

After having voted against the 1957 Civil Rights Act while he was a senator and after becoming president, John F. Kennedy (JFK) opposed the 1963 March on Washington by Dr. King organized by A. Phillip Randolph, a black Republican.

Yielding to the changing political winds, JFK asked Congress to write civil rights legislation. Senator Lyndon Johnson, head of the segregationist coalition, balked at the idea. Knowing that the Eisenhower Civil Rights Act of 1957 had been written and approved by the Republican House, JFK turned to the House and asked them to resurrect that bill and work with the segregationist left to get the legislation to the floor.

The legislative proposal did not gain traction until after JFK was assassinated in November 1963. When the bill reached the Senate, Republican Senator Everett Dirksen from Illinois, pushed through the legislation that became the well-known 1964 Civil Rights Act.

In the Senate, the bill faced strong opposition from Southern Democrats. Influential senators like Richard Russell, Strom Thurmond, Robert Byrd, William Fulbright, and Sam Ervin joined together to launch a filibuster that lasted for 57 days. Russell, a Democrat from Georgia, argued that the bill would lead to the destruction of the South’s two different social orders and result in mongrelization.

Little known today is the fact, that Dirksen was instrumental in the passage of civil rights legislation in 1957, 1960, 1964, 1965, and 1968.  Dirksen wrote the language for the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Dirksen also crafted the language for the Civil Rights Act of 1968 which prohibited discrimination in housing.

For history buffs since the end of the Civil War, Republicans wrote every Civil Rights Act, including the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the Constitution to ensure that all people of color were given the same social and political status as white Americans. 

Segregationist Democrat President Andrew Johnson who approved of segregation in the South refused to sign the 13th and 14th Amendments, and In 1867 and 1868 Congress passed four Reconstruction Acts over Andrew Johnson’s vetoes.

The Thirteenth Amendment was passed by the Republican-controlled Congress in 1866 as the Civil Rights Act of 1866 and was vetoed by  Andrew Johnson. In April 1866, Congress again passed the bill and Johnson again vetoed it, but a two-thirds majority in each chamber overrode the veto to allow it to become law without presidential signature.

The Thirteenth Amendment that was later ratified by the states on December 6, 1865, abolished slavery “within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.” Elements of the Civil Rights Act of 1866 eventually became the template for the Fourteenth Amendment that Congress eventually passed. 

Another historical note is the fact that Congress spent the days between Republican President Ulysses S. Grant’s election and his inauguration drafting the 15th Amendment to the  United States Constitution that prohibits the federal government and each state from denying or abridging a citizen’s right to vote “on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.” It was ratified on February 3, 1870.

During the Industrial Revolution, Blacks in the South moved north to work in the factories and to escape the evils of segregation. Unfortunately, that was not the case. They were the last to be hired, first to be fired, denied union membership and forced to live in shanty urban ghettos. Unfortunately, young Americans today are being denied access to true Black American history.

A recent national survey found that 22% of Black voters in six battleground states said they would support former President Donald Trump in next year’s election, while 71% said they would back President Joe Biden. The total for Trump is a percentage no Republican presidential candidate has reached with Black voters in a half-century. Black employment was at an all-time high under Trump’s leadership.

Although we’re still about 11 months from the 2024 presidential election, the season for Democratic “bedwetting” has come early this cycle. Leading the apparent panic this month are a series of polls and accompanying analysis showing something pretty obvious for some time; that Joe Biden is a really unpopular president and that dissatisfaction will make a 2024 showdown with a competitive Republican opponent. Therefore, every progressive vote will count this next election.

What disturbs Democrats is, these polls reveal that Biden is facing a problem with voters of color. This weaker standing with Blacks and Latinos influences national numbers. A New York Times-Siena poll reports Biden leads Trump 53% among nonwhite voters. That’s a sharp drop from his last election.

Democrats are nervous about this election and that is why they are bending over backward to jail Donald Trump. For the first time in years, the Democrats are unsure they can depend on the Black and Hispanic voters to reelect Biden. They are on a campaign to discredit “the evil Republicans.”

“I voted Republican this year; the Democrats left a bad taste in my mouth.” –Monica Lewinsky

Biden has recently been touting his successful economic programs geared toward minority-owned businesses to Black and Hispanic voters. Not all the “spin” in the world can change high consumer prices, soaring rents, lack of job opportunities, stagnant class mobility, and inflation.

According to the Roper Center, 65% of Hispanics support Biden and 32% will vote for Trump. And 51% of voters from other nonwhite racial backgrounds now favor Trump, while just 39% like Biden. If we add up Biden’s losses as Trump gains next year, there’s trouble in paradise for the left next election.

“Anyone who thinks my story is anywhere near over is sadly mistaken.” – Donald Trump

Black Americans have been fooled too long by the Democratic Party and only time will tell if this will turn around. In the last few months, new moves by Biden to fund businesses and entrepreneurs in Black communities have gained momentum. The Treasury Department is getting the hard sell from Biden and his comrades as support for Democrats among minority voting blocs is faltering.

Biden announced, “Entrepreneurs of color represent the fastest growing segment of the small business market, yet they have the least access to capital, are likely to be denied credit, and pay high interest rates. It is time we address their needs with grants and loans.” How soon Joe Biden forgets.

John Thomas, a black bondsman, told pollsters, “I’m not a Trump supporter, but I am concerned with Joe Biden. What has he done for Black people? We brought him a victory. We hear that noise. It’s the same ol’ thing. People begging for our vote, but not doing a thing for us after they get it.”

A Stanford study found that Black taxpayers were three to five times more likely to be audited than other ethnic groups. Biden told Blacks to file for the IRS-earned income tax credit even though few of them were entitled to it. Biden told them to break the law and blamed it on racist IRS agents.

For years Democrats thought that throwing a bone to Black voters before the election guaranteed they would secure the Black vote.

“Capitalism knows only one color. That color is green; all else is subservient to it, hence, race, gender, and ethnicity cannot be considered within it.” -Thomas Sowell