Guarding America Against Americans

After Obama was declared the winner I think I felt the earth tremble a little. Maybe not, maybe it just felt like it. People living near older cemeteries reported that they also felt the earth tremble, but it felt like more than a mere tremble. I wonder why?

Which reminds me:

In July 1959 when I turned 18 there were a couple of things I needed to do. I had to sign up at the local draft board and I felt it was my duty to register to vote.

Where I registered is vague. It seems logical that the voters registration office would be at the courthouse. But, I think it may have been across what was then Washington Avenue (now Roswell Street) at an Army Navy store.

The owner(s) of the Army Navy store had some ties with the county government.

Either the courthouse or the Army Navy store I registered to vote. I brought my birth certificate and all that. I think probably all I needed was the statement “I’m Ed Hunter’s boy” .

But I did it the right way and so did the guy who authorized my voting eligibility. I think his name might have been Luther. He pulled out a worn sheet of paper with typing on it. He told me to me to read aloud what was typed.

It was Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address.

I started reading aloud, “Four Scores and Seven ye…”

I was interrupted by Luther, or whoever. “That is good – you pass!” He told me.

“I don’t have to read it all?” I asked.

"No. You said “FOUR” instead of “Fo’” – that is what I was listening for. If you had said “Fo’” then I would have to turn down your registration application. We can’t let all those crazy people vote – no telling what crazy they would vote for.”

Of course, that was a racist ploy to prevent blacks from voting. Before then, the south used the “Grandfather Clause” to prevent blacks from voting – it was another type of literacy test – but the problem with the literacy test a lot of whites failed it too. They added the clause that if your grandfather voted you can bypass the literacy test.” That was ruled unconstitutional, so in time they fell back to the oral literacy test – which in time was ruled unconstitutional also.

The guy (Luther?) felt he was doing a great service to America by not allowing a certain segment to vote. And I bet no amount of arguing could change his mind.

I cannot think of anything more un-American than refusing a certain segment to vote because you were scared of how they may vote.

Yesterday, if you happened to have been near the cemetery Luther is buried you might have heard deep down in the earth a muffled voice, “I knew this would happen!”