Sunday morning is the most segregated time in the US. Black people are in Black churches, white people in their own, the country being clearly divided.
Black churches have been at the centre of all Black activities for hundreds of years. Martin Luther King Jr after receiving his PhD from Boston University in 1955 joined his father’s church as co-pastor. MLK chose Black churches as the platform to pursue his life’s goal, social justice. That church was the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Georgia, and it will live on in history. It is where he honed his speeches, which eventually culminated in the electrifying “I have a dream” speech.
Black churches play a very important role during elections. Congregants are provided food, given advice about voting procedures, and transportation to and from polling booths. They also travel in groups so that they have company while waiting in line for hours to vote.
Georgia is about to turn Democratic after decades of being Republican. Republicans believe Black voter suppression will allow them to stay in power.
The first thing the Republicans did was to ban Sunday voting. This will be a disaster for Black voter turnout.
As if banning Sunday voting was not enough, believe it or not, Georgia has made it illegal to give water or anything else to a voter waiting in line. This will seriously discourage voters. Polling booths in Black areas are few and far between. Black voters in Georgia have to wait hours in line, sometimes as long as five hours. If water and food are not provided, many will not go to vote and many will return home before they get to vote.
How the Black voters’ advocacy groups will fight voter suppression is not known yet. Lawsuits will invariably end up at the Supreme Court. Unfortunately, this Supreme Court is heavily right leaning. It is very unlikely that all of the obstacles can be overturned. The federal government has limited ability to go after states individually. All elections must be certified by the secretary of state.
The president of the US is not elected by popular votes. States are democratic, but the definition and execution of democracy varies by states. The majority of states are run by Republicans. There are 30 states with Republican legislatures, of which 27 have governors from the same party. It is not a question of whether there will be voter suppression, it is about how bad it will be.
Many states allow same day registration on voting day, Georgia will not. However, if anyone wants to buy an assault rifle in Georgia, they can register on the same day they buy the assault rifle. AK-47: YES. Voting: NO. Think about it.
Kazi Shahid Hasan was educated at Buet and Boston University, and has spent 40 years as a Wall Street analyst.