Writer's Block: Time Travel
Aug. 24th, 2007 09:24 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mav_fanIf you could travel back in time to spend a day with someone, who would it
be and why?
I would go back in time to the not too distant past and spend a day with Barbara Jordan.
She has been my own personal hero since I was a young girl. Her speaking voice was tremendous. But even more important was her unwaivering defense of the US Constitution especially during the Nixon Watergate hearings when she was a member of the House Judiciary Committee which debated the issue of Nixon's complicity in the Watergate debacle.
be and why?
I would go back in time to the not too distant past and spend a day with Barbara Jordan.
She has been my own personal hero since I was a young girl. Her speaking voice was tremendous. But even more important was her unwaivering defense of the US Constitution especially during the Nixon Watergate hearings when she was a member of the House Judiciary Committee which debated the issue of Nixon's complicity in the Watergate debacle.
Her use of the English language was exquisite. In her opening statements for the Nixon hearings, she made a speech which has become her most famous ever. My particular favorite part of the speech is, ""My faith in the Constitution is whole, it is complete, it is total. I am not going to sit here and be an idle spectator to the diminution, the subversion, the destruction of the Constitution."
When making the keynote address 1976 Democratic Convention, she said, "A nation is formed by the willingness of each of us to share in the responsibility for upholding the common good.
A government is invigorated when each of us is willing to participate in shaping the future of this nation."
When she was the keynote speaker at the 1992 Democratic Convention she said, "We are one, we Americans, and we reject any intruder who seeks to divide us by race or class. We honor cultural identity. However, separatism in not allowed. Separatism is not the American way. And we should not permit ideas like political correctness to become some fad that could reverse our hard--won achievements in civil rights and human rights. Xenophobia, has no place in the Democratic Party. We seek to unite people, not divide them and we reject both white racism and black racism. This party will not tolerate bigotry under any guise. America's strength is rooted in its diversity."
One last quote, not from Barbara Jordan, but from then President Bill Clinton at Barbara Jordan's funeral. He said of her, "The last time I saw Barbara Jordan was late last fall when Liz Carpenter talked me into going to the University of Texas to give a speech on race relations on the day of the Million Man March. I was nervous enough as it was. And I walked out into that vast arena, and there were 17,000 people there. But I could only see one - Barbara Jordan, smiling at me. And there I was about to give a speech to her about race and the Constitution. I think it was the nearest experience on this earth to the pastor's giving a sermon with God in the audience."
The last time I was in Texas, my friend and I went to visit the Texas State Cemetery specifically to visit her grave. It was a pilgrimage of sorts. While we were standing there, a class of junior high students was being led through the cemetery. We moved aside as they came to her grave and listened to the teacher. He mentioned several facts about her; she was the first black woman in the Texas State Senate, her history as an educator, and defender of the Constitution, and other trivia. As I listened to his dry recitation of facts to this group of people who were probably born after she passed away in 1996, I thought to myself, yes, she was all of those things. But she was more as well. She was a true patriot, statesman and to me a hero.
When making the keynote address 1976 Democratic Convention, she said, "A nation is formed by the willingness of each of us to share in the responsibility for upholding the common good.
A government is invigorated when each of us is willing to participate in shaping the future of this nation."
When she was the keynote speaker at the 1992 Democratic Convention she said, "We are one, we Americans, and we reject any intruder who seeks to divide us by race or class. We honor cultural identity. However, separatism in not allowed. Separatism is not the American way. And we should not permit ideas like political correctness to become some fad that could reverse our hard--won achievements in civil rights and human rights. Xenophobia, has no place in the Democratic Party. We seek to unite people, not divide them and we reject both white racism and black racism. This party will not tolerate bigotry under any guise. America's strength is rooted in its diversity."
One last quote, not from Barbara Jordan, but from then President Bill Clinton at Barbara Jordan's funeral. He said of her, "The last time I saw Barbara Jordan was late last fall when Liz Carpenter talked me into going to the University of Texas to give a speech on race relations on the day of the Million Man March. I was nervous enough as it was. And I walked out into that vast arena, and there were 17,000 people there. But I could only see one - Barbara Jordan, smiling at me. And there I was about to give a speech to her about race and the Constitution. I think it was the nearest experience on this earth to the pastor's giving a sermon with God in the audience."
The last time I was in Texas, my friend and I went to visit the Texas State Cemetery specifically to visit her grave. It was a pilgrimage of sorts. While we were standing there, a class of junior high students was being led through the cemetery. We moved aside as they came to her grave and listened to the teacher. He mentioned several facts about her; she was the first black woman in the Texas State Senate, her history as an educator, and defender of the Constitution, and other trivia. As I listened to his dry recitation of facts to this group of people who were probably born after she passed away in 1996, I thought to myself, yes, she was all of those things. But she was more as well. She was a true patriot, statesman and to me a hero.
