LOTT SAID IT BEFORE (Drudge Siren)

Drudge ^ | 12/10/02 | Drudge

[walrus954]

After a fiery speech by Thurmond at a Mississippi campaign rally for Ronald Reagan in November 1980, Lott, then a congressman, told a crowd in Jackson: "You know, if we had elected this man 30 years ago, we wouldn't be in the mess we are today."

More to follow...

[Poohbah]

You think he's an idiot; you are essentially calling 50 other GOP Senators idiots because they elected him to be their leader!

And that would be a fair assessment if they decide to keep the guy as leader.

Actually, they're even bigger idiots than Lott--Lott has the excuse of being an imbecile of long standing and fine pedigree, they don't.

[dennisw]

Big bleeping deal.

[hchutch]

The man is felony stupid. A different word starting with the letter F would be appropriate, but I don't want to get in trouble.

But you are right. He quits the leadership and keeps the seat until he retires in 2006. Then, we run a replacement.

[BuddhaBoy]

Do you really think Lott would have been elected Leader had this information come out before hand? Honestly?

[Poohbah]

I see you're using the "everyone does it" defense.

Sorry, I didn't buy it when Clinton was using it, I ain't buying it now.

[mike_9958]

YAWN...

News must be really slow.... if this is the best we can talk about. What Lott did is nothing but a stupid slip..comeon guys & ladies - let's talk about something else.

[deadskunk]

Yeah. Lott is done. Politically, unless the R's appeal to non-whites in the not-too-distant future, they, as well as the rest of you, will be electorally irrelevant. Karl Rove knows that, even if a lot of his colleagues refuse to admit it.

You can't be "the party of Lincoln" if you elect someone to your top congressional post who believes in segregation, especially not if he is dumb enough to say so in public, TWICE.

9 out of 10 black people voted against Dubya. Lott just made it 10 out of 10, and probably increased turnout.

Have a nice day.

[GopherIt]

You raise the interesting point that this attack on Lott has underlying it an attack on Pickering. That would make just about everyone on this thread very "useful" wouldn't it?

[kcvl]

Democrat opposition to the Civil Rights Movement:
A little known fact of history involves the heavy opposition to the civil rights movement by several prominent Democrats. Similar historical neglect is given to the important role Republicans played in supporting the civil rights movement. A calculation of 26 major civil rights votes from 1933 through the 1960's civil rights era shows that Republicans favored civil rights in approximately 96% of the votes, whereas the Democrats opposed them in 80% of the votes! These facts are often intentionally overlooked by the left wing Democrats for obvious reasons. In some cases, the Democrats have told flat out lies about their shameful record during the civil rights movement.

Democrat Senators organized the record Senate filibuster of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Included among the organizers were several prominent and well known liberal Democrat standard bearers including:
- Robert Byrd, current senator from West Virginia
- J. William Fulbright, Arkansas senator and political mentor of Bill Clinton
- Albert Gore Sr., Tennessee senator, father and political mentor of Al Gore. Gore Jr. has been known to lie about his father's opposition to the Civil Rights Act.
- Sam Ervin, North Carolina senator of Watergate hearings fame
- Richard Russell, Georgia senator and later President Pro Tempore

The complete list of the 21 Democrats who opposed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 includes Senators:

- Hill and Sparkman of Alabama
- Fulbright and McClellan of Arkansas
- Holland and Smathers of Florida
- Russell and Talmadge of Georgia
- Ellender and Long of Louisiana
- Eastland and Stennis of Mississippi
- Ervin and Jordan of North Carolina
- Johnston and Thurmond of South Carolina
- Gore Sr. and Walters of Tennessee
- H. Byrd and Robertson of Virginia
- R. Byrd of West Virginia

Democrat opposition to the Civil Rights Act was substantial enough to literally split the party in two. A whopping 40% of the House Democrats VOTED AGAINST the Civil Rights Act, while 80% of Republicans SUPPORTED it. Republican support in the Senate was even higher. Similar trends occurred with the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which was supported by 82% of House Republicans and 94% of Senate Republicans. The same Democrat standard bearers took their normal racists stances, this time with Senator Fulbright leading the opposition effort.

It took the hard work of Republican Senate Minority Leader Everett Dirksen and Republican Whip Thomas Kuchel to pass the Civil Rights Act (Dirksen was presented a civil rights accomplishment award for the year by the head of the NAACP in recognition of his efforts). Upon breaking the Democrat filibuster of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, Republican Dirksen took to the Senate floor and exclaimed "The time has come for equality of opportunity in sharing in government, in education, and in employment. It will not be stayed or denied. It is here!" (Full text of speech). Sadly, Democrats and revisionist historians have all but forgotten (and intentionally so) that it was Republican Dirksen, not the divided Democrats, who made the Civil Rights Act a reality. Dirksen also broke the Democrat filibuster of the 1957 Civil Rights Act that was signed by Republican President Eisenhower.

Outside of Congress, the three most notorious opponents of school integration were all Democrats:
- Orval Faubus, Democrat Governor of Arkansas and one of Bill Clinton's political heroes
- George Wallace, Democrat Governor of Alabama
- Lester Maddox, Democrat Governor of Georgia

The most famous of the school desegregation standoffs involved Governor Faubus. Democrat Faubus used police and state forces to block the integration of a high school in Little Rock, Arkansas. The standoff was settled and the school was integrated only after the intervention of Republican President Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Even the Democrat Party organization resisted integration and refused to allow minority participation for decades. Exclusion of minorities was the general rule of the Democrat Party of many states for decades, especially in Texas. This racist policy reached its peak under the New Deal in the southern and western states, often known as the New Deal Coalition region of FDR. The Supreme Court in Nixon v. Herndon declared the practice of "white primaries" unconstitutional in 1927 after states had passed laws barring Blacks from participating in Democrat primaries. But the Democrat Parties did not yield to the Court’s order. After Nixon v. Herndon, Democrats simply made rules within the party's individual executive committees to bar minorities from participating, which were struck down in Nixon v. Condon in 1932. The Democrats, in typical racist fashion, responded by using state parties to pass rules barring blacks from participation. This decision was upheld in Grovey v. Townsend, which was not overturned until 1944 by Smith v. Allwright. The Texas Democrats responded with their usual ploys and turned to what was known as the "Jaybird system" which used private Democrat clubs to hold white-only votes on a slate of candidates, which were then transferred to the Democrat party itself and put on their primary ballot as the only choices. Terry v. Adams overturned the Jaybird system, prompting the Democrats to institute blocks of unit rule voting procedures as well as the infamous literacy tests and other Jim Crow regulations to specifically block minorities from participating in their primaries. In the end, it took 4 direct Supreme Court orders to end the Democrat's "white primary" system, and after that it took countless additional orders, several acts of Congress, and a constitutional amendment to tear down the Jim Crow codes that preserved the Democrat's white primary for decades beyond the final Supreme Court order ruling it officially unconstitutional.

Hispanics in South Texas were treated especially poorly by the Democrat Party, which relied heavily on a system of political bosses to coerce and intimidate Hispanics into voting for Democrat primary candidates of choice. Though coercion is illegal, this system, known as the Patron system, is still in use to this day by local Democrat parties in some heavy Hispanic communities of the southwest.

The simple truth is that the Democrat Party's history during this century is one closely aligned to bigotry in a record stemming largely out of the liberal New Deal era up until the modern day. Bigots are at the center of the Democrat party's current leadership and role models. And in a striking display of hypocrisy, many of the same Democrats who dishonestly shout accusations of "bigotry" at conservatives are practicing bigots of the most disgusting and disreputable kind themselves.

[Poohbah]

How does he do that?

Simple. He steps down, and he gets ready for a rough and woolly campaign in 2006.

If he steps down, it's a tacit admisssion that he is a racist and a segregationist and I, for one, will be calling for him to resign because of that.

It's a tacit admission that he's an idiot.

[garbanzo]

If you think Lott, humiliated by being forced to step down as Majority Leader by essentially admitting he's a racist

Lots of politicans have lost their jobs for ill-considered comments -it's politics and you have to watch yourself. You can't endorse candidates who run on racist platforms and expect to stay around for long. Even if the comment is stupid and ill-considered, it compromises your ability to get things done. Maybe because America doesn't have parlimentary system we're not used to public officials resigning over dumb comments - e.g. the Canandian minister who called Bush a "moron".

[LADY J]

"I propose that all the senators who supported this resolution step down for embracing segregation, racism and a Dixiecrat."

Very astute!! It's my understanding that Strom Thurmond changed his ways almost immediately after that presidential run.

He was one of the first to hire black aides and has never done anything since to revert back to his way of thinking when he ran for president.

I am NOT a Lott fan and would like to see someone stronger in the leadership position - but his remarks are the truth if he was referring to Strom Thurmond's change of heart and was expressing admiration for him.

[plain talk]

I think Lott is simply talking about how conservative Strom was and it had nothing to do with segregation. It's clear to me his remark "we would be better off" is referring to the liberal leftist policies of the democrats over the last umpteen years with welfare, nany state, etc Lott has said as much in his pathetic apology. Unfortunately he hasn't done a good job of damage control. You would have thunk he might have learned something from Clinton.

[Weimdog]

Another tidbit...

The Congressional Quarterly of June 26, 1964 (p. 1323) recorded that, in the Senate, only 69% of Democrats (46 for, 21 against) voted for the Civil Rights Act as compared to 82% of Republicans (27 for, 6 against). All southern Democratic senators voted against the Act. This includes the current senator from West Virginia and former KKK member Robert C. Bryd and former Tennessee senator Al Gore, Sr. (the father of Bradley's Democratic opponent).

In the House of Representatives, 61% of Democrats (152 for, 96 against) voted for the Civil Rights Act; 92 of the 103 southern Democrats voted against it. Among Republicans, 80% (138 for, 34 against) voted for it

[jwalsh07]

You've said that before. It doesn't obtain any more now than it did 444 times ago.

[MattinNJ]

Mississippi has a RAT Gov.

Yikes-then Lott has to resign his post and keep his seat. I am not a big Lott fan, but you have to give the man credit. Trying to keep Chaffee, McCain, Snowe, etc...in line must be like herding cats.

[DB]

I suggest you go read the "Dixiecrat" platform in 48' before you continue... The platform was 100% racist.

[Poohbah]

I think Lott is simply talking about how conservative Strom was and it had nothing to do with segregation.

It could be that...but you really have to quibble over the meaning of "is" to get there.