Jackson Free Press

Sometimes, Democrats like to feast on red meat, too. At this year's Jefferson Jackson Hamer Dinner, held Friday at the Regency Hotel in Jackson, Georgia U.S. Rep. John Lewis, a civil-rights icon who marched with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., played the role of zookeeper.

"You look like you're ready to get in the way," Lewis said in greeting the 600-Democrat gathering that included members of the Mississippi Legislature and Attorney General Jim Hood, the lone statewide elected Democrat.

Lewis used his personal narrative as the son of sharecroppers from near the Pike County, Ala., town of Troy to rally the crowd.

Growing up, Lewis wanted to be a minister. From time to time, Lewis and his siblings would gather the family's chickens and preach to them. "Some of those chickens would bow their heads. Some of those chickens would shake their heads. They never quite said, 'Amen.' Some of those chickens I used to preach in the '40s and '50s tended to listen to me much better than our Republican colleagues," he quipped.

Lewis cited the Republican-controlled U.S. House of Representatives, which has often locked horns with Democratic President Barack Obama and has sought to block many of Obama's policy initiatives, as one reason Democrats need to organize and ensure high voter turnout in the November 2012 election.

He chided congressional Republicans for pushing laws targeting undocumented immigrants and abortion rights. Republicans made similar efforts in Mississippi during the legislative session. While the party failed to get an immigration law passed, the GOP did muscle through strict regulations on the state's only abortion clinic.

Democrats, at least the ones in Mississippi, could probably use the encouragement. In the November 2011 statewide election, Democrats lost control of the state House of Representatives, yielding control of the Legislature to the GOP. Three Democratic legislators switched parties last year, and last week seven county Democratic officials jettisoned the party.

Mississippi Democratic Party chairman Jamie Franks called on the Democratic lawmakers in attendance to introduce legislation that would automatically declare seats vacant when politicians switch parties in the middle of a term.

Responding to the party switchers, Franks told the audience, "Those people were never Democrats in the first place."

Previous Comments

ID

167874

Comment

""You look like you're ready to get in the way," Lewis said" I'll remember this when someone on here complains about the GOP controlled House (note, not Senate) blocks some partisan piece of legislation that the President is pushing. Glass houses and whatnot.

Author

RobbieR

Date

2012-06-04T12:56:15-06:00

ID

167875

Comment

Robbie: (a.) Why would you hold other people on this site accountable for something that Representative Lewis said? That doesn't make much sense. It seems that even if Rep. Lewis expressed an opinion -- on whatever topic -- a reasonable person could still complain, for instance, if the GOP decides again to take this country to the brink on the debt limit, getting our credit downgraded because the Tea Party partisan wing of that party wouldn't even work with their leadership to craft a compromise solution. (b.) From the context I would guess Lewis is talking about state politics, not national, and even state Republicans want Democrats to "get in the way" of some of their crazy ideas, which is why Reeves they sent some of the Wing-nuttiest stuff to Dem-controlled committees to kill them. (And then he went in partied in Fenian's with his bi-partisan group of homeys.) Oh, and (c.) you know the "glass house" reference is for the people standing IN the glass house, right? The ones in there sipping Prohibition cocktails with the folks from ALEC and wondering why Wal-Mart won't even hang with them anymore? ;)

Author

Todd Stauffer

Date

2012-06-05T12:35:49-06:00