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"All of this on account we want to register, to become first-class citizens, and if the Freedom Democratic Party is not seated now, I question America, is this America, the land of the free and the home of the brave where we have to sleep with our telephones off the hooks because our lives be threatened daily because we want to live as decent human beings in America? Thank you." - Fannie Lou Hamer
It is important that we know that those words came from the mouth of an African American woman. It is imperative that we know those words come from the heart of an American. In the sequestered most private heart of every American lives a burning desire to belong to a great country, to represent a noble-minded country where the mighty do not always crush the weak and the dream of a democracy is not in the sole possession of the strong. It is fitting tonight that delegates hear the question raised by Fannie Lou Hamer forty years ago. It is fitting that every American everywhere asks herself, himself, these questions Hamer asked: "What do I think of my country? What is that which elevates my shoulders and stirs my blood when I hear the words, the United States of America? Do I praise my country enough? Do I laud my fellow citizens enough? What is there about my country which makes me hang my head and avert my eyes when I hear the words the United States of America? What am I doing about it? Am I relating my disappointment to my leaders and to my fellow citizens, or am I like one, not involved, sitting high and looking low?" As Americans, we should not be afraid to own both the questions and the answers.
Americans have asked those questions down a pyramid of years and given answers that our children memorize and have become a real part of the spoken American history. Patrick Henry remarked, "I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death." George Moses Horton, poet, born a slave, said, "Alas, and was I born for this to wear this brutish chain? I must slash the handcuffs from off my wrists and live a man again," Frederick Douglas said,
* "The thought of only being a creature of the present and the past was
troubling."
· "I longed for a future too, with hope in it."
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* "The desire to be free, awakened my determination to act, to think, and
to speak."
The love of democracy motivated Harriet Tubman to seek and find not only her own freedom, but to make innumerable trips to the slave south to gain the liberty of many slaves and instill the idea that freedom is possible in the hearts of thousands. Fannie Lou Hamer and the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party were standing on the shoulders of history when they acted to unseat evil from its presumed safe perch on the backs of the American people. It is fitting and an honor that the surviving members of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party are with us here tonight. For their gifts to us, we say thank you and here they are.
The human heart is so delicate and sensitive that it always needs some tangible encouragement to prevent it from faltering in its labor. The human heart is so robust, so tough, that once encouraged, it beats its rhythm with a loud unswerving insistency. That which encourages the heart is music. We humans through all the ages and all the places have created songs to grow on and to live by. We Americans have created music to embolden the hearts of the world. It was encouraging to hear "We Shall Overcome" in Tagalog in the Philippines, in French, and in Hungarian.
Fannie Lou Hamer knew that she was one woman and only one woman. However, she knew she was an American, and as an American, she had a light to shine on the darkness of racism. It was a little light but, she aimed it directly at the darkness of ignorance. Her favorite song is a simple song that we all know. We Americans have sung it since childhood: "This little light of mine, IÕm going to let it shine."
Here are the fabled Freedom Singers to lead us in this noble song.
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