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Somebody Died for Me

By Steve Phillips

In 1988, I took a delegation of California students to the South for the first-ever Super Tuesday to help mobilize African-American voters in the cradle of the Civil Rights Movement. An idealistic college student at the time, I met many of the key leaders of the Movement and even visited the grave of Jimmie Lee Jackson, a young civil rights demonstrator who was shot and killed by a state trooper during a voting rights rally. Jimmie Lee’s death sparked the Selma-to-Montgomery march and led to passage of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Jesse Jackson says that the Voting Rights Act was written in blood before it was signed in ink. As a result of that ’88 trip to the South, I became deeply connected to the legacy of those who died for me, for millions of others, and for democracy itself.

Twenty years later, we are facing another historic moment. The nation and the world must confront life-and-death challenges such as global warming, terrorism, globalization, poverty and disease. In the Presidential primaries, people are already turning out in record numbers, for a slate of diverse candidates including a woman, an African American, and a Latino.

All of us are called to respond to this historical imperative, and PowerPAC is doing its part. Building on our work in 14 stats during the Primary, PowerPAC will be helping to coordinate a national effort to register and mobilize 1 million new Black voters in the 2008 election. This work will be focused primarily in the American South – where the critical battles for democracy, justice, and inclusion were waged -- collectively represent more than half of the national African American electorate.

Our goal and primary mission is to honor the legacy of Jimmie Lee Jackson and ensure that all of those whose franchise was secured by struggle and sacrifice in the Civil Rights Movement know about the upcoming elections and turn out to vote.

In addition to our core work of voter mobilization, from time to time, PowerPAC also supports candidates of conscience, who we believe will help expand democratic participation and advance the cause of social justice. This is one of those times, and we will independently promote the candidacy of Barack Obama, the first African-American nominee for a major party, during his historic quest for the White House. We will be reaching out in particular to Latino voters, who are an emerging force in American politics and who are poised in 2008 to become a permanent constituency of the progressive coalition.

2008 comes forty years after the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. and twenty years after my first sojourn to the Black-Belt South. Those for whom Jimmie Lee Jackson and Dr. King died can now pick the next President, and PowerPAC is going to do all it can to ensure that as many people as possible participate in this historic election. Jimmie Lee would demand nothing less of us.

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