U.S. Representative Jesse Jackson, Jr., has proposed the ANSWER to one of our basic questions: How can Democrats and progressives unite to actually accomplish something?
I think that Jesse Jackson Jr. is presidential material - he has just turned 40, having been born in the midst of the voting rights struggle on March 11, 1965. Born into a world of political activism, he became an activist early in life - spending his twenty-first birthday in a jail cell in Washington, D.C. for taking part in a protest against apartheid at the South African Embassy.
I think Jesse Jr. is presidential material, BUT what has brought him to my attention is his IDEAS.
Have you considered his IDEAS? Do you even know what I am talking about?
I am talking about Jackson's "human and constitutional rights" approach to politics -- as manifested in his remarks, January 6, in the floor debate on the Ohio election returns. Here's from his speech on the House floor, "Our Voting System Needs A New Constitutional Foundation", available at
CommonDreams
Don't be confused or misled. Today's objection is not about an election result, it's about an election system that's broken and needs fixing.
Jackson isn't limiting ANY other action or approach to the problem of voting reform when he proposes a Right to Vote Amendment. People - even otherwise well-informed Kossians - dismiss this approach as a gimmick without pragmatic value, but that is only until they take a serious look IN SOME DETAIL at what Jackson is saying! Here's from the Congressional website:
http://www.house.gov/jackson/VotingAmendment.htm
Even though the "vote of the people" is perceived as supreme in our democracy - because voting rights are protective of all other rights - Justice Scalia in Bush v. Gore constantly reminded Al Gore's lawyers that there is no explicit or fundamental right to suffrage in the Constitution. The Supreme Court majority concluded: "the individual citizen has no federal constitutional right to vote for electors for the President of the United States." (Bush v. Gore, 531 U.S. 98, 104 (2000)). . . . The United States is one of the eleven nations in the world that doesn't provide an explicit right to vote in its Constitution.
Jackson has proposed three constitutional amendments, all pending as House Resolutions. Here's the skinny on his "rights" approach, from the congressional website:
http://www.house.gov/jackson/ConstitutionalAmendments.htm
How do we form the "more perfect union" the framers of the Constitution intended? By insisting that both major political parties, and our variety of political ideologies, agree that basic human rights for all Americans ought to be added to that sacred document.
In our affluent society and under our Constitution, every American should be empowered with the individual right to vote, to education and to health care. These new rights will take all of us, and our society as a whole, a long way toward becoming a nation that truly lives up to its promise and potential.
Jackson -- sometimes confused with his better known father, Jesse Jackson, Sr. -- is perceived as a progressive and he is a member of the House Progressive Caucus as well as of the Congressional Black Caucus. But what's important to Jackson - as a pragmatic politician - is achieving a consensus within the Democratic Party while, at the same time, reaching out beyond the Party to all progressives, to the "movement" (if you will). From Jackson's 2004 NYU speech
I recommend a strategy that has the broadest possible appeal for both wings of the Democratic Party; a strategy that has the best chance of energizing the 100 million non-voters; a strategy that can potentially bring young and old, middle-class and working-class, white and non-white, the educated and the less educated, the better-off and the poorest among us to the polls. It's not a message contained in a personality, a party, an ideology, a policy or a legislative program. It's a message contained in fighting for RIGHTS!
Democrats - conservatives, moderates, liberals, progressives and populists - believe in all the right things, they just don't believe enough. They don't believe in them enough to fight for them as RIGHTS!
Jackson's "rights" or Constitutional amendements" approach is sometimes seen as too idealistic. But what Jackson proposes is eminently pragmatic -- if you see that he is talking about the pragmatic necessity for a winning STRATEGY within which pragmatic tactics can be effective.
The strategic challenge is not, "How do we redivide the 100 million who voted?" The strategic challenge is, "How do we appeal to the 100 million who didn't vote, without counter-productively alienating the 100 million who did?"
Personality is important. We do have to feel secure and comfortable with the people we vote for and elect. However, the present Democratic strategy is too narrow. The present strategy is to hook our wagon to a personality - John Kerry. But "personality" does not represent an idea or a vision big enough to cover all of the Democratic Party's constituents and interests.
Strategically, "who" is a secondary consideration. Over time, personalities will come and go. The deeper concern is to have the capacity to: (a) change the current political climate; (b) organize the broadest possible Democratic base; (c) unify the two wings of the party; and (d) do it for a
very long time?
The answer is not a personality. It's not a conservative or a liberal policy. It's not even a new progressive legislative program or agenda. No, none of those things can or will accomplish the four goals. ONLY new material RIGHTS that will positively affect peoples' daily lives, leading up to and in between elections, have the power to both maintain and expand the Democratic Party's base - and sustain it for a very long time!
Jackson -- informed by the 400-year struggle for racial justice -- perceives the necessity for long-range goals, in a concrete form, to see us through an approaching period of tremendous change that will be frought with enormous challenges!
ONLY new material RIGHTS that will positively affect peoples' daily lives, leading up to and in between elections, have the power to both maintain and expand the Democratic Party's base - and sustain it for a very long time!
***
Some will argue that constitutional amendments take too long. One did take 202 years, but another took just 10 months, and another merely 100 days. It all depends on the political consciousness and will of the American people at any given time.
But remember, people fight harder for what they believe are their rights than they do for mere programs.
And in a democratic society, rights are what the people say they are.
If Democrats and progressives fight to make voting an individual right in the Constitution, the politically disenfranchised will come running.
JACKSON'S APPROACH AND PARTY UNITY
See my recent comment Cooperation 101 by Prof. Jackson
Note: comment posted June 15/16 at ACDC's diary Progressivism vs. Liberalism
JACKSON'S APPROACH AND "VALUES"
See my diary, Can rights and values thrive in symbiosis?
JACKSON'S PROPOSED AMENDMENTS PENDING IN THE HOUSE
http://www.house.gov/jackson/ConstitutionalAmendments.htm
House Joint Resolution 28
Proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States guaranteeing the individual right to vote.
House Joint Resolution 29
Proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States regarding the right to public education of equal high quality.
House Joint Resolution 30
Proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States regarding the right to health care of equal high quality.
JACKSON'S BIO
Jackson has just turned 40, having been born in the midst of the voting rights struggle on March 11, 1965. (He spent his twenty-first birthday in a jail cell in Washington, D.C. for taking part in a protest against apartheid at the South African Embassy.)
In 1987, Representative Jackson graduated magna cum laude from North Carolina A & T State University in Greensboro, North Carolina, where he earned a Bachelor of Science Degree in Business Management. Three years later, he earned a Master of Arts Degree in Theology from the Chicago Theological Seminary, and in 1993, received his Juris Doctorate from the University of Illinois College of Law. He has also been awarded honorary doctorate degrees from the Chicago Theological Seminary, Governors State University, North Carolina A & T State University, Charles R. Drew Univ. of Medicine and Science, Meharry Medical College and Morehouse School of Medicine.
Representative Jackson resides in the Second Congressional District of Illinois with his wife Sandi, daughter Jessica Donatella, and son Jesse L. Jackson, III. He has been serving as U.S. Representative (2nd Dist., Illinois) since 1995.
http://www.jessejacksonjr.org/query/bio.htm
JACKSON'S WEBSITES
http://www.house.gov/jackson/
http://www.jessejacksonjr.org/
JACKSON'S OWN WORDS
Jackson's ideas come to note thanks to his speech "Where Do Progressives Go From Here?" -- (A Speech By Congressman Jesse L. Jackson, Jr. at the "What We Stand For Conference - Ideas And Values To Take Back America"), New York University, Saturday, May 15, 2004. Thanks to "Heather" at ProgressiveGovernment.org, you can still read and download the 2004 NYU speech
"Our Voting System Needs A New Constitutional Foundation", available at CommonDreams
Representative Jackson has co-authored "A More Perfect Union: Advancing New American Rights" (2001) with Frank E. Watkins. He has also co-authored "Legal Lynching II" (2001), "It's About the Money" (1999) and "Legal Lynching" (1996).
AMY GOODMAN INTERVIEW (2004 Democratic National Convention)
Amy Goodman interviewed Jesse Jr. outside the convention center, July 29, 2004.
Goodman notes: As a Democratic platform committee member, Jackson led the campaign for voting rights and made sure the platform included language insuring that "every vote is counted fully and fairly."
http://www.democracynow.org/print.pl?sid=04/07/29/1423238
From the interview:
REP. JESSE JACKSON JR.: First, I am opposed to the war. And I am opposed to the PATRIOT ACT. I even filed a lawsuit here in Massachusetts in Federal Court with John Boniface and a number of other members of Congress because I didn't feel the President had sufficient authorization to go to war. . . . We are going to finish the task, we are going to establish democracy and then we are going to bring our men and women home."
BornOn911's Note: The phrase "finish the task" begs the question, "What is the task?" Jackson's further remarks indicate that he had in mind an election under U.N. supervision and turning over all U.S. functions to Iraqi and/or international entitites.]
AMY GOODMAN: Yesterday, Barak Obama said the problem with the invasion was the president didn't commit enough troops.
REP. JESSE JACKSON JR.: The problem with the invasion was the president misled the American people and, so, [Illionis] State Senator, soon-to-be [U.S.] Senator Obama and I have a different take on that question. It wasn't that there wasn't enough troops. We have Saddam Hussein in jail, we have locked up most of the members of the deck of cards that president Bush went after. The problem is the rationale for the war. The problem with multi-lateral--with a preemptive strike, as opposed to a multi-lateral force, a war of choice over and against a war of necessity is the central problem. But we are there now. We have lost credibility in the world as a result of our being there and now we have to restore that credibility. We should finish the job at hand, should bring our men and women home as soon as possible and establish the necessary diplomatic ties and let the Iraqi people make a determination about their own future.
Note by BornOn911: This diary started as a comment to be added to June 17 recommended diary The Congressional Black Caucus is saving Democracy but grew into a diary.
My previous diary on this topic, Can rights and values thrive in symbiosis? , is soon due to be purged, I expect. Also that diary has a somewhat different focus than the instant diary and was in need of revision and restructuring.