From the website of The League:
https://lrna.org/battle-for-democracy-raging/
Democracy often demands more than voting, critical as that is. We are now seeing open battles for political power across the South, battles where democracy rises to defy the edicts of red state governors.
In Florida, professors vow to defy Republican governor Ron DeSantis’s horribly limited Black History requirements. In Arkansas, at least six school districts are publicly refusing to curtail the national Advanced Placement Black History exam. In Atlanta, Georgia, former president Trump is under indictment for conspiracy to interfere with the 2020 election. Some Virginia school districts refuse to implement anti-LGBTQ+ decrees. In every case, officials, backed by active popular movements, are rising to stop what can only be called fascism.
Now Tennessee is jumping off again. The mass shooting last March 27 at Nashville’s Covenant School sparked a large-scale revolt of students of all ages. They besieged the Republican-controlled state assembly to demand laws to protect them against gun violence. The assembly refused to do this, even though they have passed laws to cover the legal costs of the state’s 82 gun manufacturers against anti-assault rifle lawsuits! Then legislators voted to expel two of three pro-student state representatives! A motion to expel the third failed by one vote.
In late August, Republican governor Bill Lee called a special legislative session to pass his bills to address gun violence. Lee roped off the capitol to drive away people who are legally empowered to watch deliberations. He militarized hundreds of state patrol to menace protestors. He pushed for laws bills making it perfectly legal to carry a gun into the assembly building. But when mothers sat quietly inside the state capitol with signs that said, “Stop Gun Violence,” the speaker of the House had them arrested. This occurred as Proud Boys and counter protestors toting AR-15 assault rifles marched outside!
More battles will come. Pro-abortion organized resistance is active across the country. Now resistance is beginning to become more determined and more mobilized as fascism continues to structurally block democracy. This battle for political power is not going to go back into its shell.
“Victory cannot be won without class unity based on exposure and rejection of the white supremacy and hetero-patriarchy so deeply rooted in the structure of the American economy, politics, and history. In the practical struggle, people are uniting from below. The growing equality of misery is forming them into a social force. We rely on this developing practical unity to build conscious political understanding. Victory cannot be won until we gain the political power necessary to defeat fascism and organize the cooperative society we need.” (https://lrna.org/lrna-program/)
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Published on September 20, 2023
This article originated in Rally!
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