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Southern Christian Leadership Conference president, Dr. Charles Steele Jr., said on Saturday that Americans would need to commit financially to a campaign determined to educate citizens and end racism and discrimination in the country.
Steele made these remarks while speaking to the Alabama Democratic Conference’s Black Political Caucus in Huntsville, Alabama. The campaign would cost $50 million according to Steele who compared the issue to the fight against abortion pills being blocked.
“Just like we are taking actions to reverse the decisions of judges to block the abortion pill, we need to see this same unity in eradicating racism and discrimination,”Steele said. “We cannot wait for the government to fix our problems. Politics never freed the people. The people freed politics.”
Educational workshops would be a tool utilized to hold discussions about race and the lingering impacts of America’s violence against Black people. Steele said we could not “hide the facts” that America is to blame for lots of atrocities in the world including the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade and the Holocaust.
Steele believes having conversations like this will help heal the country.
“This educational campaign will move America to address these transgressions and then you will see the change in our society – a reduction of poverty, crime, violence and hopelessness.”
Steele was invited to speak by the Huntsville and Madison County Alabama Democratic Conference. Chairman of the organization, Eddie C. Sherrod said they wanted to invite a national figure who could excite voters and inspire them to head to the polls in the 2024 election.
Steele’s comments come a week after a “divisive concepts” bill passed an Alabama House committee. This bill would restrict the teaching of certain “divisive concepts” tied to race, religion, or sex and criminalize teachers who violate the law.
The statements also coincide with Monday being Confederate Memorial Day. A commemoration of soldiers who died trying to protect slavery
