In Black America; The Voter Education Project, Inc.

Thanks for watching. I'm John Hansen, join me this week on in Black America and we focus on the Voter Education Project Inc. Black people are only a small percentage of the electorate. There is no way that we could ever tremendously damage anything. Miss Geraldine G. Thompson, Executive Director of the Voter Education Project this week on in Black America. This is in Black America, reflections of the Black experience in American society.

I think that it's very important for Black Americans to make sure that we have values as a people, starting with family as a base. Because if we don't have strong family units we're not going to be able to move ahead in the other areas. We're simply going to end up ultimately a confused and confounded people. Values as the base for everything else. Political and economic involvement must be looked at hand in hand. Education must be promoted, cannot be put aside. There is nothing I think that would surpass that. Miss Geraldine G. Thompson, Executive Director with the Voter Education Project Inc. based in Atlanta, Georgia.

The Voter Education Project attempts to assist all citizens, particularly minorities or the disadvantaged in improving the quality of their lives through the participation in the vote. The Voter Education Project's activities is targeted to the 11 Southern States, designed to impact voter registration throughout the United States. I'm John Hansen, and this week I focus on the Voter Education Project Inc. with Geraldine G. Thompson in Black America. There's no doubt about it. We are excited about the potential for 86. There are seven Southern States that will be electing governors, but there are many blacks who will be offering for public office, some running for Congress, some running for the state legislature, many that will be seeking mayoral, councilmatic or commission post, as well as many other local type offices.

I think that still people remember 84 and want to be more involved than ever before. We will be mounting voter registration campaigns and we'll be doing conferences. We're not certain as to the number of conferences this year because monies are slow in coming in, but we are hoping to be able to have conferences in each of the states where we work. Since its inception in 1962, the Voter Education Project Inc. investigates the causes of and suggests remedies for the low participation of Southern blacks in the political process. The Voter Education Project has provided financial grants to more than 1700 community groups. These groups become Voter Education Project affiliates during the period of their grants and represent civil rights, civic, educational, religious, social and political action interests. The Voter Education Project attempts to assess all citizens, particularly minorities or the disadvantaged, in improving the quality of their lives through participation in the vote.

The group conducts Voter Education, Voter Registration and Leadership Training, offers technical assistance to political officials and carries out research on politics and public policy issues. Although Voter Education Project's activities is targeted to the 11 Southern states, it is designed to impact voter registration throughout the United States. The organization has published a number of handbooks, including Voter Registration, a guide to voter registration campaigns. I recently spoke with Ms. Geraldine G. Thompson, Executive Director with the Voter Education Project Inc. in Atlanta, Georgia. The organization was originally founded in 1962 as a special project of the Southern Regional Council. That was primarily designed to find out why black people were not participating in the political process from a logical perspective. People thought they understood why but wanted to do some definite research in 11 Southern states.

That research was completed and it was determined that blacks were not participating because there were major barriers in place that prevented that participation. As a result of that, it was determined that the organization should become an organization and not just a project of SRC. So after having worked several years to ensure that the organization became a self-sustaining operation, 1970 was incorporated as the Voter Education Project Inc. With the focus of not only doing voter registration among black people, but to ensure that they were educated on issues and were educated on the political process. Also the organization was designed to do public policy research to stay abreast of developments from a political standpoint that would impact the black community. And we provide technical assistance to black elected officials and to those who are interested in voter registration, education, and get out the vote activities. For those listeners that are not familiar with the Southern Regional Council, could you

give us a definition of the council? Okay. SRC, the Southern Regional Council, has been a very meaningful organization to black people. It consisted of whites and blacks working together since the early 40s, very frankly, to ensure greater enhancement of human rights with emphasis on the black community and on human relations, blacks and whites working together to ensure that black people's problems were pretty much solved in the South. And they looked at educational issues, social issues, and political issues as well. How did you happen to become the executive director of the organization? Well, I had served as the regional administrator for the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and for almost 10 years prior to that, I had held key government positions in the city of Atlanta primarily, and I had run political campaigns in Times Pass, including the Maynard Jackson-Famerican campaign in 1973.

We had always had a tremendous interest in the voter education project, and the work that was being done. And when I found that the organization was looking for an executive director, I was leaving the federal government because of the change of administration. I decided to consider that particular offer with several other offers. Once I looked at it very carefully and recognized that the organization had very little assets, because we receive funding from private sources primarily and do not receive any federal or any governmental funds. I thought that it would be a challenge, an opportunity for me to give maybe a couple of years of service to an organization that had meant so much to black people, and in fact had enabled me, along with very frankly many other people and organizations, as well as the Lord, to make advances in the political process. I had agreed to come on in 81 and work at least until 83, but the bug got me, and I decided

that I would stay a little bit longer and in fact have done so. Why was there such a low black participation rate in voting? Well, I think many people are not familiar with a poll tax situation, but there are many obstacles. There were literacy tests, there were poll tax in operation, that is when I say literacy tests in order for a person to vote just to cast a ballot. And many instances they were given a test, where they had to identify the number of bubbles in a bar of soap, and you know that's an impossibility, or recite the preamble to the Constitution, or give the names of the presidents, just a variety of things that would cause people to be unable to vote. Then there were people who were required to pay poll taxes to vote. They would have to give a certain amount of money just for that opportunity to participate. And many people were not land owners and were therefore kept from participating in the

political process. There were just all kinds of barriers, including the fact that many people were harassed and intimidated when they attempted to register right here in Atlanta. In my hometown, Memphis, Tennessee, it was very difficult for you to register. And I was finally of age to register in the middle 60s. I can recall when I turned 21, we were not able to register at age 18 at that time, but when I turned 21, the first thing that I did was get up, put my clothes on, go to the courthouse. And the first thing that happened to me was I was insulted by the person who was standing on the other side of the grilled cage is the way that I'd like to describe it, who said, girl, what do you want here? And I said, I came to register to vote. There were a lot of people who were determined to be registered. And as a result of that determination, and the skills of many such as a Wiley Branton who was serving as the director of VEP at that particular time, we've been able to break

down those barriers and encourage people to not overlook the existing barriers, but to be determined to not let them serve as a hindrance to their political participation. What we try to do is to do training of groups and individuals who are interested in working with voters in their particular area, on how to be prepared to educate them on issues primarily, and on the candidates that are offering for public office. What we do is we have conferences, workshops, and seminars, those conferences are considered as contemporary voting rights issues conferences, women vote conferences. And when they're in a particular area, people come from all over the state to participate because they know that we're going to bring in expertise, well, we're going to bring in experts who will share their expertise with the people who are attending. We try to let them know about the latest developments federally on the federal level that will have an impact on their lives, ultimately, on the local level.

We try to have presentations from the Secretary of State's Office or from the Governor's Office from people who are working within state government so that they can share inside information on what's going on. We make sure that local officials are participating as well so that they can let people know the problems that they are confronting and the need that they have for the community to come in and provide some input in the decision-making process that will enable them to do a better job for the citizenry. We try to have candidate forums so that people will have access to them and will be able to question them on their particular positions regarding issues that relate to the black community and to the public as a whole. That all takes a lot of money and our money is seasonal, so we have to make a determination as to when we're going to have those in the locations. In 1984, we had over 40 such conferences and workshops in 1985, we were only able to have eight.

Since the enactment of the Voting Range Act, Southern blacks have made tremendous gain as far as electing black politicians to elected office, not so the case to the North. Have you analyzed that particular situation in black America? Well, prior to 1984, there were very few groups that paid attention to black voter registration and participation in northern states, but there are such organizations now and you will begin to see some changes. Many people are not aware of the fact that the Voting Rights Act does cover all of the states, essentially, under Section 2, but under Section 5, there are many northern states that are covered, including New York City within the state of New York, and of course, when you start going out west, there are many cities that are covered there in states. Many have found though that there are organizations that are beginning now to pay attention to the voter registration levels and are encouraging people to get registered and educating them on issues as we do and getting people out to vote.

So I think that you're going to see some major changes in many of the northern states as well. It will be time consuming and maybe a very slow process because you can't change things overnight. We've been in existence now since 1962 and have only been able to register some four million during that particular period through our various projects. Was the Voting Education Project part of the effort to the renewal of the Voting Rights Act? There's no doubt about that. We worked in conjunction with the NAACP SCLC. I think one of the things that will come out in the celebration of the Martin Luther King National Holiday is that SCLC strategized on how to really break down those barriers to black political participation. VEP was created by a group consisting of the NAACP SCLC, the Urban League, the leadership, the black leadership during those days in conjunction with SRC to make sure that an organization

was in place that would be able to fund voter registration drives and would in fact be able to provide the necessary assistance to those existing groups that I just mentioned to go into communities and really organize and really make a tremendous impact on the political process in that particular jurisdiction. Speaking of getting back to voter registration, how do you go about planning a particular seminar workshop in different communities to get those people, those main persons in getting the masses to register to vote? Well, the one thing that I like about this organization is that we don't try to impose our method of operating on people. We work very closely with those who have been known to be active in voter registration and with the leadership, when I say the leadership, those who are elected to office or are in key appointed positions, we make contact with our board members in that particular area to get intelligence on what is happening in that particular area.

There is no way that I can sit here in Atlanta and determine how people are functioning in a particular locale because every locale is different. We get input from the local people. We let them know what is going on from a national or a state level and we make recommendations to them. They tell us what they ultimately want to do. We arrange for the mailings. We make contact with the people that they recommend. We use our previous contacts in those areas and we bring in the necessary expertise that they have recommended based on what their needs are. There were a couple of lawsuits brought out in the, after the 1984 election, a few southern states as far as absentee voting. Were you all involved in any of those cases? Well, not in absentee voting as such. We were involved in a case in the state of Georgia and one in Arkansas, which really challenged the lack of state's interest in advancing black political participation particularly as it pertained to voter registration.

The fact that there was a need for decentralized registration in all of the counties, not just in the few counties that seemingly had greater black population. An extension of the hours for registration. Most people are not aware of the fact that voter registration hours have been limited in some counties where you might have such irregularities as a registration office being open for only a few hours a week, not necessarily being open every day. And the location of those registration facilities have really caused a lot of blacks to be discouraged from actually getting out and registering. We were concerned about the quality of the personnel as well as their color because we found that color or race does have a lot to do with whether people feel intimidated or would want to persist in their efforts to become registered. We were concerned also that monies were not being expended to ensure that people were registered and informed on the political process.

Concerned about the fact that the purge laws were not uniform statewide, we have not been able to get that changed. Usually those purge laws are affected county by county depending on what state you're in. And we found that many counties were purging blacks without notifying them or if they notify them it was via the county newspaper which most black people do not read because they don't know where to purchase the most of the time. So we're trying to make sure that notification is made in a timely fashion and in fact that there are people who actually have oversight for investigating the procedures that are used and notifying people that they are being purged from the voting roles. That was basically what our lawsuits dealt with in the states that I mentioned. Did the Jesse Jackson campaign in your opinion, I'm quite sure there's been some analysis of that, have a significant impact on blacks registering to vote and also taking a step further and actually going vote participating in that political process?

Yes, there's no doubt about that. I will not equivocate on that whatsoever. When Jesse first started his southern crusade for registering voters in 1983, I was a little bit lary about that because I had not been consulting on it and I didn't think that it would have a tremendous impact as a matter of fact, initially I thought that it would be a way of dampening what had been strategized on by so many other groups. But as I observed it over the course of a few weeks, didn't take very long for me to see the change. I began to see that there was enthusiasm developing among young people that we had not been able to generate and I don't care who's doing what, if they're doing it effectively, we need to learn from that particular process. Jesse and I had a chance to talk during that crusade and we began to work where we could together. In fact, we coordinated some of our campaigns with him in 1983. We had to draw back when he became a candidate for president because we cannot participate

with candidates for elective office as a non-partisan organization. But clearly, his impact was felt, his influence was felt, not just among black youth, but black people across the board had a lot to be proud of and as much as he was running as the second candidate for president. But he was running a very effective, mounting a very effective campaign and used that as an opportunity to encourage people to be participants in the political process. There were a lot of people who decided to run for public office because he was running on the local level, people were deciding. There were a lot of people who went out to vote for the first time because they thought they had somebody to vote for. Somebody who was able to express their interests, their concerns. So there's no doubt in my mind that he had a tremendous impact in increasing the numbers of people registered because we saw the greatest increase in the South since the passage of the Voting Rights Act of numbers of people registered.

We had projected that perhaps the registration rate would be somewhere around 750,000 in the South, but in fact, it topped a million and we were extraordinarily pleased with that. Why is it becoming difficult and is it still difficult for young people, for you all to get to master across the young people that they need to register and they need to vote and need to become proud of the critical process? Well, we have done a study that shows that 18 to 24-year-old young people have not felt the need to participate as greatly as we had hoped they would. Many of them don't remember Dr. King, don't remember what he taught, the difficulties that he experienced. Many don't even understand the impact of his death on those who were young adults at that particular time, at the time of his death in 68. Many of them have been discouraged, they can't find jobs, their education is not of the level that they thought they feel deceived by government. They don't feel that there's much for them.

Getting the word to them is something that requires almost a person to person kind of contact. We as an organization have not had the money to do that and I know that other organizations that are in this business have not had the money to do that. You have to reach people where you can. Jesse was able to fire them up. He's been talking for years about I am somebody and he was able to create that interest in them by stressing that point and saying that you're nobody if you don't participate in a process that is a process that was designed to bring you out of the drags where you've been for so long. If you don't speak out now by your ballot, using your ballot, then your impact cannot be felt in years to come. That message was clearly communicated with a person who has been wrapping with them for so many years and they recognize them and appreciate them. That leadership I think has made the difference in helping young people to see the need to be involved.

Now we've got to be able to sustain that is not something that should be dropped which happens so many times. In attending last year's NAACP convention in Dallas, there was an effort to have blacks become more involved in the total electoral process both through public and in Democrat and providing support services, consulting services to these organizations. Is that viable reality? Yes, we're seeing more and more of that as a matter of fact when you travel across the south, you will find that there are some blacks who have been elected to public office that are Republicans. You saw very little of that in the 70s, you saw quite a bit of it in the 60s because blacks primarily felt that the Republican Party was the party of the black people until of course the Kennedy election and people began to switch at that particular time. Yes, you will see more of that because the Republican Party is making a concerted effort to attract blacks to the party and then to encourage them to run for public office as

Republicans. The Democratic Party I think is making a mistake by promoting a more conservative image to the black community which signals the black community that they really don't know which party is for them. We are finding that most blacks are choosing to stay with the Democratic Party and yes organizations will provide whatever technical assistance they can to people who are thinking about running for public office. Once they become candidates then of course organizations such as VEP or the NAACP will step back and let them run on their own. I'm here at Atlanta doing the week of the King Observance. Has Dr. King dream been realized in your lifetime and do you think so in your children's lifetime? Well, you know I've given it a great deal of thought. I think being here in Atlanta and relating to the King family and on a regular basis being involved in many of the projects that I see coming out of the Center for Social Change.

I think that yes, a portion of his dream has been realized. I think that he would be a bit disappointed in how quickly many of the gains that were so hard fought for are being eroded and that's not an imaginary thing. It's something that is a fact. The fact that our Civil Rights Act is under bombardment, affirmative action has been practically blown out of the ocean, so to speak, and I understand that there is an effort being made to wait until after the King holiday to actually blow it totally out of the waters by rescinding many of the affirmative action directives on the federal level which then means that things will really become more greatly slumped across the nation from state level and on down. I think that yes, we've been able to make some advancements politically not enough.

In the South, we still make up less than 1% of all of the elective off the numbers of people who are elected. Yes, we've been able to register more people than we're registered at the time of the signing of the Voting Rights Act, but all people I feel should feel the need to be registered and to participate. I'm not satisfied and I don't think he would be satisfied. I think that we still have a great number of people who are poor. He would not be satisfied with that. Nation as rich as ours should have dealt with our whole poverty issue. He would be concerned, I think, about the farmers today because they are feeling the impact or the brunt of a lot of decisions that have been made on the federal level and the fact that they have not been able to qualify for food stamps and other federal programs, I think, bring home to him an interest that should be stirred in all of us because we will all be impacted when somebody is in need, all of us actually will be impacted at some time

in the future. I think that he would be concerned about the whole educational system, the fact that there's a tremendous decline in our black colleges, decline of support, the fact that blacks are not getting the quality education that they can get in our educational, public educational system, the fact that many of our young people are forgetting or not even being taught where we have come from and that's a mistake for black people. We should tell our children and I have four children and I tell them constantly the difficulties that we had not to teach them to hate but as the Jewish community does to help our people remember where we've come from, cherish our background but work never to go back as far back as I was when I was growing up in Memphis, Tennessee. I think that he would be a bit disappointed on one hand but on the other hand he would be able to see there's a holiday for black person who really put his heart on the line,

his life on the line, his family on the line and all of his potential to be a very powerful and rich man on the line for his people. That I think is a tribute that should be paid to him by everybody and not just in some selected areas. I am a Paul that there's opposition to the holiday because certainly he has made a contribution to this nation to this world that will never be forgotten. This is Geraldine G. Thompson, Executive Director with the Voter Education Project Inc. in Atlanta, Georgia. If you have a comment or would like to purchase a cassette copy of this program, write us. The address is in Black America, Longhorn Radio Network, UT Austin, Austin, Texas, 787-12. For in Black America's technical producer Cliff Hargrove, I'm John Hanson, join us next week.

Listening to In Black America, Reflections of the Black Experience in American Society. In Black America is produced and distributed by the Center for Telecommunication Services at UT Austin and does not necessarily reflect the views of the University of Texas at Austin or this station. This is the Longhorn Radio Network.