Moral Movement Launches 'Freedom Summer' in North Carolina
Rev. William Barber: "We have exposed the hypocrisy, now it is time to organize."
Protesters who for over a year have railed against the "extremist" policies of the North Carolina legislature are now bringing their fight to the voting booth as the movement known as Moral Mondays launched a bold initiative to get-out-the-vote this week.
"We have exposed the hypocrisy," Rev. William J. Barber II, chief organizer of the protests and head of the state chapter of the NAACP, said during a rally outside the General Assembly in Raleigh on Monday. Now is the time to organize."
Organizers estimate that upwards of 3,500 protesters from across the state attended the mass demonstration before splitting up into smaller factions for "teach-ins" to discuss the group's new voter outreach strategy.
In what the group is calling an "aggressive" statewide voting campaign, several dozen youth activists who have undergone extensive training are now being deployed to hundreds of communities in North Carolina to initiate "deep organizing work and voter registration." Dubbed the Moral Freedom Summer, the new campaign is a nod to the 1966 Mississippi voting rights drive when youth activists partnered with local civil rights organizations to educate and register disenfranchised African American voters.
Following the rally on Monday, 15 demonstrators were arrested for refusing to leave the legislative building where, in an act of civil disobedience, they held signs and chanted: "Whose house? Our house!" and, "This is what democracy looks like!" Over 1,000 demonstrators have now been arrested since the Moral Monday protests began last April.
Sharing a picture of the swelling crowd on Twitter, one protester wrote "Massive crowds! We are changing the context in North Carolina."
Citing a recent poll by Public Policy Polling, the North Carolina NAACP notes that only 18 percent of voters in the state approve of the General Assembly and the work they are doing. For 60 weeks, members of the group have led rousing protests in an attempt to draw attention to what they call the "extremist policies" of the GOP-led legislature, which include rolling back voter protections, denying abortion rights, cutting unemployment benefits, failing to expand Medicaid and shifting public education money to private schools.
"Every major religion shares the ultimate value of how you use public power is how you treat the least of these," Rev. Barber told the crowd. "We are winning and shifting the center of political gravity."
An Urgent Message From Our Co-Founder
Dear Common Dreams reader, It’s been nearly 30 years since I co-founded Common Dreams with my late wife, Lina Newhouser. We had the radical notion that journalism should serve the public good, not corporate profits. It was clear to us from the outset what it would take to build such a project. No paid advertisements. No corporate sponsors. No millionaire publisher telling us what to think or do. Many people said we wouldn't last a year, but we proved those doubters wrong. Together with a tremendous team of journalists and dedicated staff, we built an independent media outlet free from the constraints of profits and corporate control. Our mission has always been simple: To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. Building Common Dreams was not easy. Our survival was never guaranteed. When you take on the most powerful forces—Wall Street greed, fossil fuel industry destruction, Big Tech lobbyists, and uber-rich oligarchs who have spent billions upon billions rigging the economy and democracy in their favor—the only bulwark you have is supporters who believe in your work. But here’s the urgent message from me today. It's never been this bad out there. And it's never been this hard to keep us going. At the very moment Common Dreams is most needed, the threats we face are intensifying. We need your support now more than ever. We don't accept corporate advertising and never will. We don't have a paywall because we don't think people should be blocked from critical news based on their ability to pay. Everything we do is funded by the donations of readers like you. When everyone does the little they can afford, we are strong. But if that support retreats or dries up, so do we. Will you donate now to make sure Common Dreams not only survives but thrives? —Craig Brown, Co-founder |
Protesters who for over a year have railed against the "extremist" policies of the North Carolina legislature are now bringing their fight to the voting booth as the movement known as Moral Mondays launched a bold initiative to get-out-the-vote this week.
"We have exposed the hypocrisy," Rev. William J. Barber II, chief organizer of the protests and head of the state chapter of the NAACP, said during a rally outside the General Assembly in Raleigh on Monday. Now is the time to organize."
Organizers estimate that upwards of 3,500 protesters from across the state attended the mass demonstration before splitting up into smaller factions for "teach-ins" to discuss the group's new voter outreach strategy.
In what the group is calling an "aggressive" statewide voting campaign, several dozen youth activists who have undergone extensive training are now being deployed to hundreds of communities in North Carolina to initiate "deep organizing work and voter registration." Dubbed the Moral Freedom Summer, the new campaign is a nod to the 1966 Mississippi voting rights drive when youth activists partnered with local civil rights organizations to educate and register disenfranchised African American voters.
Following the rally on Monday, 15 demonstrators were arrested for refusing to leave the legislative building where, in an act of civil disobedience, they held signs and chanted: "Whose house? Our house!" and, "This is what democracy looks like!" Over 1,000 demonstrators have now been arrested since the Moral Monday protests began last April.
Sharing a picture of the swelling crowd on Twitter, one protester wrote "Massive crowds! We are changing the context in North Carolina."
Citing a recent poll by Public Policy Polling, the North Carolina NAACP notes that only 18 percent of voters in the state approve of the General Assembly and the work they are doing. For 60 weeks, members of the group have led rousing protests in an attempt to draw attention to what they call the "extremist policies" of the GOP-led legislature, which include rolling back voter protections, denying abortion rights, cutting unemployment benefits, failing to expand Medicaid and shifting public education money to private schools.
"Every major religion shares the ultimate value of how you use public power is how you treat the least of these," Rev. Barber told the crowd. "We are winning and shifting the center of political gravity."
Protesters who for over a year have railed against the "extremist" policies of the North Carolina legislature are now bringing their fight to the voting booth as the movement known as Moral Mondays launched a bold initiative to get-out-the-vote this week.
"We have exposed the hypocrisy," Rev. William J. Barber II, chief organizer of the protests and head of the state chapter of the NAACP, said during a rally outside the General Assembly in Raleigh on Monday. Now is the time to organize."
Organizers estimate that upwards of 3,500 protesters from across the state attended the mass demonstration before splitting up into smaller factions for "teach-ins" to discuss the group's new voter outreach strategy.
In what the group is calling an "aggressive" statewide voting campaign, several dozen youth activists who have undergone extensive training are now being deployed to hundreds of communities in North Carolina to initiate "deep organizing work and voter registration." Dubbed the Moral Freedom Summer, the new campaign is a nod to the 1966 Mississippi voting rights drive when youth activists partnered with local civil rights organizations to educate and register disenfranchised African American voters.
Following the rally on Monday, 15 demonstrators were arrested for refusing to leave the legislative building where, in an act of civil disobedience, they held signs and chanted: "Whose house? Our house!" and, "This is what democracy looks like!" Over 1,000 demonstrators have now been arrested since the Moral Monday protests began last April.
Sharing a picture of the swelling crowd on Twitter, one protester wrote "Massive crowds! We are changing the context in North Carolina."
Citing a recent poll by Public Policy Polling, the North Carolina NAACP notes that only 18 percent of voters in the state approve of the General Assembly and the work they are doing. For 60 weeks, members of the group have led rousing protests in an attempt to draw attention to what they call the "extremist policies" of the GOP-led legislature, which include rolling back voter protections, denying abortion rights, cutting unemployment benefits, failing to expand Medicaid and shifting public education money to private schools.
"Every major religion shares the ultimate value of how you use public power is how you treat the least of these," Rev. Barber told the crowd. "We are winning and shifting the center of political gravity."