How I really feel about Reagan.

This past weekend, it was the 100th anniversary of Ronald Reagan's birthday. Personally, I wasn't too impressed with the tribute. Why? Former President Ronald Reagan isn't a favorite of mine. I would not have voted for him knowing what I know now about him. Some of the things he voted for and were against, well, I didn't agree with most of them. Furthermore, it was the things that disturbed me more that I don't like.

1) He vetoed the Anti-Apartheid Bill
2) Reagan claimed that the Voting Rights Act was a "humiliation to the South".
3) He supported a university that had an anti-interracial dating policy, Bob Jones University. He supported it by granting this private university a tax exemption.
4) He sided with Barry Goldwater, who opposed the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Let me tell you something about apartheid in South Africa. It was a dictatorship in which the majority Black population in South Africa was put under many restrictions in comparisons to the White population. Black people were restricted to living in "homelands", they couldn't vote, many people died from the cruelty subjected unto them from the South African police. There were other restrictions too. There were 11 universities reserved for the White population. Only 3 were reserved for the Black population. Around 1976, Blacks made up 2/3 of South Africa's population. Sounds like a gross imbalance to me. Personally, I feel that apartheid should not have existed. It was a system that took the freedom of human beings away. His plan was to veto a bill that would put economic sanctions on South Africa. It was overriden by congress.

Reagan claiming the Voting Rights Act of 1965 a "humiliation to the South" is something I am indignant about. I, as an American citizen, demand and require the right to vote, not just for Black people, but for ALL people in the USA, regardless of your race or ethnicity. People like Dr. King went into the streets, protested, marched, and died for my right to vote. I don't see that as a "humiliation". I see it as African-Americans getting the rights they should have gotten in the first place, as USA citizens. If the state government fails to support your right to vote, then in my eyes, the federal government ought to step in and force the state government to behave and support your right to vote, no matter what race or ethnicity you are.

The Bob Jones controversy, well, this is how it was. The IRS started denying private universities tax exemptions if they practiced segregation and discrimination. I agree with this. I see this as a way to get rid of the  "separate but equal" vestiges of the old days. Reagan wanted to give this university tax exemptions. Well, Bob Jones University practiced a policy of forbidding interracial dating. Sounds like racism, smells like racism, it is racism.

And Reagan wanting to work with the likes of Barry Goldwater. Let me tell you something about Barry Goldwater. He didn't support the Civil Rights Act or the Voting Rights Act. He felt like the individual states should decide that. Let me tell you this. If history is any indicator, this is what I have to show you: The Deep South state governments were vehemently against such measures to give African-Americans the same rights and privileges as White people. Isn't an African-American as much a citizen of the USA as a White American? The answer is YES. An African-American is as much a citizen as a White American and therefore, should be given the same rights that everyone else gets. Well, the states in the South during the 1960's were not for this. If my eyes, the federal government needed to enforce such measures to make sure ALL of its citizens regardless of race, have the same rights as everyone else. Reagan even went to the place where the 3 civil rights workers were murdered by the police, in Neshoba County, Mississippi, and said that he supported "states' rights". Honestly, I don't trust it. I support making sure the states behave.

That is my say about Reagan.


http://www.ontheissues.org/celeb/Ronald_Reagan_Civil_Rights.htm
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1953700