HUMAN RIGHTS Blackwell: Take risks

The secretary of state encouraged others to also challenge the status quo.
By PETER H. MILLIKEN
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
YOUNGSTOWN -- The ongoing struggle for human rights requires risk-taking now as it did in the past, according to Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell.
Blackwell appeared at a reception Thursday at Tabernacle Baptist Church in memory of Daisy Bates. She was president of the Arkansas NAACP in 1957, and, with an Army escort, led nine black students, known as the "Little Rock Nine," past bottle-throwing segregationists to Little Rock Central High School to end segregation there. She died in 1999.
"Daisy Bates could have found security and comfort in the status quo, but she was willing to take the risks associated with freedom, and that meant that she had to summon courage," as did the nine students she mentored, Blackwell said.
"She nurtured their courage, but she didn't retreat to the sidelines. She was right there on the front lines of action,'' Blackwell added.
By example: "As she was fighting to make sure that the young people of her time had access to a quality education, we still have too many of our youngsters who are locked into schools that don't work, and so, we must not find comfort in the status quo. We must challenge the status quo to make sure that each youngster has a shot at a quality education," he said.
"Each of us has the responsibility to get off of the sidelines and to understand that the human condition isn't a spectator sport -- that we must all engage in the public square to make life better for ourselves and our children," he said.
The reception was attended by three of Bates' grandchildren, Nadine Christopher Jackson, Karen Jean Taylor, and Larry Jerome Carter, all of Youngstown.
"The timing is perfect so people could remember what she did and what she stood for," Carter said of the reception, adding that the family didn't want too much time to elapse after her death. "A lot of people in the North don't know what went on down South in 1957, but we're trying to bring that memory up here," he explained.
Losing a district: On another matter, Blackwell said it's too early to tell which of Ohio's 19 Congressional districts will be sacrificed based on last year's census. Because its population has grown at a slower rate than other states, Ohio will lose one of its seats in the U.S. House of Representatives.
"It is much too early to send anybody into a deep panic or to give anybody a false guarantee, because no one knows at this point," he said. "There are several opportunities across the state for reconfigured lines," he added.
Blackwell, along with Gov. Bob Taft, State Auditor James Petro and a Democratic and Republican state legislator, yet to be selected, will sit on the state's apportionment board, which will meet between Aug. 1 and Oct. 1, for purposes of redrawing state legislative and Congressional districts in Ohio based on last year's Census. The board's apportionment decisions are due by Oct. 5.
"We have to take a hard look at the new census numbers and then we have to be guided by the principles of compactness and the preponderance of case law driven by one-person, one-vote," he said. The board will do its best to avoid dividing cities and counties when drawing Congressional district lines, he said.