“The citizens of North Carolina have not and will not sit by and allow the extremists to take control of the State. Governor McCrory, you have been put on notice.”
In an NC NAACP press release found on the Episcopal Church of the Advocate website, William Barber, the group’s president, decried Gov. McCrory’s signing of the bill that repealed the Racial Justice Act.
While the liberal Left has always argued that their support of the Act was not about the death penalty, it is generally believed that the passage of the Act effectively put an end to executions in North Carolina and the repeal would make way for the first execution since 2006. In the release, Barber admitted that the NC NAACP has always opposed the death penalty, saying that the act passed in 2009 allowed men and women on death row to change their death sentences to life without parole, if they could prove racial bias in death sentences imposed in cases at that time.
Before signing the bill, Gov. McCrory had said that the original law was so flawed that it “allowed nearly every person on death row to appeal unanimous jury decisions regardless of race.” The day after he signed the bill into law he said, “It was really going against the wishes of juries by unanimous vote, adding to another level of loopholes which I don’t think created the justice that we needed in North Carolina, so I was following the lead of a bipartisan group of DAs throughout the state.”
This warning was just the latest threatening communication from Barber to the Governor. In an earlier blog on Civitas Review we reported on an interview Barber gave to the American Prospect. In the interview, Barber talked about a letter he had delivered to the Governor;
“We just delivered a letter to the governor and the speaker saying, you’ve got the power to stop this. Just reconsider your attacks on Medicaid, voting rights, the unemployed, and the poor. If you don’t, then we will probably escalate in some ways – I’m not going to say how – because what they’re not going to do is live in peace while they hurt so many people and destroy so many lives.“
Bring it on Mr Barber,you will find out just how insignificant you and the naacp really is.
I wonder if this man knew just how SICK people are of hearing him blow hot air out of his pie hole? Maybe about as sick as God is with him using a pulpit to be all he really wants to be which is a politician. You PASTOR better be on notice. GOD not the gov. is watching all the work you do while you pimp Him out to play the race card as often as you can to DIVIDE as much as you can. YOU FOOL NO ONE~~~~~
The NAACP is nothing more than a RACIST organization.
Yeah, “jes’ keep on giving us our freebies, while we sit on our asses and do nuthin’ for them, or rob yo’ ass an’ kill ya, an’ get off light cuz we cn say it wuz cuz ya’ll is racists”.
My take on the situation. Extremists? Really? And he can say that with a straight face while there is a Muslim Extremist in the White House? What’s he going to do Tell The Racist President??? Don’t like the laws here, move elsewhere.
Why is the IRS not investigating this mob?End their non profit status and investigate their activities and members backgrounds.Hound them with the full force of government.
Thank you for this post, Ms. Myrick. As evidenced by the toxic bile spewed by the commenters so far, we welcome any and all attempts by civitas to malign a movement based on love and justice. Keep stirring it up so that it might see the light of day. As for the IRS, maybe an investigation of civitas is in order, no?
I am dismayed by the hatred coming forth on this Civitas comment line. As your website reported in its list of arrestees from Moral Mondays, I am a 66 year old, Independent ,female voter. Your website failed to mention that I am a Christian with grandchildren in public school, a community volunteer, and work as a caregiver to the elderly. I can assure you that I am doing what I believe to be right and true. I love North Carolina and have been proud to live in a progressive Southern state. Now I see NC returning to the days of voter suppression and lack of respect for teachers and public education. A good public education is the basis of a strong democracy, yet I see Republicans dismantling it and supporting vouchers for private schools. Don’t get me wrong, I call most politicians Republicrats, because sometimes it’s hard to tell one from another. However, this year I stand with the Democrats in their efforts to uplift the poor, working poor and middle class. I just had the privilege of attending the funeral of former Republican Governor Jim Holshouser. In her eulogy, the governor’s daughter spoke proudly of the fact that her father looked out for the interests of all North Carolinians with special concern for public education and healthcare. God rest his soul and God bless North Carolina.
Where are the facts that the death penalty is a deterrent to crime? Just a good old school way of getting back at the poor who can’t afford high priced lawyers to keep them off of death row.
Ellie,
The database is based on the information you gave the government when being arrested. Just because you give additional information to us here does not mean you are part of the “mainstream” as you are trying to purport. It is actaully backing up the fact that you and your ilk are well out of the mainstream of NC and are just unhappy because your people are not up there doing your progressive bidding any longer.
What’s missing for the Civitas Institute and Limbaugh Republicans is humanity, common sense and vision.
Art Pope and his hired voices want revenge, not justice. Art Pope wants political power not a free society, the word Freedom to Art Pope is nothing more than a word on a bumper sticker. Read the posts above and you see the bigots Art Pope has managed to get the Republican Party to cultivate as its base using scapegoating, fear and bigotry as political tools. The words below describe the rich but small minded Art Pope and the damage this man is doing to North Carolina.
“Chrystia Freeland, author of Plutocrats:
The Rise of the New Global Super-Rich and the Fall of Everyone Else says that the present trend towards plutocracy may not be a deliberate power grab:[20]
“You don’t do this in a kind of chortling, smoking your cigar, conspiratorial thinking way. You do it by persuading yourself that what is in your own personal self-interest is in the interests of everybody else. So you persuade yourself that, actually, government services, things like spending on education, which is what created that social mobility in the first place, need to be cut so that the deficit will shrink, so that your tax bill doesn’t go up. And what I really worry about is, there is so much money and so much power at the very top, and the gap between those people at the very top and everybody else is so great, that we are going to see social mobility choked off and society transformed.”
— Chrystia Freeland , NPR
If these comments are a reflection of mainstream NC, we really are in trouble.
I’m not sure what they have cooking, but I hope SOMEONE can bring the maniacs in Raleigh under control. I mean, trying to establish a state religion? Even considering closing public universities? Seriously?
I almost miss the last legislature, the clowns who tried to outlaw sea level rise.
I was actually surprised that Barber conveyed sincere concern and compassion for all, including his opponents on the Right. When I listened carefully to his words, it sounded nothing at all like the way he’s being portrayed in some media. Why are people so threatened by a man of God who preaches compassion?
It seems Art Pope and our so-called Republican leadership are being exposed for who they really are: opportunists who lack any sense of justice, manipulating average people who don’t like big government into thinking this Republican legislature will benefit them…Sadly, the joke is on everyone who voted Republican. Justice for ALL…which is all Reverend Barber is asking for. Small Government can include justice and fairness – but wealthy people like Art Pope would lose $ if that were to happen. So, they demonize a man of God who simply asks everyone to care about others (You know, like Jesus did!).
This reporting is a breath of fresh air in a media landscape dominated by left wing bias. One more thing: the left wing nuts also leave their opinions on this website, like Alice Simon, etc. It is funny how the left portray themselves on the side of G-d as their curiously militantly secular ‘Freedom from religion’ agenda is pushed through this great Country.