Florida Congresswoman Frederica Wilson speaks to police and youth attending a 5000 Role Models conference at Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens, Florida on Nov. 1, 2022. (Jose A. Iglesias/Miami Herald/TNS

By Rep. Frederica S. Wilson

History has a way of disappearing if no one is willing to tell it.

Too often, we celebrate milestones without remembering the struggle that made them possible. We inherit rights without understanding who fought for them. We walk through doors without knowing who had to break them open. That is why I believe every generation has a responsibility to remember, because when history fades, so does our appreciation for what it took to change it.

This is not an endorsement of any candidate. It is a civics lesson. It is a history lesson. Before you cast your ballot, know the story of District 20.

District 20 is more than a congressional district. It is a civil rights victory.

Its story begins with Josiah Thomas Walls, the first Black Congressman from the State of Florida. His election during Reconstruction represented one of the nation’s earliest promises that democracy could become broader, fairer, and more representative. For a brief moment, Black Floridians saw themselves reflected in the halls of Congress.

Trending

Transforming Gas Stations: EV Battery Resale Revolution

That promise did not last.

Across the South, white supremacist violence sought to erase the gains of Reconstruction. Terror replaced hope. Intimidation replaced participation. Organizations such as the Ku Klux Klan worked to drive Black Americans from public life and dismantle the political power they had only just begun to build. Josiah Walls was forced from Congress on April 19, 1876, and with his departure, Florida entered one of the darkest chapters in its democratic history.

For the next 117 years, Florida did not elect another Black Member of Congress.

That is longer than any lifetime. Entire generations were born, raised, and buried without ever seeing Black representation from Florida in the United States Congress. Families taught their children to keep believing even when history gave them every reason to lose hope. Black people died. Black blood was shed. Black skulls were cracked beneath the blows of nightsticks. In the rivers of Florida, the water became an unmarked grave for Black Americans whose only demand was the right to vote, to be fairly represented, and to have their voices heard. Churches became organizing centers. Neighborhoods became movements. Ordinary citizens are still carrying, to this day, extraordinary burdens because they refused to accept that this was permanent.

The story of District 20 is, in many ways, the story of America itself. It is a story of extraordinary progress born from extraordinary sacrifice. It is also a reminder that progress has never followed a straight line. Every advance has been met by resistance. Every victory has required vigilance.

Then, in 1993, history turned.

Corrine Brown, Carrie Meek, and Alcee Hastings were elected to Congress, ending a silence that had lasted 117 years. Their elections did more than fill three seats. They restored a voice that had been absent from Florida’s congressional delegation for more than a century. They reminded the nation that the arc bends towards justice.

Congressman Alcee Hastings would go on to represent what is now Congressional District 20 for many years, carrying forward that legacy of service and advocacy.

District 20 is the legacy of those who refused to be erased.

It is a seat paid for by generations of Black sacrifice.

It exists because countless Black people challenged barriers that once seemed impossible to overcome. Black people organized when organizing carried real risks. Black people marched when marching invited retaliation. Black people voted when others worked tirelessly to deny them that right. Black people understood that democracy is strongest when every community has an opportunity to be represented and every citizen has a voice.

White nationalists marched through our nation’s capital carrying Confederate flags on the Fourth of July just to remind us that Black people cannot be comfortable. Even after more than 400 years of slavery, we still have to continue the fight. The fight for our freedom did not end. It simply became our generation’s responsibility.

That is why the history of District 20 matters.

If Black lives matter, then the history of Black representation matters too.

Representation is not merely symbolic. It shapes conversations and brings lived experiences into the rooms where decisions are made. A representative cannot erase history, but a representative can ensure that history is remembered.

The story of District 20 is also the story of America’s promise and its failures. It reminds us how difficult it has been to expand democracy and how much determination it has taken to make our institutions more representative of the people they serve. It teaches us that progress is not inevitable. It is built, protected, and renewed by each generation.

That is why history deserves our attention.

As the highest-ranking Black elected official in the State of Florida, I have a responsibility to tell you the truth. I know what our ancestors endured to earn a voice in these halls of power, and I know how quickly that voice can be taken away. I know what it costs to lose representation because our history has already lived through that pain.

That is why I am imploring you to vote like your future depends on it, because it does.

We deserve a seat at every table where decisions about our lives, our children, our communities, and our future are made. That seat was not given to us. It was earned through generations of Black sacrifice.

At a time when President Trump and many Republicans are working to undo decades of hard-fought progress, we need a fighter in Congress who understands the lived experiences of Black communities, who knows the history that brought us here, who recognizes what is at stake, and who will never hesitate to defend our right to be heard, represented, and included wherever decisions about our future are made.

So, I am asking you to do more than vote.

I am asking you to honor those who never lived to see this moment because freedom has always demanded participation.

That future is now in your hands.

Every generation must choose whether it will preserve it or surrender it.

When you enter that voting booth, remember that you are carrying the hopes and voices of those who were denied one.

You are carrying the prayers of those who never stopped believing that America could live up to its promise.

Do not leave that legacy behind.

Because District 20 is more than a seat in the United States Congress, it is the seat that Black history built.

Now it is our responsibility to make sure history never has to build it again.

Courtesy of the Westside Gazette

Based on reporting by Jacksonville Free Press.

bpusa-syndication

Posts by bpusa-syndication

It was like a “Tale of Two Cities”: The best of times and the Worst of Times.

It was the best of times for the hundreds of immigrants that were sworn in as U.S. naturalized citizens across this great land. Their swearing in was a manifestation of the provisions of the 14th Amendment creating citizenship status for persons not born in this country; a provision of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution just as important as citizenship by birth. This is the provision that President Trump tried to get the U.S. Supreme Court to nullify, the Birthright Citizenship case which the Court rejected.

While many recited the Preamble to the Declaration of Independence words stating that “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights; that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness, That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed….” Many among us are being denied those very rights today as evidenced by armed troops on the streets of our cities and Federal agents killing and imprisoning immigrants, citizens and anyone who appears to be out of step with this administration.

Trending

Over 1500 Oakland Hotel Rooms Sit Empty as COVID-19 Pandemic Spreads

The celebrations, parades and millions of dollars spent on fireworks left many of us to remember to question those events with the immortal words of Federick Douglas when he raised his rhetorical question during the 1852 76th anniversary celebration of America’s independence; “WHAT TO THE NEGRO (BLACK PEOPLE) IS YOUR FOURTH OF JULY….? TODAY ONE HUNDRED AND SEVENTY FOUR YEARS LATER, the question is

still all too real. For those of us concerned about the police state and kingship that Donald Trump would establish, let us take heart in the fact that today we have tools that Douglas did not have. In addition to the Constitution with its 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments, the only thing we lack to make change is the will to get involved and do so. Let’s start right where we live. Let’s start with the issue of making sure that each of us can vote, register and prepare to do so. Let’s take another look at how we are spending the few dollars we have. Let’s take another look at who we can help as a part of our collective and prepare to use our numbers like never before in all that we do. Let’s create our own fireworks that will last all year long with our involvement and collective agreement to help ourselves before we expect others to do so, and in all this, let’s make a lasting reality out of the change that Frederick Douglas envisioned.

Based on reporting by Milwaukee Community Journal.

bpusa-syndication

Posts by bpusa-syndication

The Trump administration has shelved the decade-long effort to put Harriet Tubman on the $20 bill— while simultaneously pushing to putTrump’s face on a brand-new $250 bill.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent confirmed Monday (July 6) that the Trump administration is “not at present” planning to move forward with placing Tubman’s likeness on the $20, according to Spectrum News. Bessent did not elaborate.

Tubman would have been the first Black American — and the first woman in more than a century — on the face of U.S. paper currency. The plan originated under President Barack Obama in 2016, when then-Treasury Secretary Jack Lew announced that Tubman would replace Andrew Jackson on the front of the $20 bill, originally set to enter circulation in 2020 to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment.

Trump blocked the plan during his first term, calling it “pure political correctness” and suggesting Tubman be placed on the $2 bill instead.

When President Biden took office in 2021, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said the administration was “taking steps to resume efforts” and exploring ways to “speed up the process.” Former Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen later estimated the bill would be ready by 2030, citing the need for sophisticated anti-counterfeiting technology.

In May 2025, during a tense exchange with Rep. Joyce Beatty, a Black Democrat from Ohio, Bessent was asked for an update on the Tubman bill’s status. His response: “I can’t, my staff will get back to you.”

The contrast between the administration’s handling of the Tubman redesign and its support for a proposed $250 bill featuring Trump drew immediate criticism.

Pressed on the discrepancy, Bessent told Spectrum News: “The 250 requires an act of Congress, because you can’t have a living person on U.S. currency.”

He added: “For us to change an existing bill, whether it’s $1 through $100, takes many years in advance.” No new person has been added to U.S. paper currency since 1928.

Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, a Democrat from New Hampshire who has been introducing legislation to put Tubman on the $20 since 2015, said she was “extremely disappointed” by Bessent’s announcement.

“Commemorating Harriet Tubman would have been the perfect way to honor the women who helped build this country and bravely stood up for freedom and equality throughout our nation’s remarkable 250-year history,” Shaheen said in a statement. “Though Secretary Bessent may be more interested in illegally plastering Donald Trump’s image on a $250 bill, putting a woman on a U.S. bill remains long overdue, and I will keep focusing on finding a path to honor Harriet Tubman’s patriotism and sacrifice.”

Tubman was born into slavery in the early 1820s and went on to conduct 13 missions on the Underground Railroad, helping approximately 70 people escape to freedom. She later served as a Union spy and nurse during the Civil War.

The $20 bill currently features Andrew Jackson, the seventh U.S. president and a slaveholder who signed the Indian Removal Act of 1830, which forcibly displaced tens of thousands of Native Americans.

The Black Information Network is your source for Black News! Get the latest news 24/7 on The Black Information Network. Listen now on the iHeartRadio app or click HEREto tune in live.

The post Trump Administration shelves Harriet Tubman $20 bill plan appeared first on Atlanta Daily World.

Based on reporting by Atlanta Daily World.

bpusa-syndication

Posts by bpusa-syndication