By Staff
On Monday morning hundreds of people cued up to get into the Winston-Salem courtroom of U.S. District Judge Thomas D. Schroeder. With only 100 seats available, those who had come out early had to be turned away for Monday‘s hearing. Interest is high for this case and the turnout was serious. Attorneys for the NCNAACP indicated that the hearings could go on until Friday with testimony from both sides, including from Winston-Salem’s Rev. John Mendez whose Emmanuel Baptist church is part of the law suit.
House Bill 589 was passed by the North Carolina state legislature in 2013 and is the most restrictive voting regulation bill enacted since the Jim Crow era. It was crafted with the help of ALEC model bills, input from Republican “Think Tanks”, and was passed almost immediately after the Supreme Court of the United States gutted the Voting Rights Act of 1965 which once more opened the door on the use of segregation-era voter suppression.
At noon Monday, organizers and supporters of the plaintiffs in this case will be having lunch and prayer at Goler Memorial AME Zion on the corner of 7th St. and Patterson Ave. On Monday evening at 5:30pm the Moral Movement will be holding a voting rally at Corpening Plaza which will be open to anyone who wants to come. Corpening Plaza is located between 2nd and 1st streets behind the BB&T building.
CCD will be bringing continuous coverage of these events…
