Democrat Keith Ellison’s Flat Out Horseshit!

Democrat Congressman Keith Ellison, a candidate to take the reins and run the Democrat National Committee (DNC) penned a piece for TimeMagazine entitled Democrats Will Unite and Take Back the Country, in which he proclaims “Unity is often discussed, but difficult to obtain and maintain. In 1964, 

Democrats unified around Civil Rights to create a winning coalition.”

The problem is; Ellison’s statement is flat out horseshit! The fact is, a greater percentage of elected Republican Congressman and Senators voted in favor of the Civil rights Act of 1964 then did Democrats.

By the Numbers

The vote for the Civil Rights Act of 1964 broke down like this:

House – Democrats 153 of 244 (63%) Republicans 136 of 171 (80%)

Senate – Democrats 46 of 67 (69%)  Republicans 27 of 33 (82%)

Democrats Filibuster Civil Rights

In fact on June 10, 1964 Republican Senator Everett Dirksen (IL) the Republican Leader in the U.S. Senate, condemned the Democrats’ 57-day filibuster against the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Leading the Democrats in their opposition to civil rights for African-Americans was Senator Robert Byrd (D-WV). Byrd, often labeled by Democrats as “the conscience of the Senate” was the former Ku Klux Klan Exalted Cyclops. In his speech that day, Senator Dirksen called on the Democrats to end their filibuster and accept racial equality.

Ellison is not the first Democrat to misrepresent the facts of the 1964 Civil Rights act. 

When he was running for president in 2000, then Vice President Al Gore told the NAACP, that his father, Senator Al Gore Sr., had lost his Senate seat because he voted for the Civil Rights Act. Great story — except it’s complete horse shit too. Gore Sr. voted against the Civil Rights Act. He lost in 1970 in a race that focused on prayer in public schools, the Vietnam War, and the Supreme Court.