Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, July 23, 1993 TAG: 9307230184
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: Knight-Ridder/Tribune
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
Sen. Carol Moseley-Braun, D-Ill., the first black woman elected to the Senate, persuaded senators to reverse 95 years of support and reject the symbol. She made a passionate plea that took her colleagues by storm.
Moseley-Braun thought she had won the fight over the Confederate flag when she had persuaded the Senate Judiciary Committee in May to end the design patent for the United Daughters of the Confederacy.
But on Thursday morning she was alerted by an aide while attending a committee meeting that Sen. Jesse Helms, R-N.C., had moved on the Senate floor to reinstate the patent.
Visibly flustered, she rushed to the chamber and tried to change senators' minds as they entered to vote. After she failed, and the Helms move won in a 52-48 vote, she threatened to filibuster.
"I'll stand here until this room freezes over," she said, her voice cracking and her eyes misting over at times.
She said the debate was critical to descendants of slaves who, facing a congressional stamp of approval on the Confederate symbol, "will have to suffer the indignity of being reminded time and time again that at one point in this country's history we were human chattel, we were property, we could be traded, bought and sold."
Soon, other senators returned to the chamber to join the fight or watch the unexpected battle.
In a rare, unscripted debate, Moseley-Braun got several senators to reverse their votes. Sen. John Chaffee, R-R.I., noted that "rarely on this floor are minds changed. I've been persuaded."
Perhaps the most moving switch came from Sen. Howell Heflin, D-Ala., the grandson of a Confederate Army surgeon whose family is "deeply rooted in the Confederacy." He said he still believes the United Daughters of the Confederacy does good work and is not a racist organization.
"But we live today in a different world . . . trying to heal the scars that occurred in the past," he said. "Racism is one of the greatest scars and serious illnesses we suffer from today."
His vote against the United Daughters of the Confederacy, he said, would mean that his "mother and grandmother will turn over in their graves."
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., reached over and held Moseley-Braun's hand after pleading with Republicans to switch their votes and oppose congressional approval of the insignia.
Sen. Paul Simon, D-Ill., said the group still could use the insignia, but without the rare congressional seal of approval. Or, he said, "if they want their charter renewed, come back with a different symbol."
But Sen. Alan Simpson, R-Wyo., questioned why the Senate should reverse its earlier endorsements. He noted that the congressional charter was granted in 1898, then renewed unanimously in 1926, 1941, 1963 and 1977.
The difference, Moseley-Braun said, was that no one in the Senate had given it a second thought before. This time, she said, she was in the Senate.
"It ought to give us pause to listen to the message she carries on behalf of millions of people," said Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass.
In the end, the Senate voted 75-25 to end congressional approval of the group's insignia.
At least one senator protested, before going along with Moseley-Braun, that the vote had become a referendum on racism. Sen. John Danforth, R-Mo., said he was "sick to my stomach" voting against the group and its symbol.
"I had to tar with the brush of racism members of an innocent organization," Danforth said.
Other defenders of the group voted to maintain congressional support.
"The United Daughters of the Confederacy is largely a group not about glorifying slavery, but glorifying the lives of people lost," said Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. His great-grandmother's first husband was a Confederate soldier killed in the war; his grandmother belonged to the UDC.
by CNB