Boxed out by GOP gains, NC progressive groups seek to reignite resistance | Opinion
They gathered in the community center of Pullen Memorial Baptist Church in Raleigh on Tuesday night like the remnants of a battered army trying to regroup and rally.
The occasion was a meeting of the newly formed People’s Coalition, a collection of 16 North Carolina progressive groups committed to promoting economic and social justice. The theme was mobilizing against the actions of the Republican-controlled General Assembly.
The warm-up music included Gil Scott-Heron’s early 1970’s song, “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised.” Many in the crowd of about 75 people were old enough to remember when it was an activists’ anthem.
The Rev. Nancy Petty, Pullen Memorial’s pastor, opened the meeting with a moment of silence for the three adults and three children killed Monday in the Nashville school shooting and all victims of gun violence. Earlier in the day, the state Senate voted to override Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto of a bill that makes it easier to buy a handgun. That contrast expressed a gulf much wider than the 1.5 miles between the church and the Legislative Building.
Petty said the pandemic had halted in-person meetings and slowed progressive activism, but she said that lull is over. “We are back and we are ready to be back,” she said.
Petty noted that this year marks the 10th anniversary of the Moral Monday protests that united advocacy groups in opposition to actions by the legislature. She said it was time to reignite that resistance. Many North Carolinians, she said, “are coming together as a People’s Coalition refusing to let our lawmakers pass their dangerous agenda without a struggle and a fight.”
Other speakers also spoke against the actions of Republican lawmakers, but the prospects for blocking those actions are bleak. Republicans, now in their 13th year in power, gained seats in the last election and are one vote shy of veto-proof majority.
Meanwhile, the election also gave Republicans a 5-2 majority on the state Supreme Court, replacing a 4-3 Democratic majority that had supported voting rights and rejected gerrymandered election district maps. It’s likely the newly constituted court will approve new voting restrictions and redrawn district maps that will heavily favor Republican candidates in 2024.
Sailor Jones, associate director of Common Cause North Carolina, alluded to those setbacks in addressing the audience. “This time, my friends, the courts will not save us,” Jones said. “Who will?”
“We will,” the audience responded, but it sounded more like a wish than a promise.
Yet a counter movement has to start somewhere. The People’s Coalition hopes it is starting in the capital city. They plan to hold more town hall meetings around the state.
State legislative leaders from both parties were invited, but did not attend, though two Democratic state lawmakers did – state Sen. Lisa Grafstein of Wake County and state Rep. Greg Ager of Buncombe County.
Grafstein, a civil rights lawyer, told me after the meeting that Democrats eventually will regain a legislative majority as voters respond to Republican overreach, much as they did to the Supreme Court’s abortion ruling.
“I genuinely do believe we will get it back,” she said.
But, for now, belief is about all that progressives have.
Associate opinion editor Ned Barnett can be reached at 919-829-4512, or nbarnett@ newsobserver.com
