By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on March 6, 2024 If you are one of the 200,000 heart patients each year who received an implantable cardioverter defibrillator to detect irregular heart beats and automatically correct them, you must see this New Explorers video. A&E Network/PBS first aired the documentary below nationwide in 1993. Television producer and news anchor Bill Kurtis narrates the inspirational story of the first defibrillator implanted in a human patient in 1980. The operation was performed by Dr. Levi Watkins, Jr., MD, an Alabama native and renown Johns Hopkins Medical Center heart surgeon. In 1962, Dr. Watkins was the co-valedictorian of his graduating class at Alabama State Laboratory High School (an honor he shared with his best friend for life, Dr. Norman W. Walton, III, a renowned dermatologist). In 1966, Watkins graduated from Tennessee State University (TSU) with a 3.7 GPA on a 4.0 grading system. He was also the student government president at TSU. During his senior year at TSU, Watkins applied for admission to the University of Alabama School of Medicine. He was denied entry into the University's medical school solely because of his race. In 1966, Dr. Watkins became the first Black medical student admitted to Vanderbilt Medical School, where he graduated with honors in 1970. After graduation from Vanderbilt, Watkins began his medical residency at Johns Hopkins University Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland. There, he became chief resident of cardiac surgery, acting as the first Black chief resident at the university. Watkins eventually became Associate Dean at Johns Hopkins Medical School. In 1973, Dr. Watkins left Johns Hopkins for Harvard University where he researched the use of angiotensin blockers in cases of congestive heart failure. Angiotensin blockers were created in order to avoid the side effects of ACE inhibitors, which were previously the drug of choice for lowering blood pressure and treating congestive heart failure. Watkins’ research work at Harvard contributed to the safety and efficiency of the drug. Dr. Watkins returned to Johns Hopkins in 1975 to continue the pioneering medical research on the implantable defibrillator that had been started by Drs. Michel Mirowski, Morton Mower, and William Staewen. This New Explorers documentary chronicles Watkins’ co-development and successful implantation of the first cardioverter defibrillator in a human patient. Dr. Watkins died on April 11, 2015, but a piece of him lives on in the estimated 3 million patients around the world who have defibrillators implanted in their bodies to keep their hearts beating in a regular rhythm.

By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on March 2, 2024 BREAKING NEWS ---- Things are heating up in the race to fill the Congressional seat in the newly created, court-ordered, 2nd Congressional District in Alabama.  The District was designed in 2023 to favor the candidate of choice of Black voters as a judicial remedy for Alabama's engrained and sustained voter discrimination against its Black citizens. The Alabama Democratic Party may boot two of the candidates in the race because they have received “unimaginable amounts of dark money” from conservative Republican donors, based upon their most recent campaign disclosure reports. The two candidates at-risk of being booted from the race are Shomari Figures (Mobile) and Anthony Daniels (Huntsville). The potential disqualification of these candidates is the subject of a March 1, 2024, memo from Alabama Democratic Conference Chairman Joe L. Reed to Randy Kelly, Chairman of the Alabama Democratic Party. The memo speaks for itself and appears below.

By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on March 2, 2024 Former president Donald Trump leads President Joe Biden by five points in a hypothetical rematch, according to a new poll from the New York Times and Siena College that was released today. Among registered voters, 48 percent said they would vote for the former president Trump if the 2024 presidential election “were held today” and the candidates were him and Biden. Forty-three percent said they would vote for Biden in response to the same question. The poll also found 65 percent of registered voters said the country is on the “[w]rong track,” versus 24 percent saying it is on the “[r]ight track.” The Times and Siena College poll also asked registered voters who they voted for in the last presidential election, with 44 percent saying they voted for Biden and 34 saying they voted for Trump. Eighteen percent said they didn’t vote in the 2020 election. The Times and Siena College poll was conducted between Feb. 25 and 28 and featured 980 registered voters from across the nation, with 823 who completed the full survey. The margin of error for registered voters is plus or minus 3.5 percentage points and plus or minus 4 percentage points for registered voters who completed the full survey.

By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on February 13, 2024 An Editorial Opinion Does Donald Trump have the five votes he needs at the U.S. Supreme Court to get presidential immunity?   A week ago, I did not think so. Today, it appears that Trump has secured the votes he needs to get presidential immunity. The Court has ordered Special Counsel Jack Smith to respond to Trump’s claim of immunity in one week. Presidential immunity for criminal acts is not authorized in the U.S. Constitution.  It is not authorized in any federal statute, and it is not authorized in the Code of Federal Regulations. Until today, such an immunity claim was merely a figment of Donald Trump’s imagination.  It was regarded as a “bullshit” legal argument. Now, presidential immunity is a legitimate argument only because the required number of Justices on the Court have voted to formally consider this “bullshit” argument. Today, the U.S. Supreme Court functions as the judicial wing of the Republican Party. A majority of the Justices on the Court are nothing more than Republican political hacks.  Judicial opinions are often written to advance and protect the political interests of the Republican Party. One of these political hacks – Justice Clarence Thomas – should already be under a federal criminal investigation for bribery and income tax evasion.  The only reason Thomas remains on the Court is because Merrick Garland is a weak, scared, and useless Attorney General. Clarence Thomas was one of the five Justices who voted in favor of George Bush in Bush v. Gore (2000), thereby giving Bush the presidency in 2001. Reportedly, Thomas is leading the roundup of votes for Trump’s presidential immunity.  Because of his seniority and networking skills, Thomas operates as the "de facto" Chief Justice of the Court. I believe Clarence Thomas has secured the 5 votes necessary to deliver presidential immunity to Donald Trump.  If so, Trump’s four criminal cases are over.

By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on February 29, 2024 An Editorial Opinion There are 33 Black lawmakers in the 140-seat Alabama Legislature. All but one are Democrats. All of them support a bill to give Birmingham Southern College, a private historically White school, $30 million in taxpayer money as a “loan.” Birmingham Southern is a financially distressed college that has no credit rating whatsoever. In December 2023, Moody's credit rating agency withdrew the college's rock-bottom "junk bond" credit rating. No Black loan applicant who lacked a bank, Dun & Bradstreet, or Moody's credit rating has ever gotten a loan from the state of Alabama. Starting with Birmingham Southern, this is a "White privilege" that is sponsored and backed by Black legislators. Not one of these 33 Black lawmakers has filed a bill in the current session of the Legislature to require the state of Alabama to pay its $527 million debt to Alabama A&M University.  Not one of these 33 Black lawmakers has spoken a word about this confirmed debt in public. The state was formally notified of the debt in a September 18, 2023, letter from the Secretaries of the U.S. Departments of Education and Agriculture.  Read the letter here. No candidate running for Congress in the new court-ordered 2nd Congressional District in Alabama has mentioned the state's $527 million debt to Alabama A&M or pledged to collect it. The state's lone Black Congresswoman (Terri Sewell) has avoided any public discussion of the $527 million debt. Alabama A&M’s president and board of trustees have avoided any public discussion of this $527 million debt, as well.  They have no plans whatsoever to collect this money. Who represents the political and financial interests of Blacks in Alabama?  Absolutely nobody!

By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on February 28, 2024 An Editorial Opinion The word "jackanapes" is a colloquial term for a monkey on a leash or an impudent person. In American society, "jackanapes" is typically associated with a monkey who dances for an organ grinder. In my view, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas is the first and only “Uncle Tom” in American history to make it all the way to “jackanapes” status.  By his words and actions as a Supreme Court Justice, Thomas is an impudent "Uncle Tom" on a leash. Unlike a traditional “jackanapes” who is owned by one organ grinder, Clarence Thomas proudly buck-dances for billionaire Harlan Crow and the close-knit group of organ grinders depicted in the photo below that was published last year by ProPublica. Clarence Thomas is rewarded handsomely for his non-stop buck-dancing for these well-known organ grinders. Instead of peanuts, bananas, and pats on the head as his reward for his buck-dancing, Thomas gets: (a) free trips to exotic ports of call around the world, (b) hefty consulting fees for his wife (which were supposed to be kept on the "down-low"), (c) money to fix up his mother's home, (d) money for a relative's private school tuition, (e) loan money to buy a new RV (which was never repaid), (f) repeated pats on the head and accolades, and (g) de facto immunity from federal prosecution for his pay-to-play schemes at the Supreme Court. None of these "jackanapes" perks has been reported on Thomas' tax returns or annual financial disclosure forms. Because Thomas is an iconic "jackanapes," he does not have to worry about a criminal prosecution on federal bribery and tax evasion charges. Clarence Thomas' organ grinders seemingly "love" him and admire his iron-clad devotion to their racist causes.  In their eyes, Thomas is the perfect "jackanapes." Throughout his 32 years on the Supreme Court, Thomas has been reliable, dependable, consistent, and properly trained on how to buck-dance to his organ grinders’ music. Thomas has NEVER complained about buck-dancing, nor disappointed these organ grinders. What is more, Thomas has used his considerable buck-dancing skills on the Supreme Court to inflict the maximum possible pain and suffering on Black Americans. Last week, we learned that Clarence Thomas and his wife Ginni are grooming, platforming, and launching the legal career of flaming White racist Crystal Clanton.  I define a “flaming” White racist as someone who texts the following message to a fellow White co-worker: “I HATE BLACK PEOPLE. Like fuck them all . . . I hate blacks. End of story.” There have been “Uncle Toms” among us for hundreds of years.  However, Clarence Thomas, is the first and only “Uncle Tom” in American history to make it all the way to “jackanapes” status.

By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on February 26, 2024 An Editorial Opinion Over the weekend, the New York Times and Vanity Fair reported that U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas hired Crystal Clanton as one of his four law clerks for the upcoming term of the Court.  This article is based upon these published reports and my independent news sources. Clanton, a 2022 graduate of The Antonin Scalia Law School at George Mason University, has an extensive history of writing and sending racist text messages.  In 2017, Clanton was forced out of a conservative youth organization after a reporter uncovered virulently racist texts she sent to another employee. The racist comments stem from Clanton’s work for Turning Point USA, where she served as national field director until the summer of 2017. At the end of that year, New Yorker investigative reporter Jane Mayer unearthed a text from Clanton to another TPUSA employee in which Clanton wrote, “I HATE BLACK PEOPLE. Like fuck them all . . . I hate blacks. End of story.” At the time, Clanton told the magazine that she had “no recollection of these messages and they do not reflect what I believe or who I am and the same was true when I was a teenager.” Clanton was about 20 years old when her racist texts were sent to her co-worker. Jane Mayer also reported that, on one Martin Luther King Jr. Day during her tenure, Clanton fired a woman who claimed to be the organization’s only Black employee. On this year’s Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Turning Point founder and CEO Charlie Kirk, announced a campaign to discredit the “mythical sainthood” of Dr. King. Clanton resigned from Turning Point.  Kirk told Mayer that TPUSA “assessed the situation and took decisive action within 72 hours of being made aware of the issue.” Crystal Clanton soon found new work assisting Clarence Thomas’ wife, Ginni Thomas, in carrying out her right-wing political agenda.  Ginni Thomas is also a conservative activist who played an essential behind-the-scenes role in the attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election. Clanton’s Work for 11th Circuit Court of Appeals Judge William H. Pryor, Jr. Clanton’s closeness to the Thomas family received additional scrutiny after she was hired to clerk for Judge William H. Pryor Jr., a conservative judge who frequently sends clerks to the Supreme Court and was once on Donald Trump’s shortlist of SCOTUS picks. In response, seven members of Congress demanded an investigation into Clanton’s hiring, writing that her clerkship threatened “to undermine the public’s faith in the judiciary seriously” and called into question Pryor’s ability to rule impartially “in cases where race, religion or national origin plays a role.” The federal appeals court appointed to look into the matter ultimately cleared Pryor -- and a lower court judge for whom Clanton also clerked -- of wrongdoing, after Pryor claimed he’d learned that Clanton had been the victim of a smear campaign. In its ruling, the appeals court panel said it did not need to consider “whether the information the [judges] elicited and received regarding their hiring decisions was accurate.” This judicial response prompted a rebuke from then-House Judiciary Chair Jerrold Nadler, who penned a letter arguing that the decision ignored a well-documented record of Clanton’s bigotry and that the court’s refusal to investigate the substance of the allegations went against “the judicial misconduct statute’s core purposes of uncovering the truth.” The appeals court’s investigation did, however, reveal some new details about Clanton’s relationship with the Thomases, courtesy of a letter Thomas submitted to the court that a reporter for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution uncovered. According to Thomas, Clanton lived with the couple “for almost a year” after “her controversial and public departure from Turning Point USA.” His wife, Thomas wrote, “informed me of the horrible way in which she had been treated” at the conservative organization. According to the letter, Thomas wrote a law school recommendation for Clanton. He also recommended her to Pryor for the clerkship, telling the judge that the allegations in Mayer’s reporting were “grossly out of character and unfounded.” “I know Crystal Clanton, and I know bigotry,” Thomas wrote. “Bigotry is antithetical to her nature and character.” Thomas concluded the letter by declaring his “intention to consider her for a clerkship should she perform as I expect and excel in her clerkships.” Thomas’ Hatred for Black America is Legendary In the 32 years Clarence Thomas has been on the Supreme Court, he has reportedly hired White law clerks only – four each year.  Thomas refers to these law clerks as his "extended family."  Many of them are polished and sophisticated racists. To me, Clarence Thomas has a deep-seated racial bias against Black people.  Thomas gets away with his "in-your-face" bigotry because he is Black -- in skin color only. I know of no case where Clarence Thomas ruled in favor of a Black plaintiff in a civil rights case or a Black criminal defendant during his 32 years on the federal bench. In his judicial rulings, Clarence Thomas has gone out of his way to inflict the maximum pain and suffering possible upon tens of millions of Black Americans and women. Now, Thomas has hired a certified racist in Crystal Clanton to help him carry out his racist agenda.

By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on December 25, 2023 An Editorial Opinion I saved this photo for Christmas Day!  It is a picture of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas at a retreat with his former law clerks in 2021. Thomas refers to these law clerks as his "extended family." You can pretty much guess who paid for this retreat at the luxurious Greenbriar Resort in West Virginia. Hint: It was NOT Clarence Thomas. Clarence Thomas hires four law clerks each year. These are the people Thomas launches into the halls of power in America at the conclusion of their clerkship with him. All of Thomas’ former law clerks worked for Republican appellate court judges prior to getting hired by him.  Unless you are blind, you can see for yourself what else these law clerks have in common. Today, the reach of Clarence Thomas’ former law clerks is far and wide, and they wield tremendous power and influence across the nation. So, What's Wrong with this Picture? To me, it reflects Clarence Thomas’ deep-seated racial bigotry against Black people.  Thomas gets away with his "in-your-face" bigotry because he is Black -- in skin color only. I know of no case where Clarence Thomas ruled in favor of a Black plaintiff in a civil rights case or a Black criminal defendant during his 32 years on the federal bench. In his judicial rulings, Clarence Thomas has gone out of his way to inflict the maximum pain and suffering possible upon tens of millions of Black Americans and women. Clarence Thomas is viewed by the overwhelming majority of Black Americans the same way the Jewish Ghetto Police were viewed by Jews living in Nazi-occupied Poland during World War II. Ultimately, the Jewish Ghetto Police shared the same fate as their fellow Jewish ghetto residents. When the Nazis liquidated the ghettos in 1942–1943, they killed the Jewish police officers on-site or sent them to extermination camps. Read the full story about Clarence Thomas and his former law clerks in the December 24, 2023, edition of the New York Times. When people show you who they are, believe them!

By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on February 24, 2024 An Editorial Opinion On February 16, 2024, the Alabama Supreme Court screwed up royally when it declared that frozen embryos in an in vitro fertilization (IVF) laboratory are “extrauterine children.”  The growing outrage around the country was immediate, intense, and bipartisan. In light of this controversial ruling, most Americans view the Alabama Supreme Court as a bunch of runaway political buffoons, which they are. In a February 23, 2024, article, I explained the historical context and unspoken rationale for the Court’s bizarre and erroneous ruling. When the Alabama Supreme Court makes a mistake of this magnitude with one of its rulings, there is a simple procedure for quickly correcting it.  The Court has the power to (a) withdraw its February 16, 2024, ruling and substitute a summary affirmance (pursuant to Rule 53(a)(1) and (a)(2)(F), Ala. R. App. P.) of the trial court’s ruling that rejected the concept that frozen embryos in a laboratory are “living children.” This corrective action should be taken next week at the regular meeting of the Justices and released on Friday, March 1, 2024.  The new Order would simply read: "AFFIRMED. NO OPINION." The Order can be written in less than one minute. This correction would immediately solve the nightmare problems the Court’s ruling created for IVF treatments in Alabama. The Alabama Supreme Court utilized this “withdrawal and substitution” approach to correct a manifest injustice in the case of Ex Parte State Mutual Ins. Co., 715 So. 2d 207 (Ala. 1997).  I filed a petition with the Court to correct such an injustice in a class action case against an insurance company I was representing. After carefully studying my petition, the Court withdrew its erroneous April 4, 1997, ruling and substituted the correct ruling in its place on December 16, 1997. The same “withdrawal and substitution” judicial action needs to happen with the Alabama Supreme Court’s IVF frozen embryo case, ASAP.

By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on February 23, 2024 An Editorial Opinion Occam's razor (or Ockham's razor) is a principle from philosophy.  Suppose an event has two possible explanations.  The explanation that requires the fewest assumptions is usually correct. With this in mind, I offer this explanation for last Friday’s seemingly bizarre Alabama Supreme Court ruling that declared frozen embryos to be “extrauterine children.”  The Court's ruling is the talk of the nation. That’s right, frozen embryos in a laboratory are now “living children.” Amazingly, we don't have to wait for a heartbeat anymore to be declared a "living" person. The Court’s ruling, which was decided on an 8-1 vote, caused an immediate pause on in vitro fertilization treatments (IVF) throughout Alabama. Far Reaching Consequences of the Court’s Ruling Do the newly recognized “children” have to be counted on federal Census forms?  Of course they do, particularly if the embryos are still frozen when the Census is taken.  These “children” are judicially deemed to be living people, too. Modern science enables doctors and parents to know the race and sex of each frozen embryo.  This information would be logged into government records. Parents would be responsible for reporting the existence of these “children” to Census takers. They would also be entitled to claim these “children” as dependents on their federal and state tax returns. Of course, nearly all of the medical expenses associated with creating and maintaining these “children” in their frozen state would be tax deductible. Healthcare insurers would have to cover their fair share of these medical expenses, as well. I guess the parents of these frozen "children" should go ahead and name each embryo like they do with their birthed children. Was there an Impermissible Motive Behind the Court’s Ruling? According to HRC Fertility, 91.5% of the women who are freezing their embryos/children are White.  African Americans, Asians, and Hispanics accounted for 4%, 3%, and 1.5% of this patient population, respectively.   As such, the frozen embryos are overwhelmingly White “children.” Those of us who are intimately familiar with Alabama's long, ugly and well-documented history of White racism (as confirmed by the ultra-conservative, right-wing U.S. Supreme Court on June 8, 2023 in the case of Allen v. Milligan) must wonder aloud whether the all-White, all-Republican, nine-member Alabama Supreme Court (in a state that is 27% Black), crafted this ruling as a vehicle to increase the state’s declining White population. The Alabama Supreme Court is led by Confederate flag-waving Chief Justice Tom Parker. Mr. Parker wrote a special concurring opinion to last week's ruling. The Supreme Court Justice who wrote the majority opinion for the Court -- Jay Mitchell -- is the same Justice who railed against new bar exams last year that he claimed promoted diversity, equity, and inclusion. This guy is regressive and plain awful. If the Court's ruling stands, other Republican-controlled supreme courts across the nation are expected to follow Alabama’s lead. We must put the Court’s ruling in its proper perspective.  This ruling did not occur in a vacuum. I view the Court’s ruling as a tool to judicially boost the declining number of Whites in the state’s population by declaring frozen embryos to be "children." In 2016, for the first time in U.S. history, there were more white deaths than births in the United States, according to data from the National Center for Health Statistics.  Since that time, Alabama’s Republican-controlled government bodies and entities have taken extreme measures to slow or stop the decline of the state’s White population. Just so you know, Alabama's White population declined by 33,000 between the 2010 and 2020 Censuses. As of February 16, 2024, all frozen embryos in Alabama became “children” by judicial edict. Declaring frozen embryos to be “children" is an attempt by the Alabama Supreme Court to address the continuous decline in the state's White population. In 2023,  the number of frozen embryos in storage nationwide was estimated at 1.5 million by the National Center for Biotechnology Information at the National Institutes of Health.   The number of frozen embryos located in Alabama is estimated at 30,000. Because of the Court's ruling, these frozen embryos cannot be destroyed, discarded, misplaced, or lost for any reason without exposing the parents (and their IVF physicians) to serious civil liability and criminal jeopardy. For all practical purposes, the Court is treating these frozen embryos like living persons who enjoy the full protection of Alabama's civil and criminal laws. In a God-like manner, the Alabama Supreme Court just created tens of thousands of new “living [White] children” overnight. Wrapping himself in the Bible, Chief Justice Tom Parker wrote: “Even before birth, all human beings bear the image of God, and their lives cannot be destroyed without effacing his glory.” Of course, Parker is talking about White children. Parker believes that (a) White children are made in the "image of God" and (b) they will get to wave one of the pocket-size Confederate flags he hands out freely when they become toddlers. Well, if this isn’t a modern-day blend of Biblical and Deep South Confederate creationism by a wacko state supreme court, I don’t know what is.

By: Donald V. Watkins February 21, 2024 Thirty-nine years ago, three Black lawyers achieved something in Montgomery, Alabama that had never been accomplished before.  These lawyers were Billy L. Carter, Karen Lynne Neal Knight, and Donald V. Watkins. These three lawyers represented a severely injured Montgomery resident named Stanley Gamble in an automobile-truck accident case where the plaintiff's injuries were caused by multiple acts of negligence that rendered a rented U-Haul truck unsafe. The brakes on this U-Haul truck failed, thereby causing the vehicle to slam into Stanley Gamble's car four days before Christmas in 1984. As a result, Stanley Gamble was comatose for next several years. The case of Stanley Gamble v. U-Haul was brought to trial within eleven months from the date of the accident.  This was, and still is, a speedy trial record in a personal injury case. After a nine-day trial, a Montgomery County jury returned a verdict on November 27, 1985, for $4.1 million in Stanley Gamble’s favor.  At the time, this amount was the highest verdict for a personal injury case in America involving a comatose injury. The verdict was front-page news.  Media organizations around the nation recognized our achievements in Stanley Gamble's case. All three of us were quoted in media articles about the case. When it was all said and done, Billy, Karen, and I had achieved two records in the annals of American jurisprudence with Stanley Gamble’s case -- (a) we made it to trial in record time, and (b) we won a jury verdict in a record amount for a comatose accident victim. Nobody but Angela Gamble (Stanley’s wife) believed we could achieve this remarkable feat. Angela stood by us every step of the way, even when many Blacks in Montgomery tried to convince her to dump Watkins, Carter & Knight and use a local White law firm. We turned down a $1 million offer from U-Haul for a continuance of the scheduled trial.  The offer signaled to us that U-Haul was not ready for a trial. We did not associate any White law firm to help us develop and present the case at trial, which was the standard practice of Black lawyers at the time and remains so today.  We financed the trial preparation costs, including expert witnesses, via a $25,000 bank loan. The jury was comprised of nine Whites and three Blacks.  The trial judge was Mark Kennedy, who went on to become a distinguished Associate Justice on the Alabama Supreme Court. The courtroom was packed with mostly White observers when the jury verdicts were announced -- $4.1 million for Stanley Gamble and $15,000 for Angela Gamble (for loss of consortium). Several weeks later, we settled the case for about $4 million (which was "big money" in 1985). Billy, Karen, and I had the confidence we needed to get the justice our clients deserved. We took extreme pride in the fact that three Black lawyers in Alabama had established two national records in this 1984-85 case. After this remarkable achievement in law, embattled Mayor Richard Arrington, Jr., recruited me to Birmingham to serve as his special counsel for the next 14 years. Stanley Gamble passed away on December 7, 1997, in Montgomery. Karen Knight died on March 19, 2012. She was a brilliant lawyer, a great friend, and a wonderful law partner. Karen was serving as a Montgomery municipal court judge at the time of her death. I miss her dearly. Billy Carter is retired from the practice of law, but we regularly talk about our childhoods, careers, achievements, and families. In a recent conversation, Billy reminded me of our record-setting achievements in Stanley Gamble's case. I retired from the practice of law in 2019 and now focus solely on climbing the mountains of international business, which I enjoy immensely. I climb the mountains for my parents, my children, my K-12 teachers, and Billy and Karen.  I feel their positive "can do" spirit every step of the way. When I look back on my legal career with Billy and Karen, every record we achieved was deemed by many people to be impossible. Our talents, energy, goals, and positive outcomes in law knew no bounds.

By: Donald V. Watkins February 19, 2024 An Editorial Opinion From the day the Voting Rights Act was signed into law in 1965, regressive Whites across America have used every tool at their disposal to gut it. They got a big break in 2013 when the U.S. Supreme Court, in Shelby County v. Holder, eviscerated the Voting Rights Act on the grounds that "things have changed dramatically" since the Act was passed in 1965. The Court's ruling opened the way for a wave of voter suppression laws not seen in America since Southern legislatures purged blacks from the voter rolls in the late 1800s. White supremacy is on the rise in Republican-controlled legislatures, nationwide.  All-white appellate court systems, state government bodies, and election officials are in vogue, once again. Republicans have gerrymandered legislative districts at the local, state, and federal government levels to ensure "white minority rule" in states where the 2020 census shows a severe decline in the white population from the 2010 census data. Republicans have erected new barriers and resurrected old ones to suppress voter registration and election-day voting for Black and Brown Americans.  Republicans have also enacting new versions of the white supremacy "Redeemer" legislation that swept the Confederate states in the 1870s. Rather than avoiding the "political thicket," hyperactive federal judges around the nation have joined in the fray as protectors of the revived white supremacy political agendas. Racial discrimination against Black voters in Alabama was so bad in 2023 that the ultra-conservative, right-wing U.S. Supreme Court had to order a second Black Congressional district in Allen v. Milligan (2023). Black Representation in Government Today is Purely Symbolic Blacks who hold state and federal positions today have zero political and economic power.  Their official titles sound important, but their presence in the halls of power is merely symbolic.  Here are some examples: Through 44 agencies, the federal government spent $4.7 trillion in response to COVID-19.  Even though Blacks are 13.6% of the U.S. population, less than one tenth of one percent of this money went to Black-owned businesses. Additionally, the Federal Reserve funded up to $600 billion in five-year loans to support financial markets during the pandemic.   Not one dollar of the Federal Reserve’s $600 billion went to Black-owned businesses.  All totaled, Black-owned businesses received an embarrassing 0.06% or less of this $6 trillion investment in America in the three-year response to COVID-19.  Yet, no government official, Black or White or Democrat or Republican, complained about this economic disparity. All of this disparity occurred on the watch of the Congressional Black Caucus, which is famous for its annual gathering in Washington and attendant VIP parties.. On September 18, 2023, the U.S. Secretaries of Education and Agriculture notified 16 governors of a $12 billion disparity in funding between 16 Historically Black Land-Grant Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and their non-HBCU land-grant peers in their states. Out of fear, complacency, and/or incompetency, none of these 16 HBCUs pursued legal action or market-driven strategies to collect the $12 billion owed to these HBCUs.   What is worse, no Black elected or appointed officials in the states where these HBCUs are located advocated for the payment of this money to the affected HBCUs. Today, Black officials in local and state governments spend nearly all of their time trying to fund special projects for White developers and failed White business owners using taxpayer dollars derived from their financially distressed political constituents.  None of these officials have a publicly articulated Black economic empowerment agenda. Black officials in state and local government “prostitute” themselves, without political condoms, for White special interest groups on a routine basis, while NEVER fighting for anything of comparable value for their political constituents.  At this juncture, these officials suffer from the political equivalent of sexually transmitted venereal diseases. Black elected and appointed officials across the nation are silent about the things that matter to their constituents, especially when it comes to skyrocketing violent crime in their districts and a complete failure to invest money in Black communities. Blacks are in a Permanent State of Political and Economic Impotency The lack of a political and economic empowerment agenda by Black elected and appointed officials has exposed Blacks to a triple-whammy of bad outcomes. First, the Voting Rights Act has been gutted.  It was the only political tool Blacks have ever had. Second, Blacks serving in elected and appointed positions have been thoroughly neutered and rendered completely useless.  Many of them don’t even pretend to represent their Black constituents. Third, Black officials have been silenced on the things that matter to their political constituents -- public safety, quality education, economic empowerment, adequate healthcare, safe and secure child care, affordable housing, etc. Because they are all “whored out” to White special interest groups, Black elected and appointed officials will not or cannot fight for the political interest of Black voters.  Too often, these officials spend their time on their knees administering political fellatio to White special interest groups or taking orders from them. The most that we can expect from today’s Black elected and appointed officials is that they will gather among themselves, from time-to-time, to engage in “feel good” acts of mutual political masturbation where they hand out awards and plaques to each other for doing absolutely nothing. Personally, I do not participate in these mutual political masturbation exercises. Instead of solving skyrocketing violent crime in Black communities, these officials simply opted to get security details for themselves. Epilogue I don’t even bother to learn the names of today’s Black elected or appointed officials. If they had ever stood for anything that was politically or economically beneficial to the Black community, all of us would already know their names. With respect to the battle for voting rights in America, it is over.  Except for one district attorney in New York, one Black Attorney General in New York, and one district attorney in Atlanta, there are no Black elected or appointed officials who have real political "juice" in America. Regressive Whites have WON the voter suppression battles. They also "own" most Black elected and appointed officials. For the first time in this nation's history, Black in Americans are completely alone and unprotected in a sea of political hostility that targets them.