Booker's Senate record broke Thurmond's plea to 'go down fighting' against voting rights
With 25 hours and 5 minutes, Booker broke the Senate speech record held by Sen. Strom Thurmond who argued for a full day against the Civil Rights Act of 1957, which established voting rights protections for Black people.
After 20 hours of standing on the Senate floor, delivering what would become a record-breaking speech about the need for resistance against the Trump administration, Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey said, in a weary voice: “Don’t let this be just another day in America.”
By many indications, it was not.
With 25 hours and 5 minutes in total, Booker broke the Senate speech record held by Sen. Strom Thurmond of South Carolina, who argued for 24 hours and 18 minutes against the Civil Rights Act of 1957, which established voting rights protections for Black people.
Southerners “should go down fighting” against the bill, Thurmond said nearly seven decades ago.
“In honorable defeat they may sound an alarm to fellow Americans not yet awake to dangers to the republic,” he said. Passage of the bill “would be a defeat for all citizens of whatever race or region, for it would help to set the stage for dictatorship and oppression. The compromise on which passage now seems to hinge is only a deceptive detail in a dirty business.”
Rating: 5