what civil rights look like before brown, before we had that idea of jim crow? index of a black workers rights killers to do for them, what they thought jim crow did to them and how it harms none and in their idea was a lot prouder than brown versus board of education. it's not only was saying that black children are my children go to different schools. it's not only anti-miscegenation laws. it's also employers who only higher weight or hire african-americans only for the worst paid and most dangerous and worse condition jobs. if the federal government and the state government interfering in the economy and racially discriminatory ways. the image that comes out other cases that takes on african-american workers reveal a jim crow that is much more total, much more about deprivation and exploitation as well as stigma and symbolism and state-mandated thought. >> host: during that period, what with some of the success civil rights section? >> guest: the big success of the civil rights section had to do with agricultural workers in the south actually who are really a

it is in my view of the moral equivalent of jim crow. i'm always eager to read the there was a time that i rejected this talk out of hand. there was a time when i rejected comparison between mass and preservation and slavery and jim crow believe in those claims and comparisons more exaggerations', distortions or hyperbole. in fact there was a time people who made those claims and comparisons were actually doing more harm and good and efforts to reform the criminal justice system and achieve a greater racial equality in the united states. but what a difference a decade makes. for after years of working as a civil rights lawyer and advocate representing victims of racial profiling and police brutality and investigating patterns in cities of color and attending to assist people who've been released from prison to re-enter into a society that has never shown much use for them might have a series of experiences that began what i call my awakening. i began to weaken to a reality that is just so obvious to me now that what seems odd in retrospe

it is in my view the moral equivalent of jim crow. i'm always eager to admit there was a time i rejected this talk out of hand. i rejected comparisons between the mass incarceration and slavery believing that those kind of claims and comparisons were exaggerations and distortions, hyperbole. in fact there was a time i thought people that made those kind of claims and comparisons were actually doing more harm than good to the efforts to reform our criminal justice system and achieve greater racial equality in the united states. but what a difference a decade means. for after years of working with the civil rights lawyer and advocate representing the victims of racial profiling and police brutality in the investigating patterns of drug law enforcement in the communities of color and attempting to resist people who've been released from prison re-enter into a society that have never shown much use for them in the first place i had a series of experiences that began michael my awakening. i began to awaken to a racial realities that is jus

for them once you remove the jim crow barriers, their agenda is gone. then it's just a matter, and in fact at that point they are over qualified. opportunities are going to open up because now they are no longer facing explicitly racial barriers. jobs are opening up. so for them they don't need another one. for the black poor, the movement is just beginning. getting the vote, getting the right to go into a restaurant and going to a hotel. if you are poor, what if you gained? >> host: but a larger amount of us are still poor and there is the silence. >> guest: well i think one thing that happened before that is people who came out of the middle class saw their responsibility to know and help mobilize those who are poor and destitute. that is what sncc was. the college students, the sons in the grandsons and granddaughters of the black peasants. people like myself. my mother grew up in rural florida and segregated schools. >> host: where was your father from? >> guest: originally from alabama but he was part of that lack migration that went to detroit in

my grandma would not let them go because of the jim crow laws.sed they would never stop us from doing our dream. they were our greatest sense. -- fans. we did not know how good we were. i used to sing my way into the movies. >> how did that happen? they would let you in? >> yes. >> you just go to the game without a ticket, and they say, go on in. you mention your brother charles, who went out on the show. i was about to ask you. you are on may 27, so you were not around in the day of jim crow and segregation. since you were there, what was your experience with that common and not now and what obstruction did you have to overcome as a result of the time? >> you knew where you were not wanted. iyou did not go. even if we were playing music in those days, we could play music, but we could not go out into the audience. sometimes the dressing room was outside in the back. tavis: there were shows when they said you can perform, but don't you dare come in the audience? >> they did not say it like that, but we know that. >> you got the get your black beh

unfortunately now old jim crowe is trying to make a comeback.nder section 5 of the voting rights act, the states shown on this map need permission from the federal government to make changes to voting regulations. for instance, let's take the state of mississippi, as dr. king was talking about. if mississippi wants a voter id law, they have currently have to prove that it will not discriminate against minorities. tomorrow in front of the united states supreme court, attorneys for shelby county, alabama, will say that special protection for minorities is outdated. they want to change it. that's in spite of the fact that the voting rights act was reauthorized by president george w. bush back in 2006. frankel liss, an alabama attorney says registration of white minority voters in shelby county, alabama, has been the same for a decade. his quote was the south has changed. it's not the same as it was in 1964. the whole country has changed. we are a dynamic society, not just in alabama, but everywhere. wait a minute, not everywhere. in florida last ye

hearing about his grandfather while he was coming of age and a radicalized him to be living under jim crow in alabama while hearing about the fact black people used to have political power and be in office including his own family. >> who was he? >> he was my great grandfather, handsome man, isn't he? she was the first black lawyer in the state of alabama and architect of reconstruction. i grew up listening to my father repeat this over and over. as a teenager my eyes would roll and in this book i go off in search of the source of my father's passion and find the outline but he was admitted in 1878 -- >> to the alabama barp? >> not the first but the fourth colored lawyer in the state and he did serve in reconstruction during the reconstruction surfed to terms in the alabama legislature as a radical republican. my father always made it clear as a radical republican. he was in the architect by the time he got elected reconstruction was already closing down. but my great grandfather, the gentleman in the picture for the next 40 years never stopped giving up on this idea people of color have a

montgomery in 1957 and spends the second half of her life in detroit, fighting the racism of the jim crow no.. she leaves the south and this movement, and she has this new place in which she is struggling in, and that is not getting the same kind of attention. by the 1990's and 2000's -- in many ways, in the wake of the establishment of the king holiday we see the history of the hall they get reshaped and twisted it into this story of an american movement that rises up and changes america and then we vanquished racism, and then there is martin luther king and rosa parks. that is a very happy story, makes us feel good about ourselves as a nation, and that story, i think, is at the center of the kind of national spectacle. >> who was rosa parks hero? >> she describes it as malcolm x. she loved, admired -- she had tremendous admiration for king, but she describes of the backs as her personal hero. she was a lifelong believer in self defense. she gets that from her grandfather. malcolm x.'s willingness to talk about northern liberalism, hypocrisy. malcolm x early opposition to the vietnam war

rights act in place in 1965. >> well, rosa parks, during world war ii, they gave her a bunch of jim crowy wouldn't let her vote in alabama and she was going to take it to the courts. she eventually got the right to vote and she fought hard for it and in the 1960s, rosa parks wasn't just the person who sat on the bus in montgomery in 1955. she walked. she protested. she marched on behalf of the voting rights act from montgomery to alabama. so as roland said, a wonderful moment of unveiling a statue and then having this happen at the same time, they brought it into the conversation. >> that's exactly right. let's talk about rosa parks because you have an op-ed that has just come out here. we see the president unveiling the rosa parks statue. you think she might be embarrassed somewhat by this? >> well, certainly be embarrassed by the voting rights situation going on right now but more than that, she was a very self-deprecating individual. she didn't do anything to make herself look good. she was about grassroots activists and when i interviewed her for my biography, her big heroine and bar

lines, and long lines and ending early voting, and stopping those going to the polls, showed that jim crow'sson, james crow jr. is still trying to do what his daddy did. and that is rob us from the right to vote. >> joining me now is the co-director of the project which focuses on democracy and race. and i just want to get your thoughts on oral arguments today. i think we knew going into this, the last supreme court case this court looked at on the voting rights act, showed a tremendous amount of skepticism and hostility. i wonder, was today surprising to you? >> no, not surprising. i mean, you know, you have justice scalia, i think showed a little bit more of his attitudes towards section five, and towards race discrimination, and race discrimination issues also. his whole comment about this is a racial entitlement is just incredulous. you know, i haven't known in this country where we have had a time where there has actually been some entitlement because of race. in fact, when we look at section five, it is protection, not entitlement. and then justice sotomayor, thank goodness she was the

for them once you remove the jim crow barriers, their agenda is gone. then it's just a matter, and in fact at that point they are over qualified. opportunities are going to open up because now they are no longer facing explicitly racial barriers. jobs are opening up. so for them they don't need another one. for the black poor, the movement is just beginning. getting the vote, getting the right to go into a restaurant and going to a hotel. if you are poor, what if you gained? >> host: but a larger amount of us are still poor and there is the silence. >> guest: well i think one thing that happened before that is people who came out of the middle class saw their responsibility to know and help mobilize those who are poor and destitute. that is what sncc was. the college students, the sons in the grandsons and granddaughters of the black peasants. people like myself. my mother grew up in rural florida and segregated schools. >> host: where was your father from? >> guest: originally from alabama but he was part of that lack migration that went to detroit in

leave my camera and spends more than half her political life in detroit, challenging racism of the jim crow north. finally it provides less insight for what it takes to make change in a moment and over the course of a lifetime and what her legacy asks of his. so who was rosa parks before the boycott? parks had a history of being rebellious. she was raised by her mother and grandparents are toppers that you stand up for herself. her father was a fellow of marcus garvey. there was no education provided for but children past the sixth grade from a separate sacrifice her mother sent her to the school for gross here in montgomery. brazil is a reserved grow, it is bit of a goody two shoes who follows cool prohibitions against dancing, movies, makeup and shorthaired, the shia to feisty side. when they were threatened by a wide holy, she picked up a brick and threatened to hit him. he stopped. when a young boy pushed him in front of his mother, she pushed back. when the mother threatened to kill her, she said he pushed me and i didn't want him pushing me. parks met and fell in love with raymond par

montgomerie and she spends more than half of her political life in detroit challenging the racism of the jim crow no.. finally it provides lessons, i think, for us today, what it takes to make change in a moment and over the course of a lifetime and what her legacy asks of us now. who was rosa parks before the boycott? she had a life history of being rebellious as she put it. she was raised by her mother and grandparents who taught her to stand up for herself. grandfather was a follower of martha starving. there was no education provided black children past 6 grade so great sacrifice her mother sent her to midwife school for girls in montgomery. roselle was reserved girl. a bit of a goody 2 shoes her friends 5, who followed this will's prohibitions against dancing, movies, makeup and short hair. but she had a feisty side. when she and her brother were threatened by a white boule, she picked up a brick and threatened to hit him. he ducked. when a young boy pushed her in front of his mother she pushed back. when the mother threatened to kill her, she said he pushed me and i didn't want him pushing

just as many people were dying to jim crow and they would say yes, yes, it's a shame. but that is just the way that it is. so many people today view the millions of cycling in and out of our prisons today as just an unfortunate that an alterable fact of american life. i'm quite certain that doctor king would not have been so resigned. i believe that if we are truly, truly to honor doctor king, if we are to ever catch up with him, we have to be willing to continue his work. we have to be willing to go back and pick up where he left off and do the hard work on behalf of poor people of all colors. in 1968, he told advocates of the time it comes to transition from the civil rights movement to the human rights movement. meaningful equality cannot be achieved through civil rights alone. without basic human rights, the right to work, the right to shelter, the right to quality education. without these human rights, civil rights are an empty promise. so in honor of doctor king and all of those who labored the old jim crow, i hope we will commit ourselves to building a human rig

was always a medical act to this tradition, so i think we understand the forms of discrimination, jim crow racial segregation that we understand this is part of the early 20th century african-american life also included health care. if you go back across the 20th century to the organizations in the initiative we think is important, health care is always there. one way of thinking about the black panther party is to put them in this genealogy of people like marcus garvey who had a cadre of nurses. people like nonviolent coordinating committee come which people know how, but also had an arm that tenet to activists who are during the civil rights movement and essentially local communities. we need to understand the black panthers turned to health care both this and think strategic and internal to what they were dealing with in the late 1960s and early 1970s, but also a larger tradition and responding to medical discrimination. >> host: what transpired with the black interparty medical care clinics >> guest: lots of interesting things. by the late 1960s the national network of health clinics w

and i was raised by parents who raised ten children in jim crow education.n who was born a slave. and i talk about that in "reimagining equality." seeing that in two generations that my family moved from being property to owning property is one of those things that's inspiring. and it says, look, if you can't be optimistic you really have already lost because you've seen so much positive change. not just in my lifetime but also in the lives of people that you love. >> i'm always moved by your strength, your courage, your brilliance, and your insight. i'm grateful you spent time with us today. >> oh, this was a pleasure. thank you so much. >> stay right there. we'll be back with more "our world with black ♪ [ male announcer can a car be built around a state of mind? ♪ announcing the all-new 2013 malibu from chevrolet. ♪ with a remarkable new interior featuring the available chevrolet mylink infotainment system. this is where sophisticated styling begins. and where it ends? that's up to you. it's here -- the greatest malibu ever. ♪ >>> welcome back to "our wor

there is a professor michelle alexander and aclu attorney and "new jim crow" book and talked about the issues as it relates to drug issues and how that's a civil rights concern and that book has taken off and inspired a lot of people and lead to the human rights commission's hearing that happened and i think as a commission we should definitely as uncomfortable and difficult this topic is we're not shying away from looking at it. we might have a different analysis but it's important to take that time so thank you. >> i want to be careful. our officers in san francisco are diverse. it's one of the most diverse in the country. we have training and occ does a mag 95-cent job looking at that and. >> >> making sure things are race thought ral and you have to be. >> >> careful when you throw things out there and our officers are the best in the business. i was speaking to officer monroe and the guy said -- >> he did that in the context of his work. >> his work. >> i got your back inspector. >> he made that distinction many times. >> right. >> put him out there in a muni uniform to buy them.

of these difficult second half of her life in detroit, challenging racial discrimination of the jim crow north, housing, schools, police brutality. her description of detroit is the northern homicide and that lesson is that palpable reminder to racial inequality was a national plague, not a southern malady. while the public signs a segregation were thankfully gone from a rosa parks not find too much different between race relations in my primary or detroit. in 1964, she volunteered for a political campaign by a young civil rights lawyer by the name of john conyers, who's running on a platform of jobs, peace and justice in both conyers and rosa parks or very early opponents of the war in vietnam. so she starts volunteering on his campaign and actually persuades martin luther king was not doing any kind of political endorsement. she prevails and came to come to detroit to make an appearance for john conyers. this is an extremely crowded with the people running and conyers wins the primary by less than 100 votes than 40 votes and very match attributes part of why he wins to rosa parks preva

powerfully than its religion, and the african american inner city is strong and growing strong under jim crow. monday night at 10:00 on mpt. >> catch a free look at upcoming programs and events and find it online. >> programs on

so these were times in which blacks were challenging the old order, before the jim crow laws. i suspect that those years influenced her attitude about herself and her sense of self possession that women sometimes do not demonstrate and do not evoke today. >> hinojosa: so you have a fascining life story. and one of the things that i found so interesting was the fact that your mom, who is a preacher... because when i would look at you and i'd see you, you know, representing planned parenthood, and you were just always just owning your power and owning your dynamism and your voice, and it was so revealing to find out that your mom basically had a lot of problems about the fact that you were doing this, that you were talking about reproductive rights. >> my mother was a fundamentalist minister. she sought the ministry, or she felt the calling to th ministry, at the age of 17. so the bulk of her life, 70 years... she retired from the ministry at 87. and she believed literally in the teaching of the bible to be fruitful and multiply. >> hinojosa: so how had was that for you to negot

jim crow may be dead, but he's still got some nieces and nephews that are alive and well. and until every single descendent -- descendent of mr. jim crow are dead and buried, we at the congressional black caucus believe that the section 5 preclearance requirement of the voting rights act remains as relevant today as it was when it was passed in 1965. i yield back the balance of my time. mr. horsford: thank you representative jefferies. mr. speaker, may i ask how much time we have remaining? the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman has 13 minutes remaining. mr. horsford: thank you, mr. speaker. mr. speaker, as we have discussed this evening, as the congressional black caucus, voting rights are an issue that all americans are entitled to. and we should be helping more voters participate in our democracy, not creating laws that prevent or discourage anyone from voting. and as my colleague, the co-anchor from new york, mr. jefferies, just explained, we have made tremendous progress in recent history in securing the right to vote for many minority communities. a fully free and de

just as many people were resigned to jim crow in the south and would say, yeah, yeah, that's a shame, it's a shame, but that's just the way that it is, i find that so many people today view the millions cycling in and out of our prisons and jails today as just an unfortunate but inalterable fact of american life. well, i'm quite certain that dr. king would not have been so resigned. so i believe that if we are truly, truly to honor dr. king, if we are to ever catch up with king we have got to be willing to continue his work. we have got to be willing to go back and pick up where he left off and do the hard work of movement building on behalf of poor people of all colors. in the 1968 dr. king told advocates the time had come to transition from a civil rights movement to a human rights movement. meaningful equality, he said, could not be achieved through civil rights alone without basic human rights; the right to work, the right to shelter, the right to quality education. without basic human rights, he said, civil rights are an empty promise. so in honor of dr. king and all those who la

>> the call for universal background checks for institutional rights invokes painful memories of jim crowssed with a brain actually think background checks might nullify a gun application will not result in even fewer law-abiding black men from obtaining a weapon to protect their families? >> civic and religious leaders held this press conference this morning. participants want to protect the se second amendment. they worry proposed legislation could strip americans rights to protect themselves and their property. the group hopes the day's events can help rally others to help support their cause. ♪ >>> music is helping some students in prince george's county deal with the loss of two classmates who were killed this week. the school hosted a concert last night for the community. it comes after the death of ninth grader charles walker jr. the next day, someone killed aaron kid. police arrested five people in walker's murder, but so far, no arrests in the kid case. >>> and today, we're going to find out if exhausted efforts to generate millions for transportation projects in virginia were fo

jim crow. what do they all have in common? government sponsored racism. one more dot. federal gun laws that facilitate the flow of illegal firearm as into our urban is sectors across this country that are killing our black and brown children. >> judge jeanine: this chief of the third largest police department in the the nation also says judges should rely on public opinion polls when interpreting the constitution since they are too dumb obviously to do it on their own. and to his interpretation of the second amendment would require gun owners to carry a million dollars liability insurance policy and a gps tracking decente device on civn owned guns. hey, who needs a search warrant. okay, gary, if your definition corrupt is when i support an elected official who believes in the second amendment that right to bear arms, then by your very own definition your boss, chicago mayor rahm emanuel must also be corrupt since he receives donations from the big wigs in hollywood and the moosic industry. the same industry that sells blood soaked violence movie, video games to our kid

universal background checks is qualifiers for constitutional rights in both painful memories of jim crowa substantial body of research shows that gun controls empowers criminals and weaken law-abiding citizens. >> leaders are calling for a serious national dialogue on the gun control issue. >> the gun debate across the barista counters of northern virginia counters. gun rights activists were showing unity and support of virginia gun laws. bob barnard is here to explain tonight. bob. >> reporter: the message is simple. especially where it's openly legal to have firearms. we stopped at this starbucks and found more than a dozen men and women enjoying their coffee and packing heat. >> it's a .9-millimeter. >> she's crystal fox. >> everyone is big on having their free speech and stuff. the second amendment, make sure you have your first amendment. >> reporter: they're paytonizeing starbucks for being neutral. starbucks wouldn't let us bring the news camera inside. this is what it looked like, men and women having conversations and didisplaying their handguns openly in compliance with virgini

jim crow was strong in the south at that particular time. all over the nation really. and there were certain attitudes how far black man or what a black man was able to do. he had to deal with a lot of that. when he joined the secret service, there were people who didn't want him to be in there. the director, really wanted him to be a part or wanted african american to be a part of the secret service. a lot of people really didn't want him. he took the civil service exam. passed with flying colors. had to go down to georgia for an interview and they failed him saying that he spoke incoherently. this man had graduated from north carolina central university magna cum laude. so he was very articulate. of course, he was failed in that regard. he went to the naacp and they were able to get a monitor to go over the interview again. and of course they accepted him. then they said he couldn't see. they said his eye exam. so in other words, he was very persevere ant. >> he didn't take no. we're going to stop you there. want everybody else to pick up the book and pay for the res

they were really about jim crow. and lincoln is about how politics practiced for a good purpose can get something done, even today, something historic and glorious. and by the way, put me down as a seth mcfarland fan. there are things i would have cut from the lines. but this guy reminds me of the good old days of bob hope and johnny carson. he brought back show business in the academy wards and set up shirley bassy singing "gold finger" 50 years later and that great production number from "les mis" and my friend barbara streisand. finally, you know i like jennifer lawrence winning for best actress. she really s and that's "hard ball" for now. "politics nation" with al sharpton starts right now. >> thanks, chris. thanks to you for tuning in. tonight's lead, gop hack job. there are just four days until $85 billion of spending cuts are scheduled to kick in. these cuts would be disastrous. and may also throw millions of people out of work and hurt our economic recovery. the president wants to stop these cuts by closing

fallout and the answer isn't to just not have desegregation, not to have listed segregation laws and jim crow. obviously that is not the answer. i think there were federal policies that made it attractive for people to move out of the city and into the suburbs and took part these vibrant neighborhoods that used to exist and come in and so on so it wasn't just a little move to the suburbs all of a sudden. this was federal policy choices and local policy choices to make this easy so the people that had the money to go out could get out. so, you know, i think that there was issues but it wasn't just desegregation. there was a lot of other things that went on to facilitate what went wrong. so just as desegregation didn't fix the achievement gap, it helped probably but it also didn't cause all these problems that it was one of the factors. >> host: i think your book has that complexity and the masterful way talking about the supreme court because that you mentioned while this was rooted in the grassroots activism parents for themselves in the neighborhood in some ways ultimately becomes a supreme

to prevent racial discrimination, to stop the taxes, literacy taxes and violence rampant across jim crowe south. nine states are required, mostly in the south, to get federal permission before changing their voting procedures. this provision stopped unfair voting changes like districts redrawn to minimize the vote of african-americans. recently, it's been used to block photo id laws in south carolina and texas. and cutbacks in early voting in florida. yet, in 2009, chief justice roberts wrote quote, things have changed in the south. yes, things have changed. clearly not enough. just this past fall we saw new voter id laws and voting lines that were far too long. the voting rights act works and it's been renewed by congress again and again by overwhelming margins. put a surprise winning supreme court reporter linda greenhouse writes, if the court strikes down this part of the voting rights act, it would be, quote, a truly radical move, a march off a cliff of the court's own making. something that is unprecedented. racial entitlement? that's offensive justice scalia got it totally backwards

there was this very detrimental fallout and the answer is not to have lifted segregation laws and jim crowobviously that is not the answer. i think there were though federal policies that made it good for people to move out of the city and into the suburbs and the vibrant city neighbor that used to exist. so it wasn't just individual choices saying hey let's all move to the suburbs all of a sudden. this is federal policy choices and local policy choices to make this easy for the people who have the money to to get out to get out. so you know i think there were issues but it wasn't just a segregation. i think there were a lot of other things that went on to facilitate what went wrong. justice desegregation didn't fix the achievement gap that helped probably but also it didn't cause all these problems. but it was one of the factors. >> host: i think your book really spotlights the complexity and a real masterful way. talk to me about the supreme court because that becomes a pivotal moment. you mentioned while this is rooted in activism, black mayors mayors -- and central high school ultimate

. >> why are we still doing jim crowe stuff? why are we still on slavery terms?hy are we putting ourselves through this? >> so vision is focusing on a conversation about skin color and identity with about 50 other young poets. among the questions they will be tackling, who is black? >> race is a social construct. you are who you say you are. >> what makes you black? >> is black your skin, your culture, your experiences, your struggle? >> who determines who is black? >> the irony is who is black is determined not by black people. >> and how does skin color divide black america? >> we are very aware from our lived experiences that skin color matters. >> once you've identified -- >> these are uncomfortable, often painful questions. >> you have to stop trying to push people in boxes that we are not comfortable in. it's not about me. it's about nio's path, about becca's path. >> the journeys down these paths are just beginning. why are you so reluctant to say i'm black. deal with it. >> i am -- >> i am -- >> i am. abby needs everything to throw a big party for the big

and the long lines and the ending early voting and the stopping sunday to the polls showed that jim crowe's son, james crowe jr. esquire, is still trying to do what his daddy did, and that's rob us from the right to vote. >> james crowe jr. esquire, msnbc's reverend al sharpton speaking on the steps this morning, advocating that the supreme court leave the act alone, arguing there is still need in this country for protection it offers. when i got to the supreme court this morning to go inside and listen to the case, the first sign that i saw at the protest on the steps when i arrived was this one. i think we've got one shot of it. yeah. it says "martyrs". and the names there are scharner, james chaney, goodman. we remember them as the civil rights workers murdered in philadelphia in 1964. what we remember about them particularly today is that what they were doing in philadelphia and mississippi, what they were risking their lives for, and what they ultimately gave their lives for specifically was voting rights in messy. they were registering people to vote, registering african-americans to

law in the background check -- can you talk about the jim crow law and the background check?> the first gun laws in america started in virginia. from 1640, there has been a longtime history of rules against who. has the guns the first gun law was against the americans, africans, and chinese servant. it has grown every 30 years since then. there was an institution of the black code. it was instituted as a habitual thing for the african community that and you want to keep your child out of jail. if he had even a dog in your property, you could be pulled out by any citizen. the rules continue that way. mothers would say i cannot what my boys playing with guns. not because of the second amendment but to keep them alive. when you had everything against you, and we moved, it got even worse in the cities. all the laws were put exactly where the black people were. chicago and detroit became the styptic places because they wanted to keep us in -- became the strictest place is because they wanted to keep us in check. so when is a registration, it is a button for me. -- when you say reg

so i called in one of my favorite thinkers, michelle alexander, the brilliant author of "the new jim crow." how are you, professor? >> fine. thank you for having me here. >> great. i think the war on drugs creates the pipeline, it turns us in to felons and can't get a job, can't be in public housing. it sort of ruins your life, criminalizing people who make youthful mistakes, often nonviolent with marijuana and it becomes a permanent mistake in their life. it creates a lot of hopelessness in the young black men, especially. do you think, obviously, you think that's one of the greatest problems in our community. >> absolutely. you know, here we are in black history month when, you know, some americans pause if only briefly to consider our racial history and our racial present and the possibilities for our collective future and it's 50 years after the march on washington. it's 150 years after the emancipation proclamation. and yet there are more african-american dults under control and on probation or parole enslaved in 1850, decade before the civil war began. and in some major urban areas

and the 1950s about the biblical times, they were really about jim crowe and the need for civil rightsand "lincoln" wasn't about something that happened in 1865. it's how politics practiced for a good purpose can really get something done even today. something historic, even glorious. we ought to take a lesson from that and by the way, put me down as a seth macfarlane fan. i know there are some things i would have cut from his lines last night, but this guy reminds me of the good old days of bob hope and johnny carson. he brought back showbiz to the academy awards and the powerful moments like shirley bassey singing "goldfinger" 50 years later and the great production from "les mis" and barbra streisand paying

in reality, they want to go back to the bad old days, the days of jim crowe laws. well, the supreme court heard oral arguments today in a case brought by shelby county in alabama. during the hearing, a key provision of the voting rights act came under attack. it's section 5. section 5 gives federal authority over voting rights in states with histories of racial discrimination. it has been reauthorized by the congress, my friends, on four different occasions. we've been down this road. recently section 5 was invoked to block discriminatory voter id laws in texas and in south carolina. although conservative supreme court justice antonin scalia dismissed the protects of the voting rights act as a perpetetuation of racial entitlement. it shocked a lot of americans today. scalia continued whenever a society adopts racial entitlements, it is very difficult to get out of them through the normal political processes. meaning congress has no clue what they're doing, we'll take care of it here at the court. this man is a supreme court justice. to him the constitutional right