mr. barry mcneely. [applause] >> thank you, sam. i asked them not to read off my bio because you have a long bio when you get off. so with that, just keep it brief. this evening i will dovetail on something in terms of what to place last night in our nation and with that in mind i would like to ask us to have a moment of silence. thank you. this evening we are talking about voting rights and in terms of talking about voting rights, i thought it would be fitting if we took a step back before we took a step ahead and look at how we got to where we are today in this democracy. when we started this country after the revolutionary war, voting was a privilege and in fact, a strong bane of this story that we tell is the history of the united state is the idea that the expansion of the vote. when we first began in this country, less than a quarter of its citizens could legally vote. there were barriers in terms of religion, barriers in terms of wealth, barriers associated with property ownership. as we move forward, we try to get rid of som