To show they are serious, African-Americans are turning out to vote in huge numbers. For example, they posted a 5 percent increase in turnout in Florida last year from 1996. There are many social ills that still pain us and will continue to for the foreseeable future. But, of course, the greatest social ill of Lincoln's time, or King's time, was racism. The racism that was born here long before the Civil War will forever haunt our national soul.
Racism is hate.
And, hate, in the end, is a fear of change, of those things or people that are different from us. It will forever be with us. Above life and death and everything that comes in between, it will take the unending passage of time. And, perhaps no age of humans that houses people with different skins will ever be able to truly forgo the past. Still, as life goes on, America has the power to become better, using the past as a safeguard, to accept our differences, to reach out to our neighbors with open arms.