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Friday, September 23, 2016

These roots

There can be no peace without justice.
These roots of economic injustice in America run deep. 
These roots of racism run deep.
These roots of waging war on the poor run deep.
These roots of waging war on labor run deep.
These roots of murdering the just run deep.

They run through a thousand wars on Native Americans. 
They run through the Cherokee people on that "Trail of Tears". 
They run through Navajo people on that "Long Walk". 
They run through Wounded Knee one and two.
They run through the Standing Rock Reservation today. 

They run through every Black soul stolen from Africa's shores. 
They run through a million Black souls lost in that Middle Passage.
They run through that immoral clause a Black slave is 3/5 of a human being in our constitution. 
They run through every slave sale, every lash, every rape, and every murder of Africa's stolen souls. 
They run through Jim Crow.
They run through the lynching of 4,743 innocent Black American souls from 1882-1968. 
They run through Martin Luther King, Harry and Harriette Moore, Fred Hampton, Medgar Evers, Michael Schwerner, Andrew Goodman, and James Chaney. 
They still run deep today through Black Lives Matter.

They run through every law created to weaken labor. 
They run through the 11 lives taken by 300 Pinkerton Guards at the Homestead Steel Works.
They run through the 145 dead women locked in to burn at the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire.
They run through every Fast Food worker, Child Care worker, Health Care worker, and every worker fighting for 15 today.
They run through every occupier that stood at the gates of Wall Street.
They run through every Coal Miner, Steel Worker, Mill Worker, and every American whose job was sold out by the Wealthy, the Powerful, and the Connected.  

They run through a hundred million immigrant souls seeking justice in an America that sees cheap labor not human beings.   
They run through those "English Only" education policies.
They run though that Oriental Exclusion Act. 
They run through those that stand against the ones wanting walls around America.
They run through the soul of Cesar Chavez, and every farm worker who ever picked a grape.

They run through the Just that stood at Stonewall. 
They run through every LGBT soul saying I am here, I am proud, and all I want is the same rights as every other American.
They run through Susan B. Anthony, Harriet Tubman, Ida B. Wells, and every Suffragette who march for the vote, marched for justice, and stood for not only women, but children, and men.
They run through every Black Mother, whose unarmed child is killed by the police today.
They run through every mother, whose child suffering from addiction is told there are no beds in our treatment centers.
They run through every war veteran who has to fight for health care.
They run through every mother who can't pay for the medicine that can save their child.
They Run through the 49 states that spend more money on their wealthy schools than their poor schools.
They run through the Homeless, the Hungry, the Innocent jailed, and they run through me. 

I could go on, but these roots are too many for any one pen. 
Tonight I march with my Moral Monday and Black Lives Matter brothers and sisters in Hartford Connecticut.

I march, because while these roots of injustice run deep.
These roots of justice run deeper. 
I march, because I am empowered by living legacies of "justice denied shall not go unchallenged". 
These justice roots move me to march.  
I march tonight, because justice MATTERS.
These roots of justice compel me to march.
Jesse The Walking Man Turner


If you like to listen to what this walking man was listening to on his walk this morning its...Marvis Staples " Eyes on the prize" > https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ZWdDI_fkns <

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