 Hello, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Max Parthas. You are here for the Abolish Slavery National Network Anniversary Celebration 2022. We're going to start yourself with some fire right off the bat. I want to introduce you to one half of Maximum Impact Poetry. She is a world-renowned spoken-word artist, multi-published, multi-recorded artist, as well as the other half of my life. My wife, Shrivel Ring. Give it up for Shrivel Ring. Max Parthas, truth happens. When you look into the actual faces of the oppressed and the oppressor, you can't hide or deny what you see, one must always be the lesser, and one, the overt aggressor. See, being hunted is never going to turn out well for the prey. Having to eke out a plan to survive while continuously looking over your shoulder, wondering what, or should I say who, will be snatched up next? How many will they hurt or kill? Come on folks, we all know the drill. We all grew up in the valley in the shadow of truth. How many paints of blood will they exact for our imagined sins? It's as if being born black for an option and our pre-conscious opinions held sway. See, the Almighty had an opinion that day, so suck it up but a cup. We were born this way. And for most of us, the secret to dealing with the oppression is to deny its existence, as if we can afford the luxury of entertaining conscious distance, deliberately looking away as our people are being decimated by genocide, desecrated by pride, when the sad fact of the matter is most of us are unwilling witnesses dragged along for a ride, pulling out our cameras and recorders in order to the chronicle of you. Sheepishly bowing our heads when asked, well what did you do to assist in the struggle? To which most of us can only reply that we're out here trying to make a living. F, we're trying not to die. See, truth happens when you look into the actual faces of the oppressed and the oppressed. You can't hide or deny what you see. One must always be the lesser. When you look in the mirror, are you facing the truth? Are you existing in their lives? Whose face would I see when we're out to look in your eyes? See, the sad fact of the matter is if you're not going to stand up and act, then get out of the way. And let those of us who are consciously aware that slavery is still here and that the overseas are still hunting in America's hunting grounds, stand up and fight. Not just for our rights, but for your rights too. Even though you're doing all you can do to label us troublemakers, rabble-rousers, thieves, too ignorant and blind to realize that they're hunting you too. See, any brown or black meat will do whether serving at the master's table. Where he'll dine on the flesh of the ignorant oppressed just as lustily as he sucks the marrow from the bones of the conscious food. Come on, get a clue. Seeing their eyes, black don't matter unless it pertains to slavery or servitude. How much money are you worth in their pockets? What role will you play in their prison industrial courts? The hour won't go down without a fight victim or a willing cohort. Make a conscientious choice. Because at the end of the day, it all comes down to this. Truth happens. When you look into the actual faces of the oppressed and the oppressive, you can't hide or deny what you see. And right here, on the American plantation, there's still hunting folks like me. And now that you know, what are you going to do to stop them? Put these down. Just a little bit here as we get into our panels. All right. All right, that's good. Okay, I want to start by introducing, first of all, our lead organizer for the last two years from the very start of this movement, Brother Kamal Allen. He is one of the people who was involved in removing the slavery exception clause from the Colorado State Constitution, which started all of this movement to begin. So, without further ado, ladies and gentlemen, Kamal Allen. Good afternoon. Good afternoon. Oh man, we're going to try that one more time. I know y'all's mouth is full of food. I said good afternoon. Here we go. I need to fill the energy in the room, you see, because this movement is filled with energy. So much energy. First of all, I want to acknowledge that we are guests in Vermont as the Abala Slavery National Network. So I just want everybody to give a hand to all the wonderful organizers in Vermont that helped make this trip. And if you know we are guests in this state, I want to affirm that borders are not real and that we are community from just a couple more miles away. So thank you for inviting us back home over here. We are gathering on this day on August 28th. Does anybody here know the historic significance of August 28th? Black August. Black August, yes. August 28th is one of the most historic days for black people living here in the United States. That this is the day that Emmett Till was lynched by a mob of white men. This is the day that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and other civil rights organizers led a march on Washington. This is the day that Hurricane Katrina made landfall. This is the day that Senator, at the time Senator Barack Obama accepted the nomination for president. And this is the day that we raise health today as an organization. You see, I'm an abolitionist. I am a slavery abolitionist. I am the descendant of the women and men who have survived the unspeakable. And I'm the descendant of the women and men who did not. As a descendant of those women and men, as a family member who has seen loved ones go in and out of prison, I grew up with an obligation to fight against the system. I know many of us here have grown up with very similar obligations. Some of my own colleagues here have family members still locked up. Many of my colleagues here know what it's like to take blow after blow after blow. With very little to no hope for seeing those loved ones or beating the system. That there were so many moments in our lives individually where we felt that this system is crushing our necks. And because of that, because we've suffered individually, it feels incredible to be here together and to feel the power that we actually do have. You see, that's why we're here. Power. This ASNN, the Abola Slavery National Network started off as an idea. And I can't take credit for that. It was an idea that started among many of the other organizers both here and those who are not present right now. But what began as an idea blossomed into a movement. Back in 2018, myself and Nathan helped to lead a very similar campaign as the one that you're leading here in Vermont into victory in Colorado. It was the second attempt to Abola Slavery in Colorado because it failed the first time. But we knew that we needed to be tenacious, that this is not an issue worth giving up. So we decided to do it again. And when we did, we quickly found out that we're not alone. That there were organizers across the nation who were already in the process of doing something very magical happen. That there were organizers in New Jersey, in Nebraska, in Utah, in South Carolina, in Texas, in California that were wanting to do exactly the same thing. So we had a mission. We said we're going to get everybody here on one phone call and see what happens. Because some of us had interactions outside of this. I actually remember being invited into Dennis Feebo's home where he in New Jersey had this incredible abolition summit that took place with all the most amazing abolitionists, artists. It was actually one of the most incredible things I'd ever seen. And the moment I knew that Dennis was going to be a lifelong friend and colleague was when he let me crash on his couch. And I was just vibing like I was a family member eating up all his food and everything. Wearing robes. You know what? But that's how I knew that we were going to be family for life. And that's what ASNN is. It's family. This is abolition family. And so when we got everybody on the call at the same time, it was a bit of an experiment. Let's see what happens. This was the year 2020. At the time, Nebraska and Utah were about to put something on the ballot for that year. As a matter of fact, it was on the ballot for that year. And many other states were about to do the same thing. And so almost instantly it was like chemistry just clicked. And we were sharing ideas and theories and power and once again energy. And what became of that is what grew from an idea to a national movement. The Obama Slavery National Network gives me hope. It gives me hope that we will one day live in a society where slavery is no longer acceptable for any reason, for anybody. Shout out to Marjana. Shout out to Marjana. It has been an honor to serve these past two years as lead organizer. We're not very much into titles here in this organization because really this work is about the network. This work is about y'all. Everything that ASNN believes in is possible because of the work that you all are doing right where you are. And together. But I will be transitioning out of this position in ASNN. I'll be going to law school. Thank you. I will be one of the lawyers litigating cases based on these amendment changes so I will still be in ASNN. But the person that will be carrying this through ASNN as lead organizer is Savannah. One of the most fearsome and capable leaders I've ever met. She is incredible and she's already served this organization well. And she's going to continue to do so. So I'm going to... So before I pass this off to the rest of the panel, I want everybody to stand up. I want everybody to stand up. I want you to put your fists in the air. I want you to repeat after me. I am a freedom fighter. I am a revolutionary. I am an abolitionist. I am an abolitionist. I am an abolitionist. There we go. Next up we are going to hear from our first panel, the members of our administration team. And then after that you're going to hear the second panel including the members leading active campaigns for this November. Tennessee, I'm sorry, Tennessee, Nebraska. Louisiana, Tennessee. Tennessee, Louisiana, Alabama. In Vermont. Oregon. And as well as a member of our federal campaign. Oh wow. Give yourselves a round of applause, we're going to transition now. I just want to let you know who we have up here. I'm starting from on my left, brother Dennis Feebo. Dennis Feebo has got a thought of this whole idea on the very beginning. He'll probably tell you about it, but it started in Hudson County Correctional Facilities with the kids there. And an idea that they had and a promise that he made. So Dennis Feebo on my left here, right next to me is Melina Cohen. Melina Cohen out of Nebraska. She literally ran a campaign nearly by herself and managed to abolish slavery in Nebraska as almost like a superwoman. A one woman trucker. She was amazing, you know. She had us and she has some other people, but mainly it was her getting it all done. So if she can do it and you're watching right now in a state and you think you can do it, yes, you can do it too. And then of course we have Kamala on my right and right next to him is brother Nathan. Nathan is one of the organizers from the original Colorado campaign as he mentioned before. And next to him is Savannah. Savannah Eldridge will be in the future coming up starting now as a matter of fact, our lead organizer. So I want to start passing the mic over to brother Dennis Feebo. Dennis, can you tell us, when you came up with this idea of all these different people that are working on this project coming together to create an institution, what was it you were hoping would happen? When I started the work in New Jersey, I started at Hudson County Correctional Facility. I had shown the documentary the 13th and kind of writing on Frederick Douglass' story that once you learn something about your condition and your status, then you would want to do something about it. So that was my goal with showing the movie kind of is leading into and for me at that point for all the work that I had already done to assist people, I knew that I had a block. There's nothing I could keep doing to guarantee that when our people would come home, they weren't going to go back in. No one that recidivism rate in this country, no one in my county and in my state, New Jersey, having the highest disproportionation racially in the entire country. I was just kind of fed up and looking for a way to get around it. So understanding that maybe if we attacked it at the root, 13th amendment at the time, some of the legislators had commented that they liked the work we were doing and I suggested in proposing that's how we got the New Jersey movement going. I didn't know Colorado had a move. I didn't know that. So one day I got up from bed and I was on Facebook and I saw Colorado and Flamie and I was like, what? I just flipped. You know, I started calling them in the fraternity and I knew we had brothers in Colorado so I called them and they got me a baller slave in Colorado and I called them more. And I was like, I just wanted to see them. I just wanted to see human beings who put their minds to something as big as so many other people, professionals, legislators, leaders of movements that tell me that this was impossible. That's what I kept being told over and over when I started it. When I met them, just regularized people came together and made it happen. And I went with the intent to record, which I did. I still have the footage, and to release it during the event. But Kamal blessed and came through and surprised and said, you know, I'm going to represent Colorado. So I was like, all right, we don't got to show the movie. We standing right here so that everybody could see. So knowing that Nebraska was reaching Utah and we knew anyone that does any organizing. If you try to hit it from just one angle, you're not going to be able to get it done. But when you start showing from as many different angles as possible, we figured if as many different states stood up and started their own state-based campaign, we would be able to launch at the federal level, trying to get it from the federal on the way down. We knew that that was going to be too much of an uphill battle. So it was a state-based movement. It became easier that way, even though for New Jersey it wasn't because we lost out just like Louisiana did. We got blocked in New Jersey. But I don't feel defeated because I've seen everything else that has come out of it, and I'm going to be here for my last breath doing this work. But that's how we can start. Thank you, Dennis. And next to him, Melina, my question for you is Superwoman. What was your favorite highs and lows of doing this work in ending slavery, constitutional slavery in the state of Nebraska? Well, I think certainly meeting you all and being a small part of this was a high point. Also, Election Day 2020, when we won with a supermajority. Supermajority. That was a big one. I think a low point was that I was alone for a lot of this. And so there were moments that felt kind of defeating, but I did always have the folks up here to turn to, in particular, turning to the Colorado organizers was a big help. Because I had worked on campaigns before, but I'd never run one and I just wasn't sure, like, what is the most effective messaging? And we didn't have money or resources to do, like, messaging polling. So just learning from Kamau and Nathan and others in Colorado what hadn't worked at first and then what did ultimately work, that was helpful in some low moments. Thank you very much, Melina. I appreciate that. I guess I'll tell a little bit about myself. I've been involved in slavery abolition now for about 15 years ever since I heard Angela Davis as you heard in the documentary that was at Washington earlier when she said we needed 21st century abolitionist movement. That was my click moment. I was like, okay, I get it now. I understand. And so I worked with a brother named Scotty Reed for about seven years on a program called New Abolitionist Radio. And we did a lot of study, a lot of research, and we would report on these things and really build and educate people for seven years. And then for the following three years after that, we did our own program called Abolition Today with Brother Yusuf Hassan, where we continued to educate and inspire. And along the way, a lot of people started hearing about this through the efforts that we were making to bring this to light. And I like to think that it influenced all of the campaigns to some degree and all of the people that were thinking about this, that whether directly or indirectly, they heard it. But when we formed up, we was like, okay, who's going to run the state campaigns? We need a state campaign guy. And it was like me and Dennis like, we'll do it. Why not? We'll do it. We'll do it. And we started reaching out to the different states like Maine. And I reached out to Vermont, who was already in the process of doing that thing and many others. And we told them what we were trying to accomplish and everybody was on board with it. And here we are today now with the Freedom V, which is five states that are on the ballot in 2022 where people can decide as a voter, as a citizen, that you don't want slavery in your constitution to be legal. You don't want it. And we also have three states behind us and with Rhode Island, which did it in 1854, I believe, that makes a total of four states. When we win these five, when we win these five, we are going to have nine states that have to buy the slavery in the United States. And in 2023, we have two dozen that are going to follow suit. They're ready to go. Florida's already got their legislation. Nevada's already been through committee. All they got to do is now is get the 23 and vote on it. So there's other states already in the process of getting this done. The whole goal as state campaign managers was to get the grassroots organizations ready, get the politicians ready, the legislators ready. Because in order to change the 13th Amendment, you need three quarters of the representatives on board. So we figured we would do that going state to state working directly with these legislators. So when we say it's time, we would make that happen. And we also introduced a joint federal resolution in 21st. We did it in 2020, but we did it again in 2021 on Juneteenth. It was introduced by Senator Merkley of Oregon and Congresswoman Nakima Williams of Georgia. They introduced the abolition amendment, which would repeal the 13th Amendment and replace it with a potential 28th Amendment that had no exceptions whatsoever including as a punishment for crime and to finally end slavery once and for all all across America. So that was the role that I ended up playing and falling into. And I'm looking forward to seeing these victories happen here in Vermont in Oregon who is unable to attend today. But shout out to our people in Oregon. They are doing great. As a matter of fact, Oregon is doing so good that right now the number one topic that people want to vote about with the polls that they did is this very issue right here, ending slavery in Oregon. It's even higher than universal health care to them where it should be, right? Yeah, that's pretty awesome. So shout out to our people in Oregon. Oasis. All right, so I don't want to talk too much. I want to get everybody a chance to say a few things along the way. So what I'm going to do is go ahead over to Brother Nathan. Nathan, you were one of your original OGs in Colorado and you were there for the first attempt. And yes, OG, you were there for the first attempt. One of the things that people don't know about this movement is we lose more than we win. You see these epic victories and they are truly epic. It never happened before, but we had to go through hell and high water to get there. We've lost 16 times since this effort has begun. Not with the ASNM in general, but overall since 2014. But we still managed to abolish slavery in three states. And we got five more on the list. So you felt that pain. Tell us a little bit about that and the determination that Kamal mentioned. Yeah, good this work. I have to say that in terms of what brought me into this work in the first place, I know that I'm descended from slaveholders. I know that I'm descended from people who work for abolition. I know from the work that I was doing in Colorado, I learned a lot about criminal justice, so-called criminal justice system there and what didn't work in it. And the suffering that it caused. And when you learn, you can't unlearn that. And when I learned about the 13th Amendment and the exception and what its impact was, you can't unlearn that. And when I had a good friend to Moki Emery through the Black Lives Matter movement who said, you know, we need to just repeal this exception clause in Colorado. And even in that group the response was, oh, that's never going to happen. But it did. It took some time. In 2016, it was on the ballot as an amendment team. And we didn't know what we were doing. We were just trying to get it passed with no polling data, very little money, just and no precedent that had happened. No other state had put that on the ballot and removed slavery that way. But it did happen. And when the election occurred, it was a very, very close election. 2016, that was a rough year anyway, but that was one of the roughest parts for me was realizing that that effort just barely failed by a fraction of a percent. And part of it was, you know, there were ways we could have had a stronger coalition. The language was a real problem. They called the amendment in the exception to involuntary servitude prohibition and parse that out and try to see if you know what that means. That was the problem. And so we learned some things from that. And when we went back and did it again in 2018 and that time come out was the lead organizer for that through Together Colorado. And it was wonderful to work with him. And we built a stronger coalition. And the name of the amendment that year was abolished slavery in all circumstances. We learned from what needed to happen. And so when that passed by a two to one margin, same state, same population, it shows that these differences really do matter. And then when people started reaching out to Kamau and connecting with him and we said, well, let's let's bring them together. I mean, this was right at the beginning of the pandemic. So everything was happening on zoom anyway. And all those early meetings were zoom meetings. We didn't get to meet each other face to face for about a year. But but this whole thing came together and more and more state connections have happened and the federal level work is continuing to grow. And I, you know, I just because of all of those historical pieces, I feel a responsibility to do this work. And I hope you feel whatever is the part of your own history that makes this important, that makes it salient to you, that you feel that obligation. And if you're listening that you feel that obligation to work on this because this isn't the end of the story. It's beginning of the story. There's a lot more with the criminal justice system that's wrong than this. But this is fundamental because it's in the Constitution. And it has been one of the joys of my life to work with this team. And thank you, Kamau. And thank you for stepping in Savannah. I am looking forward to working with you on this too. And thank all of you because it's one of the most important things I've ever had the opportunity and the blessing to work on. Thank you, Nathan. Sister Savannah, you have taught us some lessons along the way and other state representatives here understand that lesson that all states are not created equal. We can do the same campaigns in different states because in the south they are for real, for real about their slavery. They want their slavery. And they're not trying to hear nothing else about that taking away slavery. And we found that out really did a tough way with the Texas campaign about how they would act when we were presenting them with this idea. And we did put the bill in in Texas as she'll explain to you which didn't pass that time. But we're ready to do it again. Tell us a little bit about the hardships and the problems with this type of bill in the south. Thank you everybody for being here. Briefly, I just want to talk about the energy in the room. Because when Kamau was talking about energy, I really just felt like an overflow of just a gush of positive energy. And I don't know if it's the Holy Spirit, I don't know if it's the Allah. But I want you guys to understand how important it is for you to know who you are. That is really the driving point in this work. Whether as Nathan said, you find that your family members and you have a history of slave holders in your family, whether you are the oppressed, we all linearly are affected by this issue. I actually got in this work by being connected with somebody who's incarcerated in the penitentiary in Mississippi. And he saw an event that I did in Texas on social media and reached out to me and said, hey, I'm planning this event. It's going to be partially in person. It's going to be a partial webinar. Can you help? And I was like, well, what are you talking about? What event? And he said it's going to be called Free the Thirteen. And he told me about the premise, of course, abolish slavery and ending the exception. So I said, you know, I didn't know slavery was still legal. Like, I'm really a rookie at this. But as you can tell, like, I'm up here with these people now because, like, I may not win the war, but I'm going to keep fighting and battle after battle. We're going to do this thing. So I met Dennis. I met Matt. There were a lot of people and Jamilia was a part of the event. Shout out to Jamilia. Shout out to Jamilia. She started this with us. But we did a webinar. It was online and then a five-day webinar and at the summation, each representative, each state representative who was able to had an in-person rally or event in their state. And I was thinking about the ways that I can tie Texas in because I wasn't sure if anybody else was doing the work. However, Feebo and Max told me, hey, there's this guy doing the work in Texas. And Max says his name's David Johnson and there's two million people in Texas. So I'm like, David Johnson, like, you know, and then, and then the way I am, I'm like, okay, is he black? Like that's gonna narrow it down. But it just happened to be the one David Johnson that I didn't know. Right. And that's what I said. This is God's work. I told David, I was like, you're reaching out to my people. Let's do this together. And that's how the coalition to abolish slavery, Texas was formed. Right. And Texas is one of those states like New Jersey where we do not have language in our constitution about slavery and voluntary servitude. It actually defers to the 13th amendment. So we had to put language into our constitution that said that slavery and a voluntary servitude were prohibited. And I've never really written a bill, but, you know, I know how to strike things out. I know how to use the computer. So I was like, just add this in there. Our bill says slavery and a voluntary servitude are prohibited even as punishment for crime. And it was just that simple. Now I knew that the bill wouldn't get far because we didn't really have time to organize, but we did put on a very powerful organizing event where we had formerly incarcerated people who actually dressed up in the garments that are not the actual ones, but the colors and kind of a resemblance of what people on the inside look like in the state prisons in Texas. And they actually sang the cadences that they sang when they did the labor. We had a mock sale. And it was just a great event. And it was in the county where the Sugarland 95 are, which are the, you know, the convicts. Yeah. The people who are buried, they're actually on school property. However, anyway, our bill, House Law Resolution 51, did not receive a hearing. We were black balls, stone balls. They didn't answer my calls. Nobody wants to talk to me. So what I learned in this is we have to have minions, right? Because they hear my name that, oh, here she goes like my slave again. And I'm coming. Every time I'm coming. So my goal is to build our coalition to where we have leaders, we have emerging leaders who can not just speak, not to speak about the message, but who can actually teach because that's really important as we're learning to go out in the community and teach other people in our community. But anyway, that's how Texas got started. I'm just so blessed to be a part of this team and looking forward to refiling our bill in 2023. Yes. We might fall down, but we get up. That's right. We get up in Tennessee. They're on their fifth try. Is it fourth? What did he say, five years in a row? The senator? Okay. I know Ohio is on their fourth try now. California is on their second try. It doesn't matter how many times you're trying. The accomplishment is what you're after. They're trying is just the way that you're getting this experience until you're successful. The goal is to end slavery, to honor our ancestors and the sacrifices that they made and finally finish this job. And with that being said, I'm going to give a brother, come on another opportunity to say a few words before we get into some more poetry with Tribal Ray. I just can't, I cannot overstate how beautiful this moment is. You heard the stories of how this modern abolition movement has gained momentum. And I just want to say that this is only the beginning. This is only the beginning, that we will not rest until slavery is abolished once and for all in this country, both in law and in practice. So this is the first of many steps and what I'm inviting, what we are all inviting you to, is to take the rest of these steps with us that you do not have to do this alone. That this is a network, a national network of organizers, activists, people who raise hell, rabble-rousers, many students, troublemakers, people who talk too much, but we are beautiful, we are capable, we are abolitionists. Thank you. Thank you. Yes, when we say end slavery, that's exactly what we mean. This is slavery, the Constitution called it slavery and we should call it slavery too. We have the largest prison population that has ever existed on planet Earth. And it is very much race-based and always has been. It states like Louisiana, the vast majority of those inmates in the state are black people. We had a meeting recently where Reverend Anderson joined us on abolition today and she explained to us that 100%, 100% of the juveniles in their juvenile detention centers are black young men. 100%, like there's no white, bad kids in all of Louisiana. It's just all black kids. And we have more black men behind bars or in cages than the top five populated African nations do combine. That's sad. My wife and I are grandparents many times over and half of my grandchildren are young men and I have to explain to them that one in three of them are expected to go to prison. If that was a virus or a disease or something else, everybody would be trying to make sure that it ends, that we reduce that number, that this thing would be done. But for some reason, it doesn't seem like enough of us care that I have to explain to my grandchildren that one in three of them are going to end up in prison. And so we're going to do this work and you're going to be there with us to get it done. Would that be the same? Time for a Q&A, a quick Q&A. Yes, a quick one, yeah, we have a quick one. All right, so if you do have a few questions, let's go ahead and take them real quick for the Abolish Labry National Network Administration team. How does one get involved without roughing fathers? I feel like they don't want to rough fathers. How do they get involved though? Anybody want to take that one? How do you get involved? Well, so we love this question because we want you to get involved. So one of the ways that you can get involved, especially, you know, especially for those listening on the internet, we're going to ask you to go to abolishslavery.edu. That is the Abolish Slavery National Network website. Dot US. Dot US. See, the lawyer is already on the EDU thing. Abolishslavery.us. Literally all of my emails have been dot edu. The past like two weeks. But yes, go to abolishslavery.us. On there, you'll be able to email us directly. Now, the other thing too is if you are in one of the five states where slavery is being abolished, we ask you to be in touch with the organizers leading those campaigns. I cannot stress this enough because Abolishslavery National Network at its core is a grassroots movement. That at its core, we defer to the grassroots organizers leading these local campaigns. And because of that, we're going to ask you to get directly in touch with those members as well. And if you don't know how to get in touch with them, get in touch with us through our website and we'll be happy to connect with you. Thank you, Kamal. Yes, go to the website, join the mailing list. If you're looking online, you want to know how you can get involved. Just ask us, we'll send you directly to those organizers in the various states. Also make some donations. This does not happen for free. It costs money. It costs money to get us here. It costs money to do all that we're doing. So make a donation while you're there. And if you're going to participate in that campaign, by texting 252886 text 252886 one word. It's actually several words, but rented is one word and the exception. So and the exception 252886 and that will send a letter of support to your local representative as well as your federal representative. So you can do those things as well. You've got one more question. Where you at? Brother Isaac? Not so much a question, but we can't pass by this amazing moment and just go into poetry. I definitely want to acknowledge you guys. You guys are angels on earth. I mean, in this hell we're living in. I do want to elaborate more on what Kamau was saying. There is no losing in this fight. That's right. That's what I'm saying. There's more work. Ohio, Tennessee is one of their. Texas, California. They own their multiple tribes. So there is no stop. We just have to have more troublemakers and abolitionists. So, appropriate. We love troublemakers. Here we go. There's no losing in this fight. Absolutely. That's what I meant as well. There's no losers. We're just making our way to getting there done. Thank you, Isaac. Anyone else? The finger thing he gave me. He did this. Wrap it up, Max. I want to say thank you to all of my peers here in the Baloch Levy National Network. You guys are absolutely wonderful. So give it up for yourselves for doing these superheroes in my eyes. I also want to recognize those who are not here at this time, Jamilia Land of California, who ran ACA3, and her husband, Samuel Brown, who wrote the bill while he was inside prison. I also want to shout out to our fiscal sponsor, March On, who made a lot of things possible for us that were not possible previously and helped us to get some miracles done. I'm looking forward towards the future. And with that being said, once more, ladies and gentlemen, give it up for the wonderful tribal ram. People get ready. There's a change come. The revolution will not be ready. We'll be poeticized. It'll be broken down here, young minds. It's time, my people. It's time. Our 40 acres and a mule. I have a dream. Cushions the world over. Whispered words. Whispered words. Whispered words that echo and become shouts of revolution. Evolution, change. The revolution will not be televised. The revolution will not be realized. The revolution, Sean, will not be trivialized. It will not start on. Cannot go down without a fight. The revolution will be poeticized. We'll be kicking butts and taking names and timing lane games. Because our poverty starvation ain't no joke. It's killing us, people. Because the revolution is now. The revolution is now. And I'm going to need all of you to stand up, go out there and vote in November, and affect the change. That being said, that concludes the first segment of our panel discussion featuring the Abolishly Renational Network Administration members. And now we want to get into the second half of our panel discussion, which includes, of course, our host here and the states being represented here today. So if I can get our state representatives to come up to the stage here. And I believe Mark, you're going to be one of our reps. All right. Mark D, did you? All right, just give us a second. Come on up to the stage. Do you have a seat, then, our state representatives and our federal representative? Okay, I'm sorry, but so we'll have Savannah representing Alabama. Of course, we have representatives here from Vermont with Mark and Debbie. Louisiana's being represented by Brother Curtis. We have Tennessee with Jeanne. Jeanne here, and of course, the Federal Amendment with Brother Jorge. So I'm going to pass the mic over to you, Debbie. It's all yours. Hold on for a minute. So here's what we should do, Max. Actually, if you don't mind if Debbie and I can serve as a team. Sure. And then you can just facilitate. You want me to keep doing what I'm doing? Is that okay? Is that okay? You guys like Max? It's Max okay. How good is Max as a host? We're just keeping it. All right, all right. I mean, Debbie can team up here because we're partners. You can take me home with you today. Yeah, we've got a lot in common. All right, let me give you a win. All right, then, awesome. Let's start out by getting commentary from our hosts here today. You guys are wonderful. You made us feel so welcome. We feel blessed to know all of you and to be here with you. So Debbie? Well, thank you very much. It's an honor to be up here with all of you. Appalachianist, it's really exciting to be part of this historic movement. And it's always good to be with my good troublemaker, pal here, Mark Hughes. I would just say that I feel particularly blessed to be in a position in which I was the state senator who actually introduced the proposal to amend our constitution here in Vermont. And that was because... Oh, that. Yeah. It's a great honor. But that, what happened, you know, Savannah was talking about the Holy Spirit and God and all this kind of amazing stuff. What happened was when I was running for the state senate several years ago, Mark had a forum for candidates and he asked each one of us if we knew that our state constitution had allowed slavery. And we all, of course, were just, we were floored, we had no idea. And at that time, you know, I said, well, if I'm elected, I promise you we will do something about that. And so I did go on to get elected. And so I worked with Mark to come up with language to propose an amendment to the constitution and we worked hard to get it through the committees and it had to get approved by both chambers of our legislature twice. And so we worked together all through that. And then I actually ran for higher office and lost so I'm not in the senate anymore but I have continued to run an organization called Vermont Interfaith Action, which has since become a close partner with the Vermont Racial Justice Alliance with Mark's organization. And so we decided to team up to have this organizing campaign to get Prop 2 passed by our electorate, which is the final stage in getting the constitution amended. So I really, really feel doubly blessed that I've been able to see this campaign from different sides of the equation and absolutely that I've been able to work with Mark throughout this whole thing. Thank you, Debbie, awesome. Brethren Mark? Yeah, it's amazing, it's pretty amazing. When we were just to give y'all some perspective, because remember we were talking on the national side, we were talking about timelines about what was going on, what was happening in Colorado, like for example, what was happening in Colorado in 2018, for example, 2016 and so forth. And there's a lot of intersections too, like Faith in Action, which is former PICO, which is the national organization that's now our other national partner, but we'll get back to that. But the work started here in Vermont with actually C4 called Justice for All, that I started back in, I think it was 2014, having turned on media and found Michael Brown did and just in the wake of just Trayvon Martin at the time. He said, that's when I started the activism work, not the abolitionist work, but the activism work in starting Justice for All, C4, which led to a coalition that passed a major, what was meant to be a criminal justice system oversight apparatus, but it was during that work that with Justice for All, in coalition with maybe 35 other organizations, that we began to understand just the depth in the breadth of the so-called criminal justice system, as well as just the sprawling industrial complex, an industrial complex which is known as the legacy of slavery, systemic racism, as it's being produced out of housing, education, employment, health services, economic development. So that's what caused me to dig into the constitution because frankly, I was befuddled because I was just beginning to awaken to the realities of the realities. And I think that's what caused me to stumble across the constitution in 2015 in Vermont, understanding that there must be some source of our protection, of our safety, of there has to be constitutionally something that assures our human rights in this state. So in a search for that, I found the opposite, which was slavery in our constitution. And it wouldn't be until 2019 that we would have the opportunity to get it on the ballot because many of you know you can only get it on the ballot every four years here in the state of Vermont. So that's kind of how the work began. And peripherally, I did see Colorado arise, emerge and then crash and burn during that time. And quite frankly, over the time that we've been doing this work in the state, it was really from the outside in as opposed to the inside out, if you know what I mean Curtis. So there are some of us who are sitting on the outside like Christine is doing re-entry for about a dozen years here in Burlington. And me myself doing the national research and understanding that we have one in 14 black men in this state in prison right now. And despite the fact that only 1.4% of the population of the state is black, 11% of the prison is black folk. So the research was less, it had more to do with quantitative analysis and not a whole lot of the reality of what it is that we're having the opportunity to connect with now nationally. So now we see the connection. Now we're standing up and we're wide awake and we're understanding that this is not just a connection to the legacy of slavery which is systemic racism here on the ground in the work that we're doing. And we have continued to do since. But it's also a connection to a much broader challenge because the fact is, is that slavery was never abolished because the 13th Amendment saw to that and we wanna be one of those states that connect to the four states that have already made that commitment, the five states that are gonna make it this year and probably the dozen states that do it next year until we move to a point where we have about 38 so we can go in and do the real work of abolishing slavery as a nation once and for all. Amen. You know, just wanna add a little story to it. I remember one of my favorite moments of working with you guys here is when people from all over the country came to testify on behalf of what Vermont was trying to achieve. And that alone was wonderful but the next day was even better when Representative Peter, it was the last day, Peter? But Representative Peter, he was up, right? Was they? Let's call him Peter. Yeah, Peter. He was on and he was like, you know, we had all these educators and historians come in and tell us but nobody ever told us that not only were we the first ones to introduce an exception clause but it had expanded across the country because of what we had done. That's right, we learned that along the way. Right, and nobody seemed to have known that and that was a beautiful moment for us to see those eyes open like that to understand that you may not have intended to do major damage but major damage is what happened and an example of that would be Louisiana. Louisiana adopted that very same exception clause and they had a much more malicious intent to use it than Vermont did. So let's go ahead and speak to brother Curtis Davis who is the lead organizer for the Costa Rica, Louisiana and talk about those connections. How you doing again, Max Parthas? And I want to say thanks to Mark for inviting us out to hold this event in Vermont. Vermont is a lot of things and we talked about the racial equity problem which is really, according to one of my new close friends that I learned, it's just a form of apartheid, right? So when we talk about the type of work that you're doing down in Louisiana, gotta know everything based on race. But I found out some things about Vermont since I was here. Did you guys know that there's 42,000 people in the city of Burlington, Vermont, right? And out of those 42,000 people, only 16 black families actually own their own. I think it's 13. 13? Yeah, only 13. 42,000 people are here. That is a racial apartheid economically, housing-wise, financially. We don't even have that problem in Louisiana. So we say, well, your ghetto ain't no hard in the mind or whatever. A lot of people own homes in Louisiana. A lot of black people own homes in Louisiana. So we have this high level of education here in Vermont. We have this situation where Bernie Sanders is getting y'all a whole lot of money up here to take care of 600,000 people in Vermont. But I know now that you're up against a more insidious fight than mine. See, in Louisiana, they let you know how loud we don't like you, Nga Nga, right? In Vermont, I've partied with a lot of good white people and I've had fun and I have not felt any racism since I've been here. But to think about the invisible, scientific fact that you guys like it or not that we can treat you like love but at the same time, hey, you can't have none of this though. So I'm here to support them. Louisiana, we gonna win, believe that. We fight, we win, we expose what's going on and we get down and dirty. And when they say, yeah, we just wanna keep our heritage alive, if it's no more slavery, then how is my heritage, my traditions? I mean, what's what you're taking from us? Heritage, hereditary, race. People are actually arguing that they're supposed to be in a superior racial position based on a law. We have to make this as plain as possible in every arena that we find ourselves. Let me give y'all that, fight hard here in Vermont. Fight hard with the knowledge that this is not just a racial equity problem, this is apartheid. When no black people get to have a house that they can own. Wait a minute, it was better than that in South Africa. So this is serious, name it something. Look at it and make the international world look at Vermont and say shame on you, Vermont. Shame on you for even letting these black people think that they're doing good up here and they don't own the land. If you don't own the land, you don't have a stake. So not to preach, I'm gonna let y'all go with that. Thank you brother Curtis. Thank you brother Curtis. Indeed, another state that is a direct result of the actions of Vermont in 1777 would be Tennessee. Tennessee has also got a unique history with slavery and racism. The birthplace of the KKK. Right now they have the America's largest for-profit prison is located right there in Tennessee, core civic formerly known as CCA. But Tennessee is kicking behind and taking names. You've got a lot of Republicans that are on your side now. You've started to gain some resources to be able to get this campaign going. And you've got a lot happening in Tennessee. So ladies and gentlemen, Jeanne Alexander, the lead organizer for the Tennessee campaign. No exemptions. Tell us a little bit about your struggle. That better. Oh, it is better. It's a lot better. Yeah, it's interesting. Our campaign I would say is a bifurcated campaign. There is grassroots campaign. There's a more traditional sized, traditional, that's a lot of work, side to that campaign. But yeah, there isn't really long history there. And I think that what's incredibly important about our campaign in Tennessee is that it came from the inside out. So I think it's helpful for people that kind of understand some history and how it happened. And the way that this campaign came out of cages was a promise basically. It was a promise that I made. I was an abolitionist who was a prison chaplain and that is a whole other story, but made a promise to someone who educated me. My friend, who's a dean, who was the first person to tell me, right, a theologian with also a legal background before the lawyer that slavery had never been abolished. And I'm like, what are you talking about? Right, I mean, I didn't know it either. And he educated me to that fact. And so I said, well, okay, we're gonna end this. He's like, okay, chaplain, okay. I'm like, no, we're gonna do this. You're gonna do this in Tennessee. At that point, then I left that position and then co-founded No Exceptions with Insiders. And that's what the meaning of our organization's name has always been. No exceptions, prison collective has always been about. There should be no exceptions to the abolition of slavery. And at that point then I wrote a bill, like Martin wrote a bill. And this is crazy, y'all, but it basically sailed through the Tennessee legislature. We had to make it through two sessions. That first time, no one voted against it because we just kind of honestly, and everyone else who was listening to this in the southern state, we just kind of okey-dokeyed it. They're like, oh, this is crazy, right? She wouldn't have it in here. You're not a racist, are you? And they were just like, oh, all these Republicans were like voting for it. So nobody votes against it the first time. The second time, during the second legislative session, some of them began to show some true powers. And we had two vote against it in the House and four in the Senate. And of course their rationale was, well, we don't have to do this, this isn't real. I'm like, no, no, for real, for real, it's right there. It's really real. But it's still overwhelmingly passed. And so now we are on the ballot for the first time. And the vote will be November the 8th. And I, Curtis, we're very confident that we are going to pass this. And it has a lot of momentum behind it. A lot of politicians have signed on to it. A lot of Republican politicians have signed on to endorse it. And it's got a growing massive grassroots campaign. And honestly, it wouldn't have gotten here without grassroots. So that's absolutely essential. And then also, without the support of ASNM, this is also absolutely essential. If this is family, this is abolition. That's awesome. Thank you so much, Jeanne. Yes, Pastor, feel free to take it. I just want to say to sister Jeanne Kenney, who is the lead organizing representative for Ohio. She's managing our stream yard today. Thank you, Jeanne. Pastor Kenneth shows up. Please patch him in for us, okay? In the meantime, I'm going to move over to our federal amendment. And Brother Jorge, I'm just, am I saying it wrong? Tell me how to say it. You're saying it perfectly. I'm saying it perfectly, all right. And he is one of the representatives working with the federal arms with worth rises to remove the exception clause or rather repeal the 13th amendment and replace it with no exceptions whatsoever. And also, he is a formally incarcerated individual who is making these things happen. Brother Jorge, tell us a little bit about yourself and the federal amendment and where we're at. Ivermont, I've never been here. I lived in Massachusetts for a bit. And I'm just glad I'm back in Massachusetts again. I live in Vermont. If you're formerly incarcerated in no Massachusetts, you know what I'm talking about. You know, when I was coming to Vermont, I told a couple of people and they all said, you know, I'm a Bernie. And I'm like, no, Debbie, you're the woman, you know, I'm not. And it's an honor to meet a former state representative, state senator who's wearing that shirt. That's just wow, wow. Yeah, move the text if you don't mind. Yeah, I'm a national criminal justice director of the group called Latino Justice. Yeah, I did spend a lot of time in Texas cages. I could have 15 years down parole for another 30. Yeah, that's the way they do it in Texas. It was just robbery, but still, I don't bear it, you know. Yeah, it's really glad to be here and meet people who I've seen on Zoom for a while. Kamau, Max, some of the folks. And I want to say, Cheney, I don't know if you don't remember, and I think when I heard your name, when I was at grassroots six or seven years ago and we were working on the video calling campaign, I reached out to you and I think Tex was in Tennessee and he was there himself. So yeah, it's really good to meet you too. Yeah, the national campaign, in the exception.org, right? If y'all have not been there, go there please. It is the coalition of individuals who are working on the federal campaign. Shout out to Worth Rises, it's gonna be on Catholic, Luke, some of the other folks over there, Daniel. Shout out to Anti-Resilivism Coalition in California, Michael, and Michael Mendoza, it's really shaping for all the work that they're doing. I'm on the steering committee again for that. And what we're doing is we're trying to do this on a federal level, but I want to concede and people need to concede and understand that, like Cheney said, this movement is a grassroots movement and grassroots movements mean that it's local and that it's state and that it's federal. If not for what y'all are doing in the states, we wouldn't be moving anything on the federal level. We depend on y'all, we take your lead, we're basically there to support what's happening on the state level. And what, you know, we do a lot of stuff to amplify, like we'll take the big holidays, of course, the Labor Day, right, and we'll do a lot of stuff on Labor Day, we're having something on Labor Day in New York, for y'all who are in New York or go to New York or wanna cross that water. I'm not a geography major, so I don't know if you cross the water here if you're in the city or if you're gonna go another 1,000 miles, but they are having something there at the Havana Post on September 5th, right, that they're having, it's weird how some of these things do. They came to me and told me, what are some of the things we should do? I heard my brother here in Louisiana talking about some of the work they do down there, right? It takes to have something they call flag-weeding. It's where you take a grubbing hole and you get like a bunch of folks in the line and you raise it up, you hit four times and take a step and you do that all day, all day. It's make work, right? It is slave labor, it is hard labor. And I propose that they have some grubbing holes there for the folks to show up and put them in a line to do that. And they said, no, that's a little bit too hard. I'm like, we want them to understand what's going on in those cages, what's going on behind those fences, what's going on if you go under the wire and can't come out every night, right? And that's a little bit too rough but anyway, they blew up my suggestion. But we're having a lot of stuff on in September in Philadelphia, right? They're having an art installation there with the folks during the mural stuff, right? A shout out to Phoebe, on Constitution Day, they're having something, the 16th and the 17th and they're showing a film on the 16th if you're close to Philly, if you show up, go to that place. So yeah, again, anything that y'all can do to support us, great, but y'all just keep doing what y'all are doing. And I'm in Texas and Savannah knows that I'm in the herb service and I'm gonna do what Savannah tells me and that I will use my contact to protect you whatever we can do. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you do, brother. Don't pay that. Don't pay that. Don't pay that. I'm Method. Thank you, brother O'Rea. Much appreciated, indeed, give it up. Give it up. We're gonna go on to, before that I wanna give a shout out once again to our activists in Oregon who were unable to make it to here today. They are doing so well with their campaign, the lead organizer is Roddy Burton. And originally it was Jordan Shot, but Jordan Shot has moved on to become an assistant to Senator Merkley, awesome, yes. And all of them are going to law school, like all these people who are getting involved in abolition suddenly going into law school. I wonder why that is. That's pretty awesome, so shout out to them. I see that we still don't have a representative of Alabama online that would be Brother Kenneth Glasgow Shot. Savannah's right here. Yeah, we're gonna get to her. She could come out of Alabama, right? Yeah, I'm gonna talk about that. You start trying to steal my job, man. I got it stolen. Now, I give you an hour's pay, is that how I got to do it? So how about when you come to my house? Yeah. So as of now, Brother Glasgow is the lead organizer for our Alabama campaign, but unfortunately he is not able to make it here tonight. But the one who started out working on this and was very instrumental is Sister Savannah Eldridge. From the very beginning, we kinda snuck this whole building and I'll leave it up to you to tell whatever stories you wanna tell and the position that we're in with Alabama, Savannah Eldridge. Yeah, so I just happened to see that amendment four had passed in Alabama, which called for the recompilation of the Alabama Constitution, which is the longest constitution in the nation. So they proposed to make some changes to remove racist language from the Constitution in Alabama. So I was like, I thought that'd be a great idea to remove slavery from it. What's more racist than slavery, right? And for me, it was like a shortcut. I mean, I don't just sit around thinking, well, I do sit around thinking about ways to make things easier for myself, but it just made sense. So I tried to reach out to the organizers who pushed the bill and from that meeting came a meeting with the powers that be in Alabama and we were able to get the language on the ballot this year. So I'm very excited about, there's really not a whole lot to tell. It wasn't a separate bill. It's tied into, it's a comprehensive, there's three total changes that are being proposed to the Alabama Constitution. So there wasn't a lot of organizing around this intentionally on my end, but we're happy to have Pastor Glasgow who is from Alabama to be able to support this piece of legislation. Cause of course I'm gonna be very busy in the near future, you know, building Texas back up and then supporting all the rest of the state. So that's how Alabama came to be. And if we get this, it's a one and done and I'm just excited about it, but it's just a testament of why strategy is important. And legislation for me is really a long-term goal and it's great that we can keep trying and we can keep trying, but if we can collectively put our heads together to look at what works in our state, then we should do it, right? And think outside the box. Let's get creative about it. I think that we'll definitely see more changes to come in the near future. Thank you, Savannah. It was a pretty funny moment too when we were in the meeting with the organizers for amendment four and one of the women said, you know, I've looked through this thing for 20 years and there's nothing in this constitution about slavery. So I don't know what you're talking about. And we were like, well, just check out section 32, article two and read that. And she read it and you can see your eyes like, I didn't know, I didn't know. And we run across that all the time. People don't know. And so we give them the opportunity to find out and once you know, you become responsible for what you know. You get a chance to do something about it. And they had a chance. I'm sorry, I forgot to mention, like a lot of this work is built from the inside out. And we had worked on free to 13 with the free Alabama movement. And I want to give a shout out to Connecticut Justice and venue Hannibal Rosson, who have taken so many risks to bring awareness to what's going on in the Alabama Department of Corrections. And really, really built the inside campaign from the ground up. So shout out to them and their contribution to this work. Amen. Indeed. Shout out to Kinetic and Ben New. I remember Ben New was hosting a radio program on abolition today from inside solitary confinement. That is amazing. It lasted 28 weeks. If you wanna see it or hear any of that, go to abolitionaday.org and look at our archives for Tales for Live from the Plantation. And you'll hear all incarcerated people discussing this issue of slavery and their families. It's an amazing revolutionary thing. All right, so we're coming up on the Q&A section. So unless anybody wanna make any more comments, I'm gonna go ahead and pass it out to the audience. Debbie. Thanks. I would like to just make one more comment if I may. You know, I wanted to say something as a white person being involved in this movement and, you know, Brother Curtis was talking about how white Vermont is. And I grew up in the deep South. I was born outside of Savannah, Georgia, I really, yeah. In a really small town and, you know, I was a kid. I was born in 1962. Now you know how old I am. But, you know, so during the Civil Rights Movement, my parents were actually really well-meaning white people. They, you know, when we were at home and when we talked around the dinner table, they, you know, they always said, you know, they taught me to respect everybody. They told me that every human being deserved dignity and they fully supported the Civil Rights Movement and they admired Dr. Martin Luther King. And, you know, and they said all these things in the four walls of our home. And then when we got outside, you know, my dad was a businessman in the area and my mother, you know, was a stay-at-home mom and, you know, played bridge with ladies and, you know, participated in the women's group at church and all. And they did not say the things outside to other white people that they said to us and me and my sisters at home. And it took me a long time, you know, when you grow up in that kind of environment, you don't always get it until you get older. But I came to realize that it wasn't okay, you know, for them to do, they were protecting their business, they were protecting their reputation, they didn't want other white people to come after them. You know, they didn't have the courage, you know, really, of their convictions. And I, you know, I want to be different. And I, you know, you made the comment too that, you know, once you know something, you can't unknow it. Once you know what's what, you have to take responsibility for your contribution to it. And, you know, as far as I know, my ancestors were kind of poor farmers. They didn't actually own slaves, they didn't have plantations, but that doesn't make me any less culpable as a white person. And it doesn't mean that I can be like my parents and just sit silently anymore. So, so I just wanted, I just wanted to add that. Thank you, Debbie. Did anybody else want to make, yes, clap for that. The courage of your convictions, you are an example of that. Would anybody else like to make some comments? We'll be back on that, because Debbie and I work like really, really, really closely together, just on a daily, on almost a day. I mean, the phone will ring. I mean, hey, it's you again, right? We're talking like three, like three, four times a day. So we're really grown close and we've gotten to know each other. And we've attended the faith in action trainings at the national level. We were in Philly, the speaker, the keynote speaker, Royster, who was here yesterday was a connection through Debbie as a result of relationships that we established through faith in action. And it just goes on and on and on. And even my wife, Christine, who's sitting back there, she's probably thinking, I hope he doesn't say something stupid too late. But she's like, you know what, this is something coming from Christine. She's like, Debbie's solid, right? She's like, Debbie, that's our people right there. So I just want to lift you up and thank you for showing up and being a part of what's going on here tonight with us, love you. I want to also add to that, this is not a drill. I mean, I came to understand this work, you kind of like almost bass-acquards, if you don't mind me saying that, in a way, because the way that I see abolitionists and the way that I have experienced abolitionists, it seems like it was more inside out, if you know what I mean, Jeannie. And so it's like that, Curtis, it's like that. But us, it's kind of like backing into it, we talk about the data and all that other stuff and a lot of real abolitionists, I'm just gonna use that, real abolitionists, folks who've been in there or who have really been shoulder to shoulder with the folks in there, probably thinking to themselves, get out of here with that data, you know? In a way, although it's important, and I guess I say that to say this, is the battle is no less real as we stand shoulder to shoulder and I've come to understand the gravity of what it means to be an abolitionist and not just to say it but to walk it because it's not one of those hunky dory, happy go lucky, you know, very positively friendly and warmly received types of walks of life. If anybody in here knows what I'm talking about, if you start, when you really get down to it, this here, this is the separator. This is what separates us from everybody else. This is when people stop calling you and when people stop liking you, right? This is when you can walk away from, you may as well walk away from that job or go do something different. This is that, okay, this is that kind of work. So I just, I wanna, you know, just give a shout out because as I've reached across, as I've looked across the country and I've looked at the condition of our people across this nation, I look into my own home state of Iowa. It is, it is horrid. Now, one thing that the numbers do is they don't lie. The second one that they do is it gives you a picture. If you know what to look for, you have a pretty good idea of what's going on in Minnesota. You have a pretty good idea of what's going on in Wisconsin. You have a pretty good idea of what's going on, FIBO in New Jersey. You have a, so these, so when you look at what's going on in Vermont, it's not an accident. It's not an accident that these things are happening when you start pulling restrictive covenants. It's not an accident is what I'm saying. So seriously, the abolishment of slavery is just that important because it is, it is the foundation of all of this stuff that we're trying to get unpacked. Systemic racism, as we love to call it, or some people say equity, or whatever you wanna call it, depends on whether you at work or whether you in the state government or something like that, but this, what we're really trying to do, we wanna eradicate systemic racism. In other words, that is what this building represents. That is what the Kilt Center is all about, this work. That's the work that we're doing with cultural empowerment, with community engagement and support, with outreach and education, as well as platforms which would be this. So what I'm getting at is that this is the foundation of everything, this whole thing about slavery, this whole thing about slavery. And systemic racism, max we call it badges and incidents. If it were not for the institution of slavery, we would not have these disparities that we're trying to eradicate. That is how simple it is, and that is how serious it is. So we can go in and we can try to tinker around the edges on all of these systems all day long until we get tired. But at the end of the day, if slavery is still here, then we haven't done anything yet. That's all I gotta say about that. Yes, thank you, Mark. Might drop on that one. Indeed, this is the root of it all. There is so much change that needs to be made, but you really can't change any of it until you open the first door, right? You can't go into the house until you open the first door. And the first door is to end slavery. Once you've ended slavery, it opens up opportunities that we've never seen in this country before because we've never done it. And nobody can predict what will happen because we've never done it, but we wanna do it and we are going to do it. Brother Jorge, you had something to say? Yeah, just a couple things I think. I have no idea how many people in this room have spent time in the cage. I know that when I was in prison, you internalize the slave mentality. I thought that I deserved to be there, maybe not with a 60-year sentence the last time, but I deserved to be there because I had put a pistol of somebody's head into it and they gave me money. I think foundation cages in this country exist because we have a failure of imagination, what to do with somebody hard or somebody else. We refuse to think about anything else. We are here today to abolish slavery, but if we don't move forward and abolish the cage, if we're stopping and if we're accepting, then okay, 13th Amendment passed, you're no longer a slave. When you're in a cage, you're gonna pay you minimum wage, and now I can move on to another fight that I think that we turn in our backs to the individuals who we are saying that okay, we have freed you now from that, because basically, slavery in prison, what it is, it's related to the labor, but it's not related to, it doesn't really attack how you feel when you're in there, and I don't know how this brother felt when he was in there. I know how I felt for a long time, right? I grew up believing that the Texas Rangers were heroes, good, lawmen. I did not understand or realize or have been taught the history of the lynchings in South Texas what these folks had done to us. It doesn't might be. I didn't know that, but it's a process of education. What this man said, what Max said about once you know it, you can't unknow it, right? And I just think that I hope that people are committed to not just ending slavery, but to ending the cage itself. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you, Roy. Yes. All right. Do we have any questions for the audience? Brother Nathan. This is to Curtis. If people wanna know about your book, Slave State, or they wanna learn more about your own history or about the history of slavery in Louisiana, where should they go? They can go to instagram.curtis.davis.ai. They can go to DeCarcerade Louisiana's page on Facebook. They can go to Curtis Davis on Facebook. Or we're getting our website set up this week for our end of the exception, Louisiana. They can also go to abolish slavery. US.com. US. US, I'm sorry, abolish slavery.us and find out anything that they need to find out about what we're doing. And I really appreciate you guys getting that book, donating to us and supporting us, because that's how we get around and we don't get the big grants from the nonprofit industrial complex, but we're working on it. Amen, amen. Just so you know, we do have books for Curtis right here available right now. Thanks, Willis. Jewelry and books from Tribal Rain. Any other questions from our team out here in the audience? Books and Jewelry from Tribal Rain. I just want to just commend all of you warriors, you guys are disciples, and it's really inspiring to me to be in honor for me to be a part of this and to be a part of this team. Yesterday, I was just getting a chance to kick it with max and what's really interesting is that, I'm originally from Patterson, New Jersey myself and I've also been a victimizer of police brutality when I was 13, just walking home from school. And it wasn't no rhyme or reason, I didn't do anything, I was just walking while black. And it was another time in which, trying to break up a fight amongst little kids that were throwing on that rocks and being as it may, was a whole bunch of other men who came out and they were coming out with bats and we're going to intercept that and Cole went out and saying that it was a riot going on, make a long story short, he ended up locking me up and slamming my friend. I'm at the same time, only 13, just because we were trying to do something right. So for me in my walk, I'm not just being known who I am and actually using basketball as a vehicle and brought me to this state of Ramon. It also brought me a sense of awareness that, like you all were saying, once you're woke, you can't close your eyes to the ills of the world. So for me, it's, you don't know how much energy, how much I'm replenishing right now and getting even stronger and dealing with stuff that just so happened to this, happened to me around the district with the school system. And I've been in the school system in the district for about 20 plus years. So I'm really excited to come now from the outside, coming back in with a new lens and a new perspective for our people and to stand up and stand forward. So I just wanted to just applaud all of you just for recharging, for doing the work. For now, but me having that level of consciousness, awareness and ammunition to go on and do so more so and knowing that I got supported and feeling behind. So I just wanted to tip my hat, tip my hat off to all of y'all and thank y'all. Thank you. Right. Thank you. Yes, okay. Marlon. Marlon. Shall I stand up? Of course. Stand up, Marlon, you know. So thank you, Reverend Marlon. Okay. My name is Marlon. I kind of came to the camp center as an invitation from Brother Rajni Eddins. He invited me to do some storytelling and poetry and that's what I came here into the center and that's how I met Reverend Mark Hughes. As a member, as just a black person, I'm so thankful to be here. Thankful that there's other people who are willing to look into constitutions and that's the hard part, that's the hard work. You know, sitting there using your time, you know, to better somebody else's life. And you know, I just want to know how many other states do have like a prompt two on their ballot this year and you know, what's the real significance of this year? So you said five, which five? We actually have one of the five that are joining us online. I'm going to try to see if you can give me a name, but the states that are on this year, Vermont, Ordon, Louisiana, Tennessee, and Alabama, we're talking really good chance to speak. Thank you for your question, brother. So Alabama, Tennessee, Ordon, Louisiana, Vermont, all on another this year. It's such an epic, epic opportunity. We got brother Kenneth Glasgow Sharpen on the line with us here joining us in Zoom. He's the organizer for Alabama. Kenny, we got a few minutes for you, so let me see if we can hear you say something. Wait, Pastor Glasgow, they can't hear you, so I'm going to repeat what you said. So he said, what they're doing in the red state of Alabama is finally changing the language to abolish slavery. So he just wanted to give a shout out to everybody across the nation who was doing this thing. He wants everybody to know that you are changing America. That you are changing, it's very systems and it's very core. He said that he's excited to, he's excited that this is like not just from Alabama, but that we are changing the language in these five states and in the federal to make sure that we change all the laws in this country. I'm so sorry, I'm here. He said, God bless y'all, God bless y'all. All right, thank you very much. To my Vermont people, especially Debbie, because you're my, the first woman I've ever met, so shout out to you. So we heard what inspires you. So how do you inspire other Vermontas? Maybe Mark can add to that. How do we get inspiration all the way to November and how do you carry on and keep on as a Vermontae? Well, we are working on that. No, that's a great question. We are actually doing some testing and messaging. Somebody, I was a little embarrassed because somebody said they didn't have money to hire a firm. Yeah, sorry, we actually did hire a firm. So we're working on testing out some of that. We've had some great volunteers talking to random people out on Church Street and at farmer's markets. We have an idea of what people are thinking, how they're surprised that these exceptions are in our constitution, but we wanna make sure that they don't just see the tip of the iceberg, that they're really understanding, as Mark was talking about, this legacy of slavery is about the contribution that it's made now to systemic racism and where we are in this country. So we're working at the grassroots. We're trying to train our volunteers to really talk the way that it needs to be said. And yeah, and then other than that, I just kinda tried to give it to some of my colleagues when I was in the legislature and when they said stupid things. But that's right, don't get it by white people, that's right, that's right. Yeah, what would you say? You know, I think I said it earlier, maybe I didn't say it earlier. Did I say what a time to be alive? This is, you know, we're literally fighting for our lives. And if that's not inspiring enough, I don't really have any words for folks, quite frankly. And the truth is, is there some people who are gonna be the ones who go down with the ship? And there's nothing that you can say to inspire them. And I'm sorry to give you the bad news, but this is that, that thing we've been talking about all of this time. You know, somebody said if you throw a frog in a boiling pot of water, he'll jump out. But if you just warm it up slowly while he in there, he won't jump out. And there's a lot of folk that right now, they're not gonna jump out. It don't make no difference what you say to them. They're not gonna jump out. I mean, if you turn the TV on right now. Hello, somebody. We are in a time of our lives right now. In the fights that we're in right now, I hope your fights matter. Whatever you're engaging yourself in, right now, whatever you're spending your time on, whatever you're spending your money on, however it is you're committing your time to other people right now. At a time such as this, whatever you're doing, make it count. Because truly right now, these are some of our last times. Now I don't, you can get all crazy on me and say, oh, this preacher done whatever. And you know what, I won't respond to you. Don't play with me. Today, we're at a place right now where every single one of us ought to be busy. And the work that we're doing ought to count. And if it don't, like she said, sit down and get out of my way. That's how I inspire people. Thank you, Mark. All right, let's give it up one more time for our state and federal representatives here. The Freedom Five, blessed effector. Yes, thank you very much. Thank you guys, thank you so much. We got a couple of more speakers and then we're going to call it an evening. We know you couldn't have been anywhere, but you're here with us and we so appreciate that. I want to start by bringing up Savannah Eldridge. Savannah is going to have the closing comments on behalf of the Abolish Slavery National Network. And then we're going to get another poem out of Tribal Rain and then we're going to hear from our host to take us home. Sister Savannah. Grandson's calling me grandma, grandma, and I forgot everything else. That's a project. Beautiful, right? You have to get it. Is it? This one is my gift. All right. All right guys, well first of all, thank you guys so much for being in attendance today. I just wanted to share that ASNN as a coalition of network partners, we are all respective leaders in our community. And I think that's important as we take everything that we've gained here back that leadership is the essence of these types of campaigns. We have to be able to galvanize the education, to galvanize the power that we gain to go and build new coalitions. My vision for Abolish Slavery National Network is not just to build partnerships, but also to build leaders. In order to achieve this, we need to get and stay connected. We need to stay connected as people. We need to stay connected spiritually and we need to stay connected as a coalition, right? Again, as leaders, we're doing different things in our communities, but when we come back into these shared spaces, we need to think about what we can bring to support our partners. We've all got different strengths and weaknesses. I'm not a great public speaker. I hate public speaking. So I always defer to Max to that. And if I need to know anything about Max, I defer to Tribal Rain, because she knows everything there is to know about Max. If I want to know where Max is, I don't ask Max, I ask Tribal Rain. She knows where Max is. But a strong network is one in which each fiber is strong in its own right, right? So no matter where we are in this journey, whether it's organizing or we're just realizing that something needs to be done, we're all ever learning. And there's no one single ASNN campaign that's going to be able to end this fight. So whether we're successful in these five states or not, we still need to keep going. We need to keep going. We need to keep supporting each other. And that's how we're going to get it done in our moments of triumph and in our moments of defeat. And there have been some, right? Like I said, we might not win the war, but we live to fight another day. So and in building relationships with people, we learn how to support each other best. We learn what questions to ask. I always ask people, no matter if it's in work or in personal relationships, how can I help you? That's how you get to know people. How can I help you? What do you need? I may not have what you need, but I may know who to ask or where to go get it. So just get in the habit of trying to be supportive to one another. This is very heavy work, physically. It's very heavy financially. It's very heavy emotionally. And so again, like I'm so thankful to be in this space where we can convene together in community and think about what it looks like to support Vermont, what it looks like to support the other four states that are on the ballot and what it looks like to support ASNN as a whole. I want to close with a quote that Max actually gave me. But before I did it, Max dragged me to ASNN. I just want to tell y'all, if Max's father, y'all have to deal with me, he told me, you got to do this. You got to do this. And I didn't even know. I was like, okay, I'll try. And it actually turned out to be my life's work. So thank you, Max, for helping me realize that. I'm so appreciative of that. And thank you so much for being my mentor for the past year. Well, actually it's been almost two years now. I'm so appreciative for that. And I also want to thank Vermont, first of all. You guys rocked it this weekend. You made us feel so much at home. Dr. Mark Christine and all the Vermont racial lines family, thank you so much. The beautiful state. And I'm definitely going to come back if I can. Cause I feel like I've made new friends and new family here. So in closing, I just want to say, Frederick Douglass said, I exposed slavery in this country because to expose it is to kill it. Slavery is one of those monsters of darkness to whom the light of truth is death. And I hope that the Avalanche Slavery National Network is the light in the darkness on the pathway to liberation. And we are going to end slavery together. Yes, give it up for Savannah Eldridge, A-S-N-N. Yes, they keep blaming me as not my fault. I ain't do none of that stuff they're talking about. I don't even know who this guy is they're talking about. Yeah, I don't know. All right, we're going to take it home. We're going to have some comments from our hosts after this. But first, for one final poem, let's bring up this tribal ring. Full speed ahead that we're chasing us. See people with an eraser sit from our lungs. She did. And she gave birth to nations, a black woman. What can I say? Black hat can't be wiped off. It won't be wiped out. Pray us is less than human because we are here. And here is where we'll remain. See our chains. And these trees, lashes you give, will implant our feet firmly into soil, our chins and shouts. We, till existence, will be persistent and unyielding. We remain. See, black is a gift of royalty. It is a mastery, a blessing. Black is one into existence. See this? Because we are here. We stand strong. Yes. Travel that grave one more time, everybody. All right. Let's bring up our hosts from Vermont, from Mark Hughes to take us home. Thank you, everybody. God bless. There is a buzz in the room right now. But what I'm gonna ask everybody to do right now, because I know everybody's headed out. I see Fibo, I see you headed out the door. I see you hugging Curtis Davis. But I see tribal ring, hugging Isaac. But I see Mike looking at the food. I see Jorge hugging. But this is what I need, what I need y'all to do is to stop and come in. Bring it in. Focus. Bring it in. Because we're still together. We're not done yet. This is not over yet. Max, this is not over yet. Come in, please. Come in, tribal. This is not over yet. This is not how we end. This is not how we end. This is, we'll do the group photo later. But what we're gonna do right now is we're going to come together in spirit. Because that's what we are. This right here, this will pass. Sure will. So if you can touch somebody, just reach out right now. Just reach out and touch somebody for a minute. Just for a minute, just touch it. Even if you don't like it. Just touch somebody for a minute. I don't care what faith you in, right? We're gonna get serious for a minute. Hold it down. Hold it down, I'm not done yet. Stop talking. Stop talking. Stop talking. Father God, I thank you for these people. I thank you, Lord, for what it is that you're doing in the Abolished Slavery National Network. Lord God, I pray that you would protect everybody as you return them to their destinations. And I pray that you would have your hand over this work because it stands for truth and it stands for justice and it stands for you, Lord. It is what you represent, Lord. It is a sense of right. You said, Lord, that if we would just do justice and love mercy, Lord, that you would be with us. So now, God, we ask that you walk with us in this fight. God, we know that the adversary is forever busy, Lord, and he never stops. So now, God, we pray that you take us all home safely and that you keep us engaged in the battle, Lord. We thank you for your power. We thank you for your grace. We thank you for your mercy. And we thank you for winning, Lord, because you are God and you are God of all. Thank you, God, in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. It is our duty to fight for our freedom. It is our duty to win. It is our duty to love and care for one another. We have nothing to lose but our chance. That's when we get back. We need you to go take a picture with us.