Share Link:

US Rep. John Conyers, Jr. speaking at the rally in Detroit in Oct. 5:

Listen (full speech):  [wav]

(Note: heckler in the background does not in any way represent World Can't Wait or its political viewpoint)

Transcript of the speech: 

To our friends all over the United States, that are doing exactly what we're doing here in Detroit, let's give them a big shout out!  Detroit joins you in this great outpouring in which we begin the long and hard fought path to end the George Bush regime in the United States of America.  This is the beginning.  What we've done is demonstrate that people are aware and sensitive to the fact that we got into a war we should never have gotten into.  How can you, when you think about it, how could Iraq attack the United States?  The whole thing gets almost ludicrous.  In all deference to some of my colleagues, whose naivete is beyond belief, I think they knew what I knew, they knew what you knew, we didn't need a preemptive strike because they had no weapons of mass destruction, they had nothing.

We are here today to consolidate our friends who are coming over to our side. For that reason, I will talk about the President of the United States in the most deferential terms that I can, because we"re trying to get independents and Republicans to vote with us on November 7.  So we want you to be on your best behavior, whatever that means to you, to get as many people to come out and vote on November 7.  What is it 32 days yet?

(a heckler yells that Democrats voted for the war).  My dear brother - that's what we"re trying to change.  I can only tell you that not voting is the worst thing anybody can do.  Let me get this in.  Every Democrat running for Congress in the 3 districts around me, are all against the war (cheers).  It's also true that all 3 Congressional candidates running for Congress are all against the war.  I want you to help them.  We have to grow the seeds.  At the rate the scandals are coming out in Washington, somebody is going to pull an upset in Michigan.  We have may a new Democratic Congressperson.  That is quite possible. 

What I am here today to do is to urge you to do couple of things.  One of them is to remember Proposition #2, the affirmative action proposition that Ward Connerly is behind, at a fee that he charged his non-profits in access of one million dollars per year, to spread it from California, to Oregon, to Michigan.  We"ve got to turn this back because the affirmative action for the nation started in Ann Arbor for the nation.  So we"re not going backward on this, we"re going forward.

While we were being cut out of all the decisions about how the legislature ought to be run, we put together a little manual called George Bush v. the U.S. Constitution.  It contains information about the Downing Street Minutes, what did they say in that?  That they would make the facts and the circumstances accomplish the objective of going to
war in Iraq,  That was way before the war ever started.  Then we have an introduction by Ambassador Wilson, who was sent to Niger to look for the uranium, and guess what he found - there wasn't any.  He reported it, and they reported his wife as a covert CIA agent. 

So, we gather here today and I consider you among the best of our patriots, because, I don't see anyone holding elected office besides myself.  You"re here because you know we have to persuade the rest of our citizens that we"ve got to take back the country, and move in a new direction.  And that's what this election is about.  The only thing we have is the election process.  To invite you to join with me these last 32 days"I'm at Livernois between 7 and 8 Mile Road across from Sherwood Forest/Coney Island.  What we need to do is replicate ourselves.  There's nothing more disturbing to the enemy within those who are holding powerful offices in Washington who are dedicated to staying the course on an impossible no-win situation in the war.  We need some people that are willing to use some diplomacy. We need some people that are willing to stand up for the Geneva Accords, and to cut out the signing statements that the President has done on hundreds and hundreds of bills he signed into law that we didn't not anything about.  More than any other president, way more.  And we need most of all to be able to stand up against the President as a part of our First Amendment rights to free speech.  If you disagree with the President, it is exactly your prerogative to say so. 

You have done that, and you have done is with great distinction and great clarity.  And so I want to let you know I identify with you, 100%.  I am working now to prevent any persons from coming into office that would turn us away from the goals of Martin Luther King.  It's ironic that a religious person would give me my political philosophy, but it boiled down to jobs, justice, and peace.  And that's what I"ve been working on for all of these years, and that's why I'm going to continue to work on. And I want to invite all of you down to my office. What we"re going to do is provide us with coffee, snacks, telephones, let's work on getting the vote out. That to me is very important.  And I can say this is not a political rally, but voting is a Constitutional responsibility, without which we cannot maintain a democracy.  So it's in that spirit that I'm happy to join you.  I"ll be working with you.  I"ll be coming to your meetings at the café in Ferndale, and I want you to leave me some literature so that we can get new people out. 

The whole thing is most people are hip to George Bush, and Cheney and Rumsfeld.  They should have never been in office in the first place.  Two elections!  You know, he can fool all he wants, but Florida and Ohio, twice.  And we"re mad as hell about it and we are taking our country back.  Today, across America, people like you and me come together to reinforce our commitment to do what has to be done. As Americans that want our democracy to be a Constitutional democracy.  We don't want one in which the pres takes power and keeps assuming more power.

And we want to thank 3 judges, as I close. One is judge is Damon Keith, about 3 blocks away, who long ago said you cannot wiretap an American on U.S. soil without a warrant.  That's what he said a long time ago.  As a result, the Congress passed the FISA act.  The FISA courts were created because of him.  So let's give the judge a round of applause.  Number 2, a courageous woman in the Eastern District Court just came out recently and said, Mr. President, you do not have the power if it's not in the Constitution, if it's not in the federal laws, you do not have the inherent power, even if there was a war, which there isn't, to assume that you have powers that are not identifiable in print.  And so, your acts of having people wiretap Americans on American soil is a violation of the Constitution of the U.S. and I order you to stop the warrant-less wiretaps immediately. Judge Anna Diggs Taylor.  And number 3, another judge, a woman, Bernice Page Hood, said that the Patriot Act provisions in which you think you can go into libraries and find out what people are reading, and that you can surveil people and break into their homes and offices without a warrant is illegal and unconstitutional.   And this trial brought by the American civil liberties union, will go forward right here in Detroit.

And so there are people like you and I, not enough of them, in government and public office, trying to make this Constitutional democracy work.  As our numbers grow, and as people realize where their self interest is, maybe it's in some of these, look, maybe, where the 10 Commandments go is the most important thing in your world, there are some who believe that.  Maybe there are people who are so worked up that the most important thing is who may marry whom.  That's that the most troublesome thing on their mind that they can think of.  Maybe there are people who worry that the American flag may be burned somewhere by somebody somehow, and that's the only thing they want to understand.  But we understand one thing, that this Constitution is the basis for the rule of law, and we"re going to carry it beyond just the US, because there are other nations who are trying to have some respect for all for the things we stand for, and we"ve lost a lot of respect around the world.  Thank you for coming out.  I"ll be with you at the coffee house on Thursday.

 Quote this article on your site