Education is of Great Importance to Congressional Black Caucus, Congress, and Constituents

Floor Speech

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Mr. CLYBURN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding to me.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to join the gentlewoman from Virginia (Ms. McClellan) tonight in opposition to the Trump administration's attacks on education.

Mr. Speaker, as the gentlewoman just mentioned, our country has a very spotty history when it comes to educating everybody. I know a lot about the history she just mentioned in Alabama and Mississippi and now in Virginia.

Hailing from South Carolina, my own dad was not allowed an education beyond the seventh grade by the State of South Carolina.

Thanks to Black churches. In fact, in my congressional district, there are seven HBCUs. Only two are supported by the State. The other five are church schools: The AME Church at Allen University; the Baptists at Benedict College and Morris College; and Episcopalians at Voorhees. The African Methodist Episcopal Zion, AME Zion, has a school up in Rock Hill outside of my district. I better mention Claflin University in Orangeburg, as well.

Mr. Speaker, as we talk about education and think about the Trump administration's efforts to minimize the importance of focusing on areas that have been left out of the process, I will mention a couple things here tonight that is going to run a little bit contrary to what my staff has researched for me.

The knowledge and skills of our young people and the things that they learn in school should not be limited to people who look like them or only people with similar backgrounds and experiences. We learn from each other when we bring to discussion a plethora of backgrounds and experiences that we can learn from.

I found that out in my own marriage. I was married to the same woman for 58 years. I remember when schools were first integrated and the courts demanded in the case called Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education in Charlotte, North Carolina, that we ought to allow busing to educate children.

Mr. Speaker, I thought there was something wrong with that decision. I didn't like it because I thought it put too much burden on students.

I went out talking about my opposition to that decision.

In fact, I spoke to a TV reporter who held the mike in my face and I waxed what I thought was eloquent until I got home. When I got home, my wife was standing in the middle of the door, tears were streaming down her face. I asked her what was wrong. I thought maybe something had happened to our daughter. We had one child at the time. I rushed toward her, what is wrong? Is something wrong with Mignon? She said no. There is nothing wrong with Mignon. I just saw you on television and there is something wrong with you. Sit down and let me ``splain'' something to you.

Now, it is one thing to get an explanation, but when the Gullah Geechee woman from South Carolina starts ``splaining,'' it is time to sit down, and I did. She told me about her experiences growing up in rural South Carolina when her class, her students did not have schoolbuses. They had to walk 2.5 miles to school every morning and 2.5 miles back home every afternoon. She told me that the White kids had buses. They would ride by them and throw urine-filled balloons as they walked.

She said to me on that day, they were not against busing then and you best not be against busing now.

I learned the difference in our backgrounds. I grew up on a paved street. I walked three blocks to my elementary school, six blocks to my middle school, and I am a graduate of Mather Academy. We called it a boarding school in those days. So I didn't know what it was like to have to walk 2.5 miles to school. Then I reflected on those children in Clarendon County, South Carolina, who walked 9.5 miles to school every day, no bus. The White kids had buses and they had to walk. Why? Because the superintendent of education said that yours don't pay enough taxes for buses. That is what we have been trying to get over in this country. That is why we had Brown v. Board of Education, which started in that little town of Summerton, South Carolina, as Briggs v. Elliott when a Federal judge, Waties Waring, himself a great-grandson of a Confederate soldier, Waties Waring decided that the time had come for us to put that kind of process behind us, and he wrote the dissenting opinion in Briggs v. Elliott that Earl Warren used to issue the majority opinion in Brown v. Board of Education getting that behind us.

That is what this is all about, bringing people of different backgrounds and experiences together so that we can educate our children properly. When we see young people going to school, becoming educated, and trying to do the things that are necessary to prepare themselves for the future, we would do well as a government, a Federal Government, to reinforce the efforts of our States because when you give total educational responsibility to States, it means that the quality of education will be dependent upon the wealth of the State.

South Carolina is becoming wealthy, but it is not a wealthy State. We have States in our country that will not be able to afford the investment in education that other States can. We should not have an educational system with 50 different kinds of educational levels for our children. We should have a unified process, and that is what we have been trying to do with the Department of Education.

When the President closes the Department of Education and he then sends all of that back to the States, we will have people in one State getting a different quality of education than kids in another State. That is not what building a unified country is all about. E pluribus unum; Out of many, one. We ought to have out of many departments of education one Department of Education that would take on the responsibility of making sure that all of our children get the kind of education they deserve.

I will speak just a little bit to what my colleague just talked about here about DEI. I will say a little bit about DEI here as it relates to education and to the all-important industry that we have in South Carolina.

Now, this picture here is a picture that tells you a little bit about education and DEI. As you can tell, this picture is about the Revolutionary War. Now, a lot of people talk about Massachusetts and Virginia and what they did for the Revolutionary War.

Let me tell you something, if you were really educated properly, you would know that some, if not the most important battles, of the Revolutionary War took place in South Carolina. If you talk to people today about a war in South Carolina, they can only talk about the Civil War.

Yeah, it started there in the Charleston Harbor, but if you go back and look at the Battle of Charleston, that critical battle that we had lost twice, General Gates was not a good general, and then George Washington decided that he would get outside of his comfort zone. George Washington decided that he would not hold Nathanael Greene's background up in Rhode Island against him.

He sent Nathanael Greene down to Charleston and Nathanael Greene took over, won the Battle of Charleston, and changed the direction of the Civil War.

I love this kind of history. That is why way back in 2001, along with Congressman John Spratt, I authored a resolution to do a study of the Revolutionary War sites because I thought it was important for little children in the public schools of South Carolina to know what role our State played in the Revolutionary War. That was important to me because all they could see in their textbooks was what happened in the Civil War and that is all people knew about.

It took me all the way to 2019 to introduce the legislation, and I think it got passed in 2022. Twenty years we worked on this and then we had the big celebration. I am getting to this DEI stuff here.

We had the big celebration there in Camden, South Carolina, where I graduated from high school, this cannon was fired just about six blocks from the school I graduated from. The bill I worked on for 20 years finally became law. We took about 100 pictures that day. Look at this picture. The Congressman from the Fifth District you can see him standing there in the center. The Congressman from the Seventh District standing there in the center. Where is the guy from the Sixth Congressional District whose bill this was? Well, let me show you where he is. If you can see through this guy, you can see me. Why is that? It is called DEI.

They are saying the person who is in charge of taking the picture decided who he wanted to have credit for it. That is what DEI is all about.

I don't know what this gentleman is talking about. We all know what DEI is. We have been having trouble with these lights all day. I hope I am more than a silhouette back to my constituents tonight. We celebrate Thomas Edison as the most prolific inventor of American history. Why? Because we said he invited the lightbulb and that is true. I taught that when I was teaching history that Edison invented the lightbulb. I am proud of that.

However, what was not in those textbooks that I was teaching from, and I had to go to my own book to teach my children properly, because Thomas Edison couldn't get the lightbulb to work properly. It was not until Thomas Edison sat down with Lewis Latimer who had invented a filament.

Lewis Latimer's filament is what made Thomas Edison's lightbulb work. Then I am hearing from this administration that there is something wrong, uncomfortable about children learning about Lewis Latimer. Well, it is not uncomfortable for me to teach about Thomas Edison, why should it be uncomfortable for you to learn about Lewis Latimer because together they made the lightbulb work?

Why should we leave Lewis Latimer out of the textbooks and keep Thomas Edison in? That is what this administration is facilitating. That is why I saw on the front page of The Washington Post--I think it was this morning; it might have been yesterday--it was a big story about Harriet Tubman checking her stuff out of Federal facilities. What is this about? Why is it that it is uncomfortable for people to learn about that?

It is not uncomfortable for me. I was very proud of Albert Sabin. When Albert Sabin finished his professional career at the Medical University of South Carolina because Albert Sabin discovered how that little drop of serum on a lump of sugar would help eradicate polio.

I was proud of that. I know Jonas Salk had one too, but I like Albert Sabin better because Jonas Salk was a shot in the arm. Albert Sabin was a little lump of sugar. Who would rather get a shot in the arm than a lump of sugar?

I was proud of Albert Sabin finishing his career at the Medical University of South Carolina. I don't mind telling people about him. I don't mind teaching about him. What is wrong with teaching about Charles Drew, an African American who discovered the method by which we can refrigerate blood and save it until we would need it. What would we have done without that discovery? That is what the proper education is all about.

I mentioned here last week Charity Adams and Arthur Gregg. Now my colleagues think Arthur Gregg was from Virginia because that is where he retired, but he was from Florence, South Carolina. Charity Adams, Columbia, South Carolina, Fort Gregg-Adams.

Is that DEI because the Army decided that their contributions to the defense of this country were significant enough to name a facility for them? Am I going to see them taking their name off of that fort now?

We have taken Jackie Robinson's picture and resume out of the Department of Defense. I understand they took it back.

Why are you thinking about taking it out in the first place? That is what education is all about. We are in need of bringing our people together.

My number one industry in South Carolina happens to be tourism. When I came to Congress, the two big things in South Carolina were tobacco and textiles. Today, it is transportation and tourism.

Tourism is big for my State. People are going to come to South Carolina because of legislation on that southern campaign of the American Revolution. They will come to South Carolina to visit the South Carolina National Heritage Corridor. They will come to visit the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor. They will come for those three national parks we have, including the Congaree National Park. They are going to come visit Fort Moultrie, Fort Sumter, the Reconstruction Era National Historical Park--six big tourist attractions.

I just read the other day that already tourism and visitations at Myrtle Beach are down over 15 percent already. Why? Because this is the time of year that the Canadians come. They aren't coming this year. Why? Because of this foolishness, this big tax that is coming out. We can call it whatever we want to call it--a tariff. A tariff ain't nothing but a tax at the border. So, the people in Canada are staying north of the border rather than coming.

Charleston's tourism is down. That is going to be the case throughout the South.

We created these opportunities for us to have better economies because when we have better economies, we will have better schools, because we will have our children being able to get the education that they deserve.

I had these prepared comments here, and I apologize to my staff for the work they did over the weekend, but listening to my colleague denigrate the history of this country--that is what he is doing, denigrating the history--we ought to celebrate our history.

All of it wasn't good. My parents lived through a history that I don't want to see my children and grandchildren live through, but if we continue down the road that this administration is taking us, that is what is going to happen.

I am the ninth African American to serve in Congress from South Carolina, eight before me. The problem is there are 95 years between number eight and number nine. Why? Because of a history we ought to be ashamed of and should not ever allow to come back again.

Yet, the policies I am seeing coming out of this administration, the decisions coming from some of the courts in this country, seem to be wanting to take us back to that history that I thought we had gotten beyond.

I am proud to pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, but I am also proud to work in this body with people whose backgrounds are different from mine, trying to find common ground and how we can make what this country is all about accessible and affordable for all of its citizens.

I am proud to be a part of what I consider to be a great country. There is no need of being made great. We have to make that greatness accessible to everybody, affordable by everybody. That is what educating everybody is all about.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for the Special Order.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to voice objection to the Trump Administration's attacks on our Nation's education system, which I view as part of a wider attack on the fundamental principle that we all benefit when people come together, exchange ideas and opinions and learn from each other in an atmosphere of respect and good will.

At the same time Americans are calling for their leaders to do the things that are necessary to lower everyday costs so that they can better their conditions and plan effectively. Their schools--our greatest laboratories for economic development and individual advancement--are being targeted.

The repercussions of eliminating the Department of Education would perpetuate cycles of economic instability for generations of American families. As a former public schoolteacher, I know very well the value of education as a tool for upward mobility.

The knowledge and skills our young people learn in our schools are crucial to securing a good foundation for vocations and professions-- that provide financial security and family stability for decades to come.

The destruction of the Department of Education is compounded by another serious threat to our economic future: the indiscriminate, non- strategic tariffs the president announced on so called ``Liberation Day'' last week.

With markets tumbling in response to these exorbitant taxes--and that's what tariffs are, taxes--the only thing Americans are ``liberated'' from is their hard-earned retirement savings.

A small group of my Republican colleagues in the other body has moved to vote to reclaim their congressional trade authorities in response to the president's misguided tariff war on our friends in Canada, by introducing legislation to reclaim Congress's authority in the face of the president's recklessness. Mr. Speaker, it is time for this body to act.

At first glance, it may appear that dismantling the Department of Education and imposing slapdash sky-high tariffs have little in common beyond their destructiveness. I believe, however, that they both give us an insight into this Administration's narrow, dark, dangerous mentality.

Public schools and international trade are both fundamentally rooted in bringing people together.

Our public schools, at their best, bring children together from a wide array of backgrounds to learn with and from each other, on a level playing field, forming, in the words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., a beloved community that will make our society stronger as generations emerge into adulthood.

International trade, at its best, brings together individuals and corporations from around the globe to do business with each other on a level playing field, each contributing their talents and specialties so that all can be better off. soybean farmers

You will note, Mr. Speaker, that in these descriptions of public education and international trade, I included the phrases ``at their best'' and ``on a level playing field.'' And it is regrettably true that in recent decades, our public education system and international trading system have not been at their best, and have not brought students, workers, and countries together, as effectively, they could have, to learn and to trade on a level playing field. As a result-- American children have been denied good educations, and American workers have been denied good jobs.

Yet rather than working together to seek constructive solutions, the Trump Administration has used these challenges as a pretext for destruction. And the result will be worse education and a worse economy.

Without the Department of Education providing resources and guidance, our public schools will move further from the unifying, excellent educational institutions that we aspire to have.

It is important to note that the Administration's aim to move the oversight and authority for administrating education completely to the states overlooks the lessons of history.

The Office of Civil Rights in the Department of Education was created because of the ongoing discriminatory practices in Southern schools denying education to African American students and students with disabilities. dad's story the southern campaign

Federal intervention was required to rectify the situation and ensure that states were complying with the letter and the spirit of Brown v. Board of Education, which ensured that children of different races could learn together.

With trade hobbled by confiscatory tariffs, including on some of our closest allies, American families will lose affordable access to the items they need to sustain and enrich their lives, and American business will lose affordable access to the items they need to make the products that sustain and enrich their employees and their customers.

This trade policy reveals ignorance of history as well, particularly the history of the catastrophic effects of the Smoot-Hawley tariffs during the Great Depression.

The common thread of the Trump Administration's misguided approach to these issues appears to me to be that they do not believe people of diverse backgrounds can come together in a mutually beneficial way-- whether they are coming together to learn or to engage in commerce. To the Trump Administration, the world is zero sum, where if there is a winner there must a loser.

I fundamentally reject that approach, and I believe the American people are rejecting it as well as they begin to suffer its harmful consequences. I believe that when people learn together and work together, all can be made better off.

One area where the Trump Administration's zero-sum worldview is having a harmful impact in my home state of South Carolina is in the tourism industry. Tourism is a clear example of people, interacting with unfamiliar people and places, benefit both the tourists themselves and the communities they visit.

This Administration's divisiveness is turning people off, and South Carolinians are suffering the consequences.

The tourism expected this year in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, a popular destination for Canadians subjected to the president's demeaning rhetoric and policies, is already down 15%.

Expected rates of tourism in Charleston have declined as well.

The success of a long-anticipated seasonal flight directly from Canada to Charleston airport is now in question as Canadians choose to vacation outside of the United States in response to the president's bluster.

You can see here on this poster a prime example of the tourism that bolsters my state's economy by bringing together people of diverse backgrounds to learn about our shared history: the Southern Campaign of the Revolution National Heritage Corridor.

This heritage corridor is one of three in my state along with the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor and the South Carolina National Heritage Corridor. We now have three National Parks, Congaree, Fort Moultrie and Fort Sumter, and the Reconstruction Era National Park. I am also particularly proud of a historic site in my congressional district--part of the African American Civil Rights Network--which commemorates the Briggs v. Elliot case, the first of the five consolidated cases that became Brown v. Board of Education.

I am particularly proud of this because it was a South Carolinian, great grandson of a Confederate soldier, J. Waites Waring, who dissented in Briggs, writing ``They showed beyond a doubt that the evils of segregation and color prejudice come from early training, . . . and that it is an evil that must be eradicated.''

These attractions illuminate examples of how tourism enriches people both financially and educationally by bringing them together with other people, places, events, and ideas they may not have otherwise encountered. indian burial mound

These mutually beneficial interactions sadly appear to be at odds with this administration's worldview.

It is a sad irony, I have observed over the years, that those with the outlook held by this administration are those who would benefit the most from learning from, and interacting with, those different from them--yet they are the most resistant to doing so and actively seek to prevent American children from learning these lessons.

I want to share a few such lessons I believe all of us would do well to remember and heed.

Over the Christmas holiday's, I held a viewing of the historical drama, The Six Triple Eight. The subject of the film is success of a regiment of Black female soldiers who overcame extra ordinary obstacles to eradicate a backlog in mail correspondence to American soldiers on the front lines of World War II and restore morale by ensuring servicemembers could communicate with their families back home. The leader of that group was Chasity Adams. (Gregg/Adam)

We also remember the all-Black Tuskegee Airmen who went valiantly into battle for the United States in the European theater. They gave a sense of confidence to their fellow airmen, many of whom would not fly unless they had the assurance that the Tuskegee Airmen would join them in the skies.

We also remember the first U.S. mission to orbit the earth and that the astronaut leading the mission, John Glenn, refused to go up into space without the final sign off on the orbital mathematics of the mission by NASA's Katherine Johnson.

These pivotal moments are all instances where the coming together of people of very different backgrounds had immense benefits for themselves and for all of society.

It is these types of events that this Administration's policies will make far less frequent by its dismantling of the Department of Education and of mutually beneficial international trade.

It is sadly no surprise that this administration seeks to prevent the teaching and celebrating of these types of moments in our schools and museums.

I'll close by reiterating the admonition to my Republican colleagues I shared during this hour last week: it is my hope that fairness and dignity will prompt them to speak out and act against this administration's reckless agenda.

If the economic destruction of the last week has a silver lining, it will hopefully be that it is awakening the American people to the destructiveness of the administration's divisive zero-sum agenda and making it clear to my Republican colleagues that the American people prefer an approach that brings people together.

I often refer to this Hall as America's classroom and in the classroom and the marketplace, even on travel and vacation--that we should lift each other up toward a better future for all.

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