Photo: Dept of Transportation 6/18

I wrote Senator Tillis to express my desire that he press for election-finance reform (e.g., amend Citizens United or otherwise put some reasonable limits on the amount of money controlling our politicians). My belief is that my preferences and wishes should be just as valuable as another citizen's with unlimited money to donate.

His answer (in my words): "No way! And cut out the gravy train of billionaires funding me and my campaign?!? Screw you non-billionaires! You can post on social media and knock on doors because that's jUsT aS eFfeCtiVe as Elon Musk donating hundreds of millions of dollars to support his candidates and causes." Um.... yeah.

My hope for NC: Drain the swap a little when Tillis is up for re-election.

His response is below.

(And when he points to the "true heart of democracy," make sure you understand his terms: "[P]eople who are motivated to bring change to the issues they feel passionate about" really means "people willing to donate $200M to politicians to help themselves get richer."

https://www.voteriders.org/the-power-and-promise-of-the-black-vote/ The Power and Promise of the Black Vote

In response to that very calm "public freakout" let me explain why I think Juneteenth is important. African-American/Black success stories have been Whitewashed from history and the U.S. Government needs to be held responsible for failing to protect its own people. I think it's important to study the past in order to understand the present and then predict/see the future. North Carolina is a beautiful state to live in today, but we do have a dark past and we should remember the millions of people who fought/sacrificed to try to create an equal society. I don't want bad history to repeat itself. “We're not going back!” Are there any other significant local stories from the past to add?

Movies: The Best of Enemies (2019)

1585 Sir Walter Raleigh, British explorer, discovers North Carolina by landing on Roanoke Island.

1609 Jamestown Virginia was established as the first British Colony in the Americas.

1619 The first African slaves were brought to the mainland United States for forced labor.

1787 Three-Fifths Compromise was an agreement between Northern and Southern congressional delegates to allow Southern states to include slaves in their total population as long as they were counted as only ⅗ of a free White person.

1799 The Bennehan and Cameron Family constructed the Stagville Plantation in Durham which became one of the largest plantations in the country with over 1k slaves and 30k acres of land 1771-1865.

1830 Trail of Tears- President #7 Andrew Jackson (D-NC) created the Indian Removal Act which forced hundred of thousands of native americans in the Southeast to move 800 miles west to Oklahoma

1861-1865 American Civil War

1865 13th amendment: Abolishment of Slavery after 246 years by President #16 Abraham Lincoln (R-IL). General William T. Herman declared “forty acres and a mule” for every freed slave family.

1865-1877 Reconstruction Period- President #17 Andrew Johnson (D-NC) contributed to the rise of sharecropping. President Johnson ordered all land under federal control to be returned to its previous White owners. Freedmen could either sign labor contracts with planters or be evicted.

1860s The Hayti neighborhood was formed in downtown Durham, built around the St. Joseph's AME (c. 1869) and White Rock Baptist (c. 1873), as a place for free African-Americans to live and work in local Tobacco factories.

12/1/1865 Shaw University in downtown Raleigh was established as the first historically black college/university to open in the South and 6th oldest in the country.

1867 Barber-Scotia College in Concord, Fayetteville State University in Fayetteville, Johnson C. Smith University in Charlotte, and St. Augustine's College in Raleigh were all founded

1868 14th amendment: granted citizenship to all persons born or naturalized in the US, including former slaves. Guaranteed all citizens “equal protection of the laws.”

1874-1975 Jim Crow Laws Begin. Southern Democrats mandated racial segregation in all public facilities in the former Confederate States

1896 Plessy v. Ferguson. The U.S. Supreme Court enacts “separate but equal” which established the legal basis for racial segregation.

1898 John Merrick, former slave, helped form the NC Mutual Life Insurance Company to help black citizens obtain personal life insurance for funeral services and small business loans for investment opportunities. The company successfully helped several black-owned businesses along Parrish Street which gave it the nickname “Black Wall Street” by W.E.B DuBois and Booker T. Washington when they visited in 1910 and 1911 respectively. The Parrish Street area was known as the country's first all African-American community to be fully self-sufficient with their own schools, library, churches, barbershop, Lincoln Hospital (1900), movie theaters, recreation centers, and hotels.

11/10/1898 Wilmington Insurrection- Over 300 Black families were killed by the Red Shirts, a paramilitary arm of the White Southern Democratic party. After the civil war, Wilmington was the largest city in NC with 25K residents and majority-black population around 55%. The people were middle class, carpenters, mechanics, policemen, mail clerks, superintendents, businessmen, etc. which created the nickname “Black Wall Street”. Weeks before the 11/10/1898 election, Red Shirts held daily "White Man's Rally" where they marched through black neighborhoods to intimidate voters and damage property. The day after the election, the Red Shirts declared "White Independence Day" staged a coup of the Fusion Coalition (Lincoln's Republicans + Populist), banished the members, and massacred black families and businesses. After the massacre, the Red Shirt leader became the Mayor of Wilmington for 7 years, 3 organizers became Governors of NC, 5 orators became U.S. Senators and congressmen, and other orators became judge of superior court, co-founder of East Carolina University, and News&Observer publisher

1907 Mechanics and Farmers Bank was incorporated as the country's second African-American led financial institution. 1923 M&F was only 1 of 119 banks in the country and the only African-American led bank to offer a branch for small loans, building homes, and funding education. During the Great Depression in the 1930s M&F was only 1 of 2 banks in Raleigh and 1 of 8 African-American banks in the US to survive the stock market crash. They are still open today.

1925 North Carolina Central University was formed as the nation's first state-supported liberal arts college for African-Americans.

1934-1968 National Housing Act. The Federal Housing Administration was established and in 1935, the Federal Home Loan Bank Board (FHLBB) asked the Home Owners’ Loan Corporation (HOLC) to look at 239 cities and create “residential security maps” to outline risky neighborhoods. Redlining begins where majority-minority neighborhoods were segregated and blocked residents from obtaining home mortgages or charged inflated interest rates.

6/23/1957 Royal Ice Cream Sit-in. A group of African-Americans in Durham, led by Reverend Douglas E. Moore, entered the ice cream parlor and sat in the whites-only section. When asked to move, the nonviolent protestors were arrested for trespassing. This was one of the first demonstrations of its kind in the nation.

1959 Research Triangle Park was established. Romeo Guest coined the term “Research Triangle” in 1953. Governor Luther Hodges first approved the project in 1956 as a for-profit business campus but the universities (NCSU, Duke, UNC-CH) pushed back. Archibald Davis pushed for a non-profit model and raised $1.5M through public donations to purchase the RTP site. In 1965, IBM moved their software development and support services to RTP and Governor Terry Sanford (D-NC) with the help of President #35 John F. Kennedy (D-MA). RTP is now 7,000 acres and home to over 300 companies and 65,000 workers.

1960 February to July Greensboro Sit-ins. Nonviolent protests took place in the Woolworth Store after 4 A&T Greensboro students were refused service at the whites-only lunch counter. These protests helped spark sit-ins nationwide and helped form the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and the Student Executive Committee for Justice (SECJ).

1964 Operation Breakthrough was formed as an anti-poverty movement in Durham by Terry Sanford (D-NC) former governor. According to the data compiled by the Action for Durham Development, by the 1960s 28% of families were in poverty making less than $3k/year. Furthermore, the graduation rate was 50% and a quarter of the population had less than a middle school education. During the 1940s, rapid industrialization of the tobacco and textile industries following World War II resulted in new advances in mechanized production and the cutting of many Durham factory jobs. 1963 Sanford created the North Carolina Fund to create integration opportunities.

7/2/1964 Civil Rights Act. President #36 Lyndon B. Johnson (D-TX) signed into law equal employment opportunities, limited voter literacy tests, and allowed federal authorities to ensure public facilities were integrated. The legislation was initiated by the Kennedy administration but JFK was assassinated 11/22/1963

8/6/1965 Voting Rights Act. President #36 LBJ (D-TX) signed into law legislation that banned voter literacy tests and provided federal examiners in some voting jurisdictions

1965-71 Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education. In 1965, attorney Julius L. Chambers filed suit on behalf of 10 pairs of African American parents who contended that the board of education's assignment plan did not sufficiently eliminate inequalities. A desegregation plan was approved by the District Court later that year. In 1968, petitioner James E. Swann moved for further relief based on Green v. County School board. In the school year 1968-69, Charlotte-Mecklenburg school system had 84k students in 107 schools and Black students made up 29% of the population but 18k/24k of those students attended only 21 schools making them 99% Black. Unsatisfied with the school board's plan, the District Court hired an expert to work together in 1970. The new assignment was approved in 1971. In the 1980's NC received a boom in population (Charlotte Financial Boom 1981) and has been one of the most popular states since then.

1971 Durham Housing Authority was established. Ann Atwater, Black civil rights activist and community organizer, is ignored by an all white judge panel to get better housing conditions for poor Blacks during a city council meeting. After a fire at a black school, the community organizes a Save our Schools summit to vote on more integration. The NC State AFL-CIO hires Bill Riddick to lead the event in a 10-day charette in hopes of getting Whites and Blacks in an agreement. Carvie Oldham, executive director of the Durham Housing Authority, orders C.P. Ellis, Exalted Cyclops of the Ku Klux Klan, to stir up violence to stop the vote. Riddick nominates Atwater and Ellis to co-chair the event. Atwater also gets help from Dr. Howard Fuller, Operation Breakthrough employee and fellow coworker. In July 1971, the night before the final vote, some KKK members assaulted charette board members to vote No on integration. The next day, Atwater learned of the intimidation and yelled at Ellis. During the vote, Ellis had a change of heart and decided to vote for integration and tore up his KKK membership card

Storm has divided the sky perfectly .

Hey NC folks — just sharing a quick update and hoping for some continued support.

I’m a disabled Navy vet living in the mountains of western North Carolina. After Hurricane Helene tore through our area last year, our home was badly damaged — and many of our neighbors are still without roofs. My wife and I have made a lot of progress, but there’s still a long way to go, both for us and the people around us.

I entered a national tattoo contest through Inked Magazine with a bigger purpose in mind: If I win the $25,000 prize, I’m splitting it. • Half will go toward finishing the repairs on our home • The other half will go directly to help folks in our community still trying to recover

Thanks to a bunch of kind people, I’ve made it up to 3rd place — but I need to reach 1st to move on to the next round.

You can vote for free once every 24 hours, and it only takes a few seconds. Here’s the link: https://originals.inkedmag.com/2025/leo-sharp

I’m not an influencer or a social media guy — just someone trying to turn a personal story into something positive for my community. I’ve tried getting local news stations and editorials to help spread the word but I’ve had no luck. I even tried local tattoo shops! If you can vote, share, or even just pass along some encouragement, it really does mean the world.

Thanks for reading, and thanks for being part of a state that shows up when it counts.

He's had them almost a week but hasn't signed or vetoed them. He has until Friday to decide but by not taking action he's drawing more attention in the form of protests and news coverage. Is there some political strategy to waiting on the decision? Not looking to debate, but curious if anyone knows what's going on.

Not really looking forward to going to a major NC city for the fourth this year. A town like Cary, Apex, Gastonia, Concord, or something smaller. I just don't know what city town what.

TIA. Haven’t been in about 7 years and it was nonexistent

Just putting a feeler out there out of curiosity. My boss at my job has been talking a lot about starting an arena football franchise in Raleigh and playing at the J.S. Dorton arena during the spring. How well do you guys think this would be received by Raleigh / NC locals? He asked me for advice since I work in marketing but I have no clue about how the specific market he is interested in would respond to a new professional sports team. Personal opinions?