10-24-2025 9:04am

From The Public Agenda: An America Without Rights Rights Or Reckoning by Dr Shellie Bowman

John L Williams Editor

I remember the first time I truly understood what America could become without laws that bind morality to power. It was not through a court ruling or a political debate but through a mother’s grief. Mamie Till-Mobley’s decision to open her son’s casket in 1955 forced the nation to confront the horror of what had been done to fourteen-year-old Emmett Till. His face, beaten beyond recognition, reflected a truth many preferred to ignore: without law, humanity collapses into cruelty. If America ever forgets why civil rights laws exist, it will forget what it means to be human.
To imagine a United States without the enforcement of civil rights or voting rights is to imagine a return to sanctioned inequality. Before the Voting Rights Act of 1965, democracy was a gated privilege. Poll taxes, literacy tests, and intimidation kept millions from the ballot box. Without federal oversight, these tactics would not only re-emerge but be defended as “local control.” History has shown that power, left unchecked, protects itself. As Alexander (2010) argues, systems of oppression do not disappear; they adapt. When fairness is not enforced, discrimination becomes policy, and policy becomes culture.

You can read the complete article at

https://open.substack.com/pub/drshellieb/p/the-unprotected-class-an-ame…

You can find all of Dr Shellie Bowman’s Articles at https://substack.com/@drshellie?r=va8ka&utm_medium=ios&utm_source=profi…