As a child of the Jim Crow era South in Americus, I marched to protest inequality. A lot has changed since then, but not in Fayette County.
Because of great schools and increasing property values, my wife and I thought Fayette had the best quality of life in metro Atlanta. Being near the Atlanta airport was important, since I am a commercial airline pilot.
The black population was about 13 percent when we relocated in 1997, so I instinctively knew the NAACP was needed in Fayette. We became charter members of the Fayette County branch.
Soon, we encountered an all-white power structure that expected black folks to keep their grass cut, pay their taxes and stay in their place. Little did we know we had stepped back in time because, in essence, the civil rights movement had simply bypassed our county.
As the African-American population increased toward the current level of over 20 percent, several well-qualified black political candidates from both major parties ran for various countywide offices and failed. It’s unnecessarily costly to run a countywide campaign to serve a single district, and they simply couldn’t get enough white votes to win.
The only black candidate who ever held countywide elected office in Fayette was now-deceased Magistrate Judge Chuck Floyd. Ironically, he was chosen to replace a white judge who resigned in 2002 under pressure from the NAACP.
I moved up through the ranks to become Fayette NAACP Branch president in 2008, continually advocating for a change to district voting.
Georgia NAACP President Ed Dubose helped get the NAACP Legal Defense Fund to file a federal lawsuit in August 2011. U.S. District Judge Timothy Batten rightfully ruled in favor of the NAACP and ordered Fayette to adopt district voting. County commissioners are pursuing an appeal of the judge’s decision.
Close to $300,000 has already been wasted trying to keep Jim Crow Era at-large voting alive in Fayette, and the meter is still running. Those in the majority say that with district voting, they will be disenfranchised because they will no longer be able to vote for candidates that represent other districts outside of the one in which they live. How selfish is that?
In the 1960s, the majority didn’t want blacks to have an equal opportunity to vote or get elected to political office. The Voting Rights Act was enacted to prevent voter suppression and give minorities residing within a geographically compact area the opportunity to elect the candidate of their choice.
Subconsciously, most blacks in Fayette know that we are still not considered equal in the eyes of many white people, and it’s up to white people in Fayette to help change that.
My ultimate goal is to make Fayette a model of diversity and inclusion and a place where African-Americans and people of all races feel welcome. Every surrounding county has district voting, so I appeal to fair-minded whites in Fayette to press county leaders to accept district voting.
I also appeal to my Fayette leaders to comply with Judge Batten’s order and advance us into the 21st century, or risk exposing the county to serious unwanted consequences.
Resisting change will just draw more attention to this place, where the heirs of Jim Crow are trying to cling to absolute power. But the Fayette County civil rights movement is gathering momentum. One day soon, we too shall overcome.
John Jones is president of the Fayette County NAACP.
