(CNSNews.com) – Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) on Wednesday questioned how the Republican Party lost the black vote after a century with the GOP - from the Civil War to the civil rights movement - during a speech at the historically black college of Howard University in Washington, D.C.
“How did the party that elected the first black U.S. senator, the party that elected the first 20 African-American congressmen, how did that party become a party that now loses 95 percent of the black vote?” Paul asked.
“How did the Republican Party, the party of the Great Emancipator lose the trust and faith of an entire race? From the Civil War to the civil rights movement for a century most black Americans voted Republican. How did we lose that vote?” he asked.
“I think what happened during the Great Depression is that African-Americans understood that Republicans did champion citizenship and voting rights, but they became impatient, because they wanted economic emancipation,” Paul said.
“African-Americans were languishing, and they languished below white Americans in every measure of economic success, and the Depression was especially harsh for those who were on the lowest wrung of poverty at that time,” he added.
“The Democrats promised equalizing outcome – everybody will get something through unlimited federal assistance, while Republicans offered something that seemed to be less tangible – the promise of equalizing opportunity through free markets,” Paul said in explaining why blacks switched to the Democratic Party during the Great Depression in the 1930s.
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