Mississippi’s newest U.S. Senator-elect Scott Colom stands on the shoulders of giants.
And knows it.
Colom invoked the ancestors during his acceptance speech on the campus of historic Tougaloo College Wednesday night, thanking those who got him to this win, which included icons of Black history and everyday Mississippians who fought and died for this moment.
“There’s so many people that had faith in Mississippi at times where it seemed impossible. People like Medgar Evers,” said Colom during his acceptance speech, referencing the WWII veteran who was shot dead in 1963 by a white supremacist opposed to his Civil Rights Movement activism. “I can’t help but think about Medgar Evers on Veterans Day. A moment like this where he served his country and came home to Mississippi when they wouldn’t let him vote. But he had faith that Mississippi could make progress. He had faith that one day everybody would have the right to vote. He had faith that a day like this was possible.”
“God bless you, Medgar. God bless you, Medgar. God bless you,” he said.
Along with Evers, he thanked activist Fannie Lou Hamer, America’s first Black U.S. Senator Hiram Revels of Mississippi, and the thousands of unknowns who registered voters, marched, protested, organized, and never gave up on the dream of a Mississippi that is for all of its citizens, regardless of race.
“One of my mentors is the national president of the NAACP, Derrick Johnson. And one of the things that he told me a long time ago that always stuck with me is that in Mississippi, it’s local people that make the difference,” Colom said. “Not just the names that are recorded in history, but people that do the work without any expectation of recognition. And I’ll tell you, it’s local people that have faith that Mississippi can make progress, and it’s local people like the people out here who have faith that we can win this election. So God bless you.”
Colom’s win was due to the work of those activists, organizers and innocents he thanked, many of whom, like Evers, lost their lives fighting for a better Mississippi. They believed the risk of life and limb was worth the state’s salvation. It was worth fighting for the right to vote. It was worth fighting to have a say in your home, community, and country. They would fight the impossible in the deepest, darkest part of the South, where, until yesterday, no Black person had held a statewide office since Reconstruction.
“For months and months, I’ve been telling everybody everywhere I go that we’re going to win this election,” said Colom. “I was saying it eight, nine months ago. Recently, I’ve been saying it on the news. But every time I said it, I pointed out that people were going to give me too much credit for it, because it’s not something that I did, y’all. It’s something that we did.”
“All I did was have the courage to imagine a night like this,” he said. “I had the courage to believe in Mississippi. I had the courage to understand that we could show the country that Mississippi matters.”
When Colom’s win was announced, many online quoted hip-hop duo OutKast’s acceptance speech from the 1995 Source Awards, where rapper André 3000 announced, “The South got something to say!” People linked that iconic moment to the blue-wave- turned-blue-tsunami sweeping across the region, turning long-standing Republican strongholds like Texas, South Carolina, North Carolina, and now Mississippi blue.
But the South didn’t just have something to say.
The South led the way.
A multiracial coalition led by Black organizers in Mississippi and across the South made it happen. Not the billionaire donors and, in some cases, not even the Democratic establishment, who were late to Colom’s cause.
But although Mississippi would’ve liked to have the outside validation, they didn’t need it.
Generations of organizers in Mississippi never gave up, had the vision, and even if they wouldn’t live to see it, they were willing to put their lives on the line.
It was generations of Mississippians who never stopped registering voters, running candidates, and organizing, even in the face of violence, gerrymandering, voter suppression, and purges of voter rolls. They kept trying. They kept showing up. And even after the establishment abandoned them, they did not stop fighting for their state and the people in it.
They saw what we couldn’t. And because of their persistence, a new hope was born.
There’s an old saying, “Lord, I’ve seen what you’ve done for others…,” and Black people across this nation are repeating it, dreaming of the day their states and communities change for the better.
I’m from Missouri, with family roots in the South, and I’m old enough to remember when my home state was run by rational people. But in recent years, Missouri has become best known for the antics of Sen. Josh Hawley and the constant shenanigans from a string of Republican governors, some of whom have left Jefferson City in shame, who often ignore the desires of the people and have tried to strip them of their power.
“Lord, I’ve seen what you’ve done for Mississippi (and Georgia, South Carolina, and Texas),” so many are uttering. Now their prayers are specific: Do it for Missouri. Do it for Louisiana. Do it for Alabama. Do it for Arkansas. Do it for Florida. Free these states from the grips of dysfunction and exploitation. Do it for Tennessee. Do it for Kentucky. Do it for every state that has languished and suffered under conservative, one-party rule.
But as people say these prayers, remember: Mississippi did not wait for a sign from above. Mississippians believed and did the work, never knowing if they’d get there. They simply kept showing up, putting one foot in front of the other, until they reached victory. Many did not live to see Colom’s win, to see the day Mississippi would have a Black U.S. Senator again, but their unwavering belief and their actions carried us to this moment.
You can’t count the South out, because the South won’t allow itself to be counted out.
The South has something to say. And now the South has even more work to do and the power to do it.
It’s morning in Mississippi, and the sun is shining with hope for the future. A hope that Mississippi and America can save themselves.
The people are leading the way.
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