The Crisis we Cannot See

                In March, the national League of Women Voters joined a lawsuit to oppose a presidential executive order that attempts to radically change the way voting is conducted in this country, shifting the Constitutional right of states to control their own elections to the executive branch of government. The League also came out strongly against the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility, or Save Act, which would require documentary proof of citizenship to vote. The SAVE Act has passed the House but is likely not to pass in the Senate. (39 out of 50 states already require that voters prove they are citizens.) The League opposed both moves because if enacted they would drastically limit voter participation, especially among women and low-income and minority voters, many of whom may not have access to the required documents.

                Why would the current administration and Congress want to limit voting and why would the League oppose such attempts? And what does all of this have to do with white poverty? A new book offers some compelling answers. Recently, members of our local League’s “Well-Read Citizen Book Club” (open to everyone, we meet monthly at St. John’s church) read Rev. William J. Barber’s book White Poverty: How Exposing Myths About Race and Class Can Reconstruct American Democracy. Barber, an African American minister and academic, born in Indianapolis but raised in North Carolina, focuses on how eliminating poverty has not been a major focus for either political party since the 1960’s. Ignoring the issue of poverty, he argues, has had a damaging effect on all poor people, the vast majority of whom happen to be white. He sees this as not just a political issue, but as a deeply moral one as well. How can the richest country on earth, one so strongly influenced by the Judeo-Christian tradition, ignore the basic needs—for food, housing, health care and education—of millions of its citizens?

He calls poverty “the crisis we cannot see,” a crisis that affects 140 million Americans, 43% of our population. This figure is dramatically higher than the current official poverty measure (OPM) because those measures are based on outdated cost of living figures. (Barber’s book includes extensive objective research that support his conclusions.) In particular, the official definition of poverty ignores the vast number of “working poor” white, Black, Latino and Native Americans, who are living paycheck to paycheck because prices for necessities like rent and food have become so high relative to their wages. When you look more closely at the figures one can see that 24 million of these poor are Black, (60% of all Black people in the United States) but 66 million out of the 140 million are white.

Barber argues that we generally don’t recognize this reality about poverty because of the myth, perpetuated by those in power in our society (some of the 1% in 2023 that owned more wealth than 80% of the population) that poverty is only a Black Issue. This divisive myth, one accepted by many, makes the white poor believe that the system is basically working for them—when it clearly isn’t.

Many poor people feel responsible for their economic condition and ashamed that they are poor, so they often either do not vote or, believing the myth that poverty is only an issue for the “other,” vote for people who may not represent their interests. If they did see their connection to Black and other minority poor people, Barber believes, they could create a powerful voting block that would challenge politicians who ignore the overwhelming needs of almost half of America. Barber refers to the Poor People’s Campaigns in the 1960’s, which led directly to legislation that created Medicaid, minimum wage expansion, and the Food Stamp Act of 1964. Such a coalition of whites and people of color, creating what he calls a “moral fusion,” might confront these same issues that persist to this day.

Unfortunately, many politicians who wish to maintain the status quo seek to limit voting rights.  They seem only to represent the interests of their constituents with economic means, and do not support policies that would address the increasing economic inequality in our society. They fear that more people of all backgrounds voting, especially those who share the daily challenges of poverty, might unite to demand actions that will help make their daily lives less oppressive. Barber uses the example of politicians in some of the poorest states voting to not expand access to Medicaid, thus denying thousands of their citizens necessary health care. Refusing to accept those additional federal funds has led to the closure of hundreds of rural hospitals, leading to increased negative health outcomes and to avoidable deaths. (We are not immune to these issues in Montgomery County.)

The League of Women Voters has taken an active stand against attempts to limit voting rights because such limits hurt all of us. As Barber writes about earlier attempts to limit Black voters in the South, “Voter suppression that targeted Black folks also hurt poor white people because it prevented politicians from getting elected who would pass policies that lifted all poor people.”   Barber’s book invites us to see the relationship between poverty and the right to vote in our democracy. Only through elections that include all eligible voters can we hope to solve the problems that affect those struggling economically in our community, those visible to us and those we cannot see.

The League of Women Voters is a nonpartisan, multi-issue political organization which encourages informed and active participation in government. For information about the League, visit the website www.lwvmontcoin.org; or, visit the League of Women Voters of Montgomery County, Indiana Facebook page.