The Rainbow PUSH Coalition will sponsor Keep the Vote Alive! Pro-Democracy March and Rally in Atlanta on August 6, 2005. The event commemorates the 40th Anniversary of the Voting Rights Act and is aimed at educating citizens about the significance of voting and other democratic institutions.

According to Jesse L. Jackson, founder and president of Rainbow PUSH, “Dr. King and Cesar Chavez, working together in the Poor People's Campaign, established the need and the framework. We all obtained the right to vote in 1965, with Section 203 prohibiting discrimination based on language, and Section 5 enabling us to forge winning electoral districts and prohibiting changes in voting procedures without first getting pre-clearance from the Department of Justice. The Voting Rights Act created an historic rise in African American and Latino elected officials all around the nation.” The rise in black elected official helped to spur economic and educational gains for the black middle class.

Keep the Vote Alive! begins at 10:00 a.m. with a march on Peachtree at 10th Street and ends in Piedmont Park, with an all-day rally. Other events taking place in the park during the Rally include Hip-hop, R&B and Gospel music, spoken word artists, a health fair and Democracy School.

Keep the Vote Alive! Pro-Democracy March and Rally is supported by a coalition of conscience that also supports the right of workers to organize, the fight for a living wage; high quality public education; accessible, affordable health care for all Americans; a secure Social Security system; gender equity; clean air and water, a sustainable environment; and the right to personal privacy. But without the right to vote, and to have that vote counted, none of these other freedoms are guaranteed.

Confirmed participants include Congressman John Lewis, Congresswoman Maxine Waters, Coach Ken Carter, Ambassador Andrew Young, AME Bishop Vashti McKenzie, AFL-CIO President John Sweeney; Dr. Joseph E. Lowery, Convener of the Georgia Coalition for the People’s Agenda; SCLC President Charles Steele, SEIU President Andy Stern, Tish Tallman of MALDEF, Barbara Arnwine of the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law.