Yom Kippur Morning 5773/2012 Enfranchisement

Unetaneh tokef k’dushat hayom – Let us proclaim the sacred power of this day.

This is the most sacred season on our Jewish calendar, and today is the holiest day of all. We stand before God, with our whole community, linked to Jews all over the world, fasting, praying, and asking for forgiveness.

This is a day set apart from all others, in which we and God renew the covenant –the brit – between us. Many of our ancestors sacrificed everything to make it possible for us to be here, worshipping according to our custom – in freedom.

At the very same time, we are in the midst of another sacred season. On our secular calendar, this is the season of citizenship. We stand up to be counted as Americans as we register to vote, as we participate in the national conversation about our country’s future, and as we ultimately exercise our citizenship by casting our ballots in November.

So many people who came before us made enormous sacrifices – some even gave up their lives – in the struggle for all citizens in this country – men and women, Black and White— to fully participate in our democracy. Many Jews were among those activists who rode buses to the South, to stand with their Black brothers and sisters, risking and sometimes suffering beatings, and even death to claim the right of all citizens to register and to vote.

Despite the negativity of the election campaigns swirling around us, I want to take a moment today to mark the holiness of this season of enfranchisement and to recognize how we must continue to safeguard it.

The word enfranchise in Old French comes from the particle en- (expressing a change of state) and the word franche which meant ‘free’, combining to mean “to change one’s status to free.” In modern parlance, the word has taken on two meanings. One, to free a slave. And the other, to give the right to vote to.

Both of these meanings surface in this morning’s Torah portion. As they are about to enter the Promised Land, after forty years of wandering in the desert, our ancestors, proud and free, station themselves before God. They have already been enfranchised once, as they crossed the split Red Sea from slavery to freedom.

Now they are experiencing the second meaning of enfranchisement. God establishes a partnership – a covenant – in which both God and the people are bound to each other through a system of law and obligation. They may not yet be voting specifically, but the people are empowered to choose, to act, and to build a community of common purpose.

Atem nitzavim hayom kulchem. . . You stand this day, all of you, before the Eternal your God – your tribal heads, your elders and your officials, men, women, children, even the stranger within your camp, from woodchopper to water drawer – to enter in the covenant of the Eternal your God, which the Eternal your God is concluding with you this day.. . . I make this covenant not with you alone, but both with those who are standing here with us this day. . . and with those who are not with us here this day. (Deut. 29: 9-14)

In this passage, we see the beginnings of the concept of citizenship. God’s vision of nationhood requires the participation, the presence, and the contributions of every citizen – from menial laborers to elite public officials. Strangers, men and women – everyone is needed, everyone is recognized.

There are people in this country who know what it was like to be excluded. In Selma, Alabama in the 1960’s, the struggle for enfranchisement was embodied by the simple act of hundreds of local blacks lining up at the County building to demand the right to register to vote. White county and city police beat and arrested them, by the thousands. We are all most familiar with the images of African American protesters, attempting to cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge over the Alabama River en route to Montgomery. Just short of the bridge, they found their way blocked by State troopers and local police who ordered them to turn around. When the protesters refused, the officers shot teargas and waded into the crowd, beating the nonviolent protesters with billy clubs and ultimately hospitalizing over fifty people. For African Americans who experienced that fight, going to vote is now almost a religious pilgrimage.

Unfortunately, the struggle for enfranchisement in this country continues today. Minorities, the poor, and the elderly do not face beatings or lynchings in their efforts to vote. Instead, they face more subtle forms of intimidation and voter suppression.

After the 2000 elections, a raft of new legislation was introduced at the state level, including dozens of voter-ID laws which are now on the books. Those advocating for these new laws explained that it was needed to combat rampant voter fraud. However, several exhaustive studies have found that voter fraud is exceedingly rare in our country. Rather than reduce fraud, these laws have placed barriers in front of honest people attempting to exercise their rights as citizens.[i]

Marie Crittenden[ii], a 92 year-old woman from Tennessee, has been an active voter since 1948. So when Tennessee passed its new voter photo id law, she knew she would need to get one to continue exercising her right. But, she says, there were quite a few obstacles between her and that photo id, since she no longer could drive, and her married name didn’t match the name on her Birth Certificate.

Thankfully, her niece Janis was willing to drive her back and forth to the election commission several times after having her old ID and then her paperwork rejected. It took Janis’ skillful advocacy with election officials, arguing that this elderly woman was clearly not trying to scam the system, and that they should use common sense, to convince them to finally allow Marie to vote. Not all elderly citizens have a niece to do all of the legwork. Many many more out there would, and do, just give up and go home without voting at all.

A federal court recently struck down a Texas law that would have required voters to show government-issued photo identification before casting their ballots in November, ruling that the law would hurt turnout among minority voters and impose “strict, unforgiving burdens on the poor” by charging those voters who lack proper documentation fees to obtain election ID cards.[iii] In Pennsylvania, a high court also recently blocked aspects of a voter photo-ID law.

The real impact of these laws has little to do with fraud – they suppress the votes of the poor, minorities, and the elderly, many of whom would have to go to great lengths and pay what amounts to a poll tax to obtain the necessary ID.

These laws, as well as efforts by organizations to train their own poll watchers to go into minority neighborhoods and challenge voter registration records, aim to weaken this nation’s commitment to full enfranchisement – a commitment that was won through years of struggle and sacrifice.

Our Torah portion this morning continues, saying, “Surely this Instruction which I enjoin upon you this day is not too baffling for you, nor is it beyond reach. It is not in the heavens, that you should say, ‘Who among us can go up to the heavens and get it for us and impart it to us that we may observe it?’ Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, ‘Who among us can cross to the other side of the sea and get it for us and impart it to us, that we may observe it?’ No, the thing is very close to you, in your mouth and in your heart, to observe it.” (Deut. 30:11-14)

Full participation in the community – in the nation – should not be too baffling or beyond reach, whether for a WWII veteran who was turned away from the polls in Ohio during the primaries because his VA card has his photo but not his address[iv], to the working parent who needs access to the polls on the weekend, to the elderly person who needs a ride. Whatever it might mean for the results of an election, our covenantal obligation as a nation is to put the right to vote – the foundation of citizenship – within the reach of all of our nation’s citizens. “For the thing is very close to you, in your mouth and in your heart, to observe it.”

Even the stranger in our midst has access to the covenant, according to our text.

And in this country, there are many aspects of our national covenant that should be accessible to the “strangers” living among us. I’m especially thinking about the Dreamers – those young people who were brought to this country as children when their parents immigrated illegally.

Martha[v] is a young woman from east LA who was brought to this country from Mexico at age 6 by her parents, who are undocumented immigrants. In contrast to most of her peers in her poor, immigrant neighborhood, she graduated high school. Not only that, she did so with honors and was accepted at UCLA, thanks to the fact that California law allows children of illegal immigrants to attend public universities. Martha’s dream is to become an Ob/Gyn. A career in Medicine has always been her goal, as she sees herself as a public servant and a scientist.

For three years Martha commuted 2.5 hours each way to college, coming home most nights to do the housework and cooking, as her parents worked long hours at multiple jobs. On top of all of this, she worked full-time as a waitress to support herself. Often, when she just couldn’t deal with the commute, she would live “hobo style” on campus, sleeping in the library, storing her food in building lounge kitchens, and showering and keeping her clothes in the gym locker room.

When she was offered job in a lab, working for one of her UCLA professors, she realized she couldn’t take it, as she did not have a Social Security number.

Her dream of becoming a doctor keeps her motivated, but she also knows that once she graduates, her UCLA diploma will mean nothing. She is unlikely to be able to go to medical school, given her illegal status, and she still cannot work legally in this country, even with a college diploma. To immigrate legally, she would need to return to Mexico, where she has no connections, where she hasn’t lived since she was a young child, and put her name on a waiting list that is 10-15 years long. If she could only be allowed to attend grad school and work here, this woman who is American in every way except for her immigration status, would only be adding to our nation’s strength.

At one point, Martha almost lost hope. Exhausted and depressed, she quit school with only one quarter to go. But eventually she returned and finished her degree. She is still holding out that someday, our country’s policy towards Dreamers like her will change. Even though the Dream Act, which would give young people like her a path to citizenship, has not yet passed Congress, there is still hope that it will continue to gain enough support to eventually pass.

In the meantime, President Obama recently issued an executive order to make it possible for young people who were brought to this country illegally as children, to apply for permission to legally work and study and serve in our military, for two years with the possibility to renew. This is a promising step. For now, Martha’s college diploma does not represent the end of a road, but the beginning of a future.

Martha and hundreds of thousands of young men and women want to come out of the shadows and participate fully in this nation’s life – in our economy, in our intellectual community, in our defense.

There is more work to do to bring enfranchisement to these folks. I urge you to get informed and involved in the efforts to pass the Dream Act. As a congregation we belong to an interfaith organization, United Action, that is working on this issue. If you are interested in getting involved, please let me know.

We see in these Dreamers the universal human impulse to participate fully in community – not only to enjoy the benefits of being a part of the community, but also to have the privilege of contributing.

We see this impulse amplified a thousand times over when we look at Syria and see the struggle of an entire population to enfranchise themselves – to take ownership of their country and their future. We see it in acts of resistance in the state of Israel, where ultra-Orthodox women are standing up to Jewish extremists attempting to impose strict gender segregation in the public realm. These women risk harassment by demanding to sit where they want on public buses and walk where they want on the streets. We see it in Jerusalem where women face the prospect of detention and arrest by wearing tallitot and carrying Torah scrolls to pray publicly at the Western Wall.

Our tradition recognizes as holy this impulse of all people to want to be a part of something greater – of all people to have full and equal access to the power of citizenship. It also celebrates the variety of ways in which people can contribute to the nation’s strength. If the woodchopper only makes minimum wage or needs food stamps to make ends meet, his importance as a citizen is not dismissed. The community recognizes that he contributes to the whole in other ways. The tribal heads and the elders may have different views on politics, but they still adhere to the same covenant and work towards the same sacred vision.

We can see how inclusion, enfranchisement and diversity enriches and strengthens us when we look at our own Jewish community. This synagogue, I hope, is a good example of how a community works hard to make it possible for all to participate and values everyone’s participation, regardless of the ability of an individual or family to pay full dues. The synagogue might be one of the last surviving types of communities in America where we have Democrats and Republicans working, eating, learning and praying together. I see all kinds of bumper stickers out there in the parking lot. And I do not see us tearing each other apart in here.

Thriving Jewish communities recognize that we do indeed need everyone. If my neighbor is unable to participate – then my experience is diminished. The same goes for my experience as a citizen. As Nelson Mandela once said, “to be free is not merely to cast off one’s chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others.”

Our people, standing at the edge of the Promised Land, are the first generation of Israelites in 400 years to know a life free from slavery. They have cast off their chains, and they have crossed the first river. But their freedom is not yet complete. Now it is time to cross the second river. In this crossing they commit to creating a community, in partnership with God, which will have the power to make others free.

We read in this morning’s haftarah from Isaiah, that only when we use our power as enfranchised people to make others free, then we are worthy of standing before God, on this holy day.

The people complain that when they fast, God pays no heed. When they afflict themselves on this holy day, God takes no notice.

And Isaiah exhorts them,

“Because on your fast day you pursue your own affairs, while you oppress all your workers! . . . . Such a fast on this day will not help you to be heard on high.

Is this the fast I have chosen? A day of self-affliction? Is this what you call a fast, a day acceptable to the Eternal?

Is not this the fast I have chosen: to unlock the shackles of injustice, to loosen the ropes of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free?

Then shall your light break forth like the dawn, and your healing shall quickly blossom. . . . Then, when you call, the Eternal One will answer; when you cry, God will say: Here I am.
(Isaiah 58)