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TO: PROCLAMATIONS OFFICERS OF STATE |
GOVERNORS, MUNICIPAL MAYORS, HISTORICALLY BLACK COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES, STATE AND PRIVATE COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES. |
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FROM: The BHMO State and Regional Founder`s Commission |
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| WHEREAS: the Black History Month Observance nationally celebrates the achievements of African Americans in all fields of endeavors, from the perspective of an “inclusive” American society and internationally celebrates the “cultural affinity” and “kith and kin” links between African Americans, their enslaved forefathers, foremothers and their progeny throughout the New and Old World lands of the African Diaspora and the populations of post-liberation struggle, free citizens of sovereign African states … and; |
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| WHEREAS: the 25 august 1893 “Coloured Peoples Day” Observance (over which the African American abolitionist, publisher and first African American diplomat, Frederick Douglass [b. 1817 - d. 1895] presided at the Chicago World`s Fair`s Haiti Pavilion) launched the 114 year evolution of the Black History Month Observance… followed by the Reconstruction Era`s Black community dialogue, which set forth the proposal for an official Negro History Day annual observance, which was promulgated by Mrs. Josephine Bruce (b. 1814 - d.- ) (the wife of the African American U.S. Senator from the State of Mississippi, Mr. Blanche K. Bruce, who was the first African American to serve in the cabinet of an American president as the U.S. Secretary of the Treasury) in her 1895 Negro History Day resolution which she presented to the National Association of Coloured Women`s Clubs (which are extant in 38 states); through the apex of the development of African American community ethnic observances in the establishment of the 1926 first annual Negro History Week Observance by the venerated African American scholar and author Dr. Carter G. Woodson (b. 1875 - d. 1950), who is also known as “The Father of Black Studies” (as an American academic discipline); and its philosophic and calendar expansion in 1965 by “history`s first American career-viable virtuoso concert-pianist and recording artist of African descent”, Robert Starling Pritchard II (b. 1927-), to the annual month long Black History Month Observance (which Dr. Pritchard established as a fitting tribute to Dr. Woodson). |
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WHEREAS: The Black History Month Observance joins the Jamestown Committee in recognizing America`s four hundredth anniversary of the establishment of the Jamestown, Virginia Settlement (where African culture first developed into American culture), with this commemorative poem dedicated to the “Innominate Slave” written by Dr. Robert Starling Pritchard: |
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| "REQUIEM PRAYER TO THE INNOMINATE SLAVE" |
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| May this National Day of Remembrance and Mourning |
| and the Monument to the Innominate Slave |
| serve as a fitting Memorial, |
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| ... to all those of our African fore-fathers and fore-mothers |
| who lie restless, |
| buried beneath the high seas of the Middle Passage, |
| with only the crests of its waves as their tombstones; .... |
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| ... to the African victims of the slave-trade holocaust, |
| yet unavenged by God and man, |
| who lie restless beneath the soil of this Nation's Capital, |
| this community, |
| throughout the states of our country, |
| the Americas and Europe, |
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| in graves marked only by the unredeemed agony |
| of their lifetime of un-rewarded toil, |
| and the sancitified dust of their bones; ... |
| ... to those of our ancestral kith and kin |
| who never tasted freedom in their lifetimes |
| and who still await the day |
| when, |
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| through some appropriately humble act of national contrition, |
| they may at long last Rest in Peace ... |
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| May our Observance |
| of this National Day of Remembrance and Mourning |
| remain such a day. |
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WHEREAS: The National and International Black History Month Founder`s Commission (and its Chairman, Dr. Robert Starling Pritchard, who was selected as the first Artist-in-Residence for the Republic of Liberia) honour the first anniversary of the election of the First Woman President in all of Africa, Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, who stated that her victory would benefit women in Africa by opening the doors to leadership to all, particularly in the Republic of Liberia, which is Africa`s oldest republic and whose longstanding ties to America began with its establishment by American slaves. |
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WHEREAS: If the consistency of the American access to the natural resources in the emerging countries of Africa, Latin America and Asia ... and also trading of American products in foreign markets, is to be maintained and expanded during the "New Millennium" ..... American official and private sector traditional racialist attitudes towards people-of-colour must be transformed into a concept of “Mutuality of Benefit” ... or such regressive attitudes will continue to inveigh against the credibility of those Euro-American entrepreneurs who rely upon the International Community's "Population-of-Colour" for both natural resources and the sale of American products; and |
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WHEREAS: ?In this "New Millennium", when Euro-Americans will continue to enjoy and prosper from the economic benefits of an American Economy which developed from American technological supremacy throughout the International Community ... the "BHMO Founder" and the "BHMO State and Regional Founder's Commissioners" particularly call for federal, state and local government wider support for K-12 and "Equity of Access to University Education Opportunity" for Americans of African descent ... in addition to their call for "Equity of Access to Venture Capital" for African- American entrepreneurs. |
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| WHEREAS: The "BHMO Founder" and the "BHMO State and Regional Founder's Commissioners" especially invite their fellow Americans to initiate "Black History Month" programmes in their communities which will address the afore-referenced themes of "The Black History Month Observance's 42nd Anniversary ... |
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| NOW THEREFORE, I, ________________________________________ , do hereby proclaim the month-of-February / Year 2007 as: |
| “NATIONAL BLACK HISTORY MONTH” |
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| IN THE STATE / COUNTY / CITY / PROVINCE OF __________________________________________. |
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| GIVEN UNDER MY HAND AND THE SEAL OF THE STATE /COUNTY / CITY / PROVINCE OF _______________________, |
| THIS ________ DAY OF __________________, IN THE YEAR TWO THOUSAND AND SEVEN. |
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