"There’s no doubt that this was a historic election. Obama is the first black person to be president of the U.S., the most powerful position in the world. Many other world leaders and their people were jubilant when Obama was elected.

Yet what sticks in my craw, as my mother used to say, are the “experts” who seem to ride on this historic election and claim that it could bring an end of the Civil Rights era. Civil rights activism won’t be much needed anymore, they say. The issue of equality now has been settled.

I don’t think so.

Just because a black man was elected president, racism, bigotry and prejudice are not going to disappear. I don’t believe we can do away with civil-rights laws, policies and speeches. They’re needed to bring people upright, especially people who are so self-involved that they see only their own needs.

Nor do I believe that a wave of a black presidential hand will change hundreds of years of mistrust and bad treatment."

Get the Story:
DORREEN YELLOW BIRD: Obama's election doesn't banish racism (The Grand Forks Herald 11/13)

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