By Marc R. Churchill and Kathy Wray Coleman, Cleveland Urban News.Com and The Cleveland Urban News.Com Online Blog, Ohio’s Most Read Online Black Newspaper
CLEVELAND, Ohio-The Rev. Dr. Ralph David Abernathy III (pictured), whose famed father, the Rev. Ralph David Abernathy Sr., marched along side of the late Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr during the Civil Rights Movement and led The Southern Christian Leadership Conference after King was assassinated, visited Cleveland, OH on Sunday to stomp for President Obama. (See The Rev. Ralph David Abernathy (left) and The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. pictured together above. Picture courtesy of The University of Memphis Libraries).
“My father and Uncle Martin [King] were like twins, they even dressed alike sometimes, and Uncle Martin died in his arms.” said Abernathy, 53, an evangelist and motivational speaker who grew up in Montgomery, AL. and served a decade in the Georgia State Legislature as an Atlanta senator. “We have got to vote in this election so that President Obama can continue to fight for the legacy of equal opportunity and Civil Rights that they left.”
Abernathy is among a host of famous Blacks that toured Cleveland last week and more recently this year to push early voting and in support of the reelection of President Obama, the first Black president of the United States of America.
He spoke at a rally at Mount Olive Missionary Baptist Church Sunday night in Cleveland after appearing as a guest on ‘The Art McKoy University Show, ’ which airs weekly from 5:00 pm to 7:00 pm on W.E.R.E. AM radio.
Other Blacks recently in Cleveland to get out the vote include singers John Legend, Stevie Wonder, and Yolanda Adams, Congressional Black Caucus members, California Attorney General Kamala Harris, Obama for America Campaign Senior Adviser Broderick Johnson, Actress Vivica Fox, and Valerie Jarrett, one of three senior advisers to the president and the assistant to the president for public engagement and intergovernmental affairs.
Ohio remains pivotal with Obama and Mitt Romney neck and neck, though many believe that Obama will pull off a win tomorrow night.
"He will win," said Abernathy of Obama.
Abernathy Sr died in 1990. His son believes that too often Blacks get 'Romnesia' and forget what other Blacks fought for, and died for, including the right vote.