Tennessee's Democrats
by Elaine Reynoso
| Tennessee,
the 16th constituent state of the United States of America lying east of
the south-central part of the country, home to country and western music
and sometimes called the “Athens of the South”, is rich in its folk culture.
In addition, it is also notorious for its political background.
Not only did Andrew Jackson once reside in Tennessee, but it is also the
site of American Civil War battlefields. The state's major
manufacturing industries are chemicals, food processing, electrical machinery,
apparel, and textiles. Tennessee’s population consists of approximately
5,300,000, comprised of 80% White residents, 15% Black residents,
and about 1% of Hispanics and Asians. Most households consist of
about 50% of married middle-aged couple families.
In Tennessee, 59 members of 99 in the assembly are Democrats. Tennessee House Democrats have been in the majority for virtually every legislative session going back to the days of the early 1800's. In essence, these Democratic party leaders are as follows: Fifth District Congressman Bob Clement, who voted for welfare reform (Coincidentally, welfare reform stands as one of the main issues of the party, since Governor Sundquist has created a way to reduce welfare spending by his Families First program which gets recipients off of welfare and into the job force within 18 months), has supported music and arts education, and won funding for the restoration of buildings in historically black colleges and universities. He also proposed to eliminate soft money contribution for campaigns. Sixth District Congressman Bart Gordon passed a bill to require phone companies to make available free blocking of 900 lines, so that parents could keep their children from pornography services. He also supported the Communications Decency Act to apply obscenity standards to the Internet and opposed construction of a temporary nuclear waste dump in middle Tennessee. Eighth District Congressman John Tanner is one of the founders of the Coalition, known as the Blue Dogs, a group of conservative Democrats who have advanced their own budget and welfare reform proposals. In addition, Tanner passed amendments allowing states to provide non-cash assistance like baby formula and diapers and providing that no one loses Medicaid because of federally-imposed time limits. Lastly, Ninth District Congressman Harold Ford formed a Congressional Children's Caucus to give every child access to a high-quality education. He spoke for reauthorization of the TRIO program and offered an amendment to the Republicans' flextime bill that aimed to protect employees who choose monetary compensation over comp time. He also called for a banning of construction or expansion of hazardous waste facilities within 5,000 feet of any residential community, school, day care center or church. Tennessee's voting age population is estimated at about 4,000,000; 3,000,000 are registered. Most registered voters are affiliated with the Democratic Party. To aid in influencing and advising its constituents today, the Tennessee Democratic Party raises issues that are of concern to its members, as well as fellow residents. They state that their purpose is to promote ideals and principles of the Democratic Party and to assist in the election of Democratic nominees. These ideals are equal opportunity for all citizens, access to quality and affordable health care, access to affordable education, maintaining a strong economy while being fiscally responsible, protecting social security, being environmentalists, uniting Americans, expanding opportunities for minorities, and continuing and expanding services to individuals with special needs. The Party believes that bipartisan approaches should be taken on Tennessee's issues on state budget, the education system, the health care system, home health care programs, and public servant pay increases. In order to improve education, the Party has proposed a tax reform plan that would include a new tax on adjusted gross income to fund education and repeal the sale tax on food. It would repeal 6 percent state sales tax on grocery food and the new "education privilege fee," which would apply a 2.5 percent levy on the adjusted gross income of all Tennesseans. In turn, this would generate about $2 billion, whereby $400 million would go toward covering the state's loss of revenue from the repeal of grocery food tax. Another $350 million would go toward providing free tuition and books to all Tennessee high school graduates attending a "public institution of higher learning" in the state. The remaining $1.2 billion would be reserved for funding kindergarten-through-12th grade education and higher. Due to the fact that Tennesseans end up paying more taxes to the federal government than taxpayers in states that have an income tax, another tax proposal concerned the Tax Deduction Fairness Act (1999). This package would allow taxpayers to deduct either their state income tax or state sales taxes in a given year. In previous years, the citizens of Tennessee paid an average of $927 in state and local sales taxes, but they could not deduct one dollar of it from their federal income tax returns. In essence, Tennesseans are being forced to pay taxes on their taxes. This tax act would treat all taxpayers equally, regardless of the system of taxation of their state. In issues of health care, Congressman Bart Gordon has supported a $200,000 U.S. Department of Health and Human Services grant that will enable a Middle Tennessee organization to educate and reduce the number of women at risk for HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. Women on Maintaining Education and Nutrition, the grant's recipient, provides support, referrals, education and nutritional information for HIV at-risk women in Middle Tennessee. "Women, especially in the African-American community, are contracting this horrible disease at an alarming rate," Gordon said. "So it's gratifying to know this grant will be used to help stop the spread of HIV. Education and outreach, along with research, are the weapons needed to fight this deadly disease." Since African-American women have the greatest increase in HIV rates in Tennessee, the grant will serve as a positive impact on the Middle Tennessee community's fight against AIDS. These funds will be used to reach out to 500 females between the ages of 13 and 25, 200 at-risk youth and 12 area churches. Recognizing the state as agrarian, the Democratic Party supports supplemental funding for farm ownership loans, farm operating loans and emergency loans to assist their farm communities. For example, Congressman Bob Clemente has voted for a bill to spend $69 billion in federal funds for agricultural programs. This bill includes $8.7 billion in emergency aid to farmers who suffered natural disasters, market losses, and for crop insurance premium subsidies and crop insurance associated costs, as well as funding for the Farm Service Agency, Agricultural Credit Programs, rural housing loan authorizations, rental assistance programs, rural electric and telephone loans, and the distance learning and telemedicine program. It also provides funding for important food and nutrition programs. He states his motivating factor as such: “ Living on a farm or in the city, we cannot afford to see Tennessee’s farming community decline . . . farming has long been the backbone of Tennessee’s economy, and this year the farmers are truly suffering. For this reason, I voted to approve this crucial agriculture funding.” The Democratic Party also provides services to aid in the process of selection by establishing a web page to allow people to examine the legislative process in politics, provide access and information to all of their constituencies and promote involvement. Through the use of this technology, they are able to communicate with fellow democrats and legislators. The use of this new media allows the Party to enhance their communications among Democratic elected officials, party leaders, and activists. |