Description

Harvey Gantt delivers a campaign speech to students and his base at UNC Greensboro. He thanks students for their enthusiasm and support from the beginning of campaign and encourages young people to get involved politically (comparing to his experiences in the Civil Rights Movement) beyond just voting. Gantt calls his opponent, Jesse Helms, out of touch with the times and with the needs and issues of working families. Gantt criticizes Helms for voting against Head Start, school lunch programs, not supporting strong public school systems and voting against student loans and grants. Gantt says he supports all of these programs, and the election is about the future. Gantt also criticizes Helms for voting against the minimum wage, to cut Medicare, against Social Security, and to give tax breaks to the wealthy. He attacks Helms for having the worst rating from the National Council of Senior Citizens and for receiving donations to his Jesse Helms Foundation from multinational corporations and foreign nations, which he calls a conflict of interest for a sitting senator who is chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee. Speech followed by a question and answer session, with topics including environmental protection, same-sex marriage and gay and lesbian rights, the National Endowment of the Arts, teachers, tobacco, safe sex education, small businesses and minimum wage, corporate welfare, and schools for the deaf.

Record Contributed By

University of North Carolina at Charlotte

Record Harvested From

North Carolina Digital Heritage Center