Missouri Faith Voices joined several other groups on Sunday to announce their unified opposition to the Missouri Legislature's recently passed voter ID proposals.
"I personally feel that it was as if they were dancing on my ancestors' graves," said the Rev. Cassandra Gould, pastor of Quinn Chapel AME and executive director of Missouri Faith Voices.
They joined forces at a hastily called news conference at Quinn Chapel to announce Freedom Summer '16, a campaign designed to oppose voter ID restrictions and educate the public on the issue.
Gould said the groups represented, including the NAACP and Empower Missouri, will work together to hold "teach-ins" across Missouri to educate people about the history of voting and what it means to change the Constitution.
Missouri NAACP President Rod Chapel said voter education "will be huge" in communities across the state, including churches and senior centers. "We can't sit by and pretend someone else will take care of this," he said.
Gould said her mother died with a scar on her leg, which she got while fighting in Selma, Alabama, in 1965 for the right for blacks to vote. She did it because "she thought that I wouldn't have to fight for voters' rights."
Before adjourning, the Legislature approved a voter ID bill as well as a resolution setting up a November vote that, if passed, would change the state Constitution to make the voter ID requirement constitutional.
A previous voter ID measure was shot down by the Missouri Supreme Court as unconstitutional in 2006.
Gould said based on an estimate from Secretary of State Jason Kander, enacting the Legislature's voter ID proposal would disenfranchise 220,000 Missouri voters. That's the number of Missourians who lack a photo ID.
Many of them are believed to be minorities.
Democrats compromised with Republicans to pass the measures, saying those without photo ID can still vote by signing a statement. Under the bill, the state would pay for ID - as well as documents needed to get an ID - for people who don't have one.
Still, the group at Sunday's news conference said lawmakers, especially after the anger after racial unrest in Ferguson and other parts of the country, should be working to make voting easier, not harder.
Gov. Jay Nixon made a similar statement on Friday, but hasn't said whether he will veto the bill.
"We will not accept this," Gould said. "We will beat the politicians. We will beat them at the ballot. It's going to take all of our churches and all of our organizations mobilizing against this kind of rhetoric work working to make sure the citizens of Missouri have access to the ballot."
The Rev. Cornell Sudduth, pastor of Second Baptist Church, said lawmakers have used the excuse of voter fraud, which does not exist, as a reason for passing the voter ID legislation.
"This is not about politics. This is about right and wrong," he said, adding that Second Baptist is committed to doing everything they can to fight the measure.
The Rev. W.T. Edmonson of Second Baptist, who also is a Missouri Faith Voices board member, said lawmakers have continuously brought back the idea of voter ID. Lawmakers, he said, are hoping the proposal draws people "who don't believe some of you need the right to vote."
"Missouri is a Southern state. They are now acting Southern," he said.