Why We Need “From the Block to the Ballot Box

In 1964, Malcolm X challenged America with a question that still echoes today: the ballot or the bullet. He was speaking to the urgency of power — the kind that comes not from protest alone, but from participation. Sixty years later, that message has evolved into a new reality here in Michigan: we must move from the block to the ballot box.

Our communities don’t suffer because people don’t care — they suffer because opportunity and access are not available. Politicians and pundits like to talk about “affordability,” but affordability means nothing when jobs, housing, healthcare, and grocery stores are missing from our neighborhoods. You can’t afford what doesn’t exist. What’s at stake in Michigan’s next election cycle is not simply how much things cost — it’s whether we will finally make opportunity available to the people who built this state.

In Detroit, Black families helped shape the industrial heart of America. We came here from the South to work, to serve, to build. But the promise of progress was too often followed by policies that stripped wealth, closed schools, and shuttered factories. Decades later, the pattern continues: when we do not vote, we lose availability — of contracts, of investments, of representation.

From the Block to the Ballot Box is about reclaiming that availability. It’s about turning every block, every church, every community center, and every family into a force for change. The Michigan Democratic Party Black Caucus is leading this movement across nine counties — bringing voter registration, political education, and civic empowerment back to where it began: the streets, the people, and the neighborhoods that built Detroit’s legacy.

This movement isn’t anti-anyone. It’s pro-access, pro-opportunity, and pro-democracy. We are saying to our people: your vote is not a favor, it’s a form of availability. It’s how we make sure our voices shape the decisions that affect our children, our safety, and our economy.

When crime rises, test scores fall, and grocery stores disappear, the answer isn’t despair — it’s direction. We must direct our energy toward the ballot box. Voting gives us the leverage to demand better schools, safer streets, and fair economic investment. And when we vote in numbers, we make ourselves available to power — and make power accountable to us.

The From the Block to the Ballot Box campaign reminds us that democracy begins where we live. It’s about transforming frustration into focus, and apathy into action. It’s about knowing that the power of one block can ripple across the entire state.

We honor the past by acting in the present. Malcolm X told us the ballot was our weapon — today, it’s still our shield. It protects the progress we’ve made and opens the door to the future we deserve.

This is our time to stand together, county by county, neighborhood by neighborhood, and remind Michigan that the road to justice runs straight through the ballot box.

Because from the block to the ballot box — our vote is our power, and our power is our availability.