Black leaders in Congress have rejected the apology of Republican Senator Trent Lott.

"Members of the Congressional Black Caucus on Tuesday rejected Senate Republican leader Trent Lott's apology for saying that America would have been better off if Strom Thurmond had won the U.S. presidency in 1948, when he ran as a segregationist."

"His remarks require minimally a much larger apology ... a meeting with the black caucus ... and whatever else the caucus may decide," said Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, a Texas Democrat."

"The three dozen members of the caucus, all black Democrats in the House of Representatives, plan to consider options, which also appeared to include pushing for a Senate censure and even asking for Lott's resignation as Senate Republican leader."

Maxine Waters, a prominent Democrat and member of the Black Caucus, criticized Tom Daschle for so readily accepting Lott's "apology."

J.C. Watts, outgoing African-American Congressman from Oklahoma, actually defended Lott's statements, saying no racism was intended.

Kwesi Mfume, a former Democratic Congressman and current head of the NAACP, said, "Senator Lott's statement is the kind of callous, calculated, hateful bigotry that has no place in the halls of the Congress." The NAACP has called for Lott's resignation.

And over at the Drudge Report, a headline screams that Lott has said the same thing before:

"After a fiery speech by Strom Thurmond at a Mississippi campaign rally in November 1980, Lott, then a congressman, told a crowd: 'You know, if we had elected this man 30 years ago, we wouldn't be in the mess we are today'... MORE... Quotation appeared in an account of the rally on Nov. 3, 1980, in Clarion-Ledger in Jackson, Miss... , in 1980."

Update: Washington Post confirms the 1980 Lott story, here.