Vying for the Black Vote
Will Clinton's Martin Luther King comment cost her black support in the South Carolina primary? A veteran of the civil rights movement weighs in.
Suddenly race is the hot topic of the Democratic presidential campaign. Hillary Clinton got it started—unwittingly, it seems—with a remark about Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. that seemed to diminish the role of activists in the civil rights movement. "Dr. King's dream began to be realized when President Lyndon Johnson passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964," Clinton said last week. "It took a president to get it done." Realizing, perhaps, that her statement might cause offense, Clinton emphasized King's vital role and sacrifice in subsequent appearances. But a backlash had already begun. Clinton later criticized the Obama campaign for "deliberately distorting" her comments. And on Sunday, Obama shot back that "Senator Clinton made an unfortunate remark, an ill-advised remark … But the notion that somehow this is our doing is ludicrous."
The exchange comes as all sides prepare for South Carolina's Democratic primary on Jan. 26—the first real test of the African-American vote. How will the controversy affect voting in the state, where roughly 50 percent of the Democratic electorate is black? Cleveland Sellers, who heads the department of African-American studies at the University of South Carolina, is an Obama supporter. He's also a veteran of the civil rights movement. Now 63, he helped organize sit-ins in 1960, he participated in the March on Washington in 1963, and he was wounded during the 1968 "Orangeburg massacre," in which police opened fire on student protesters, killing three and wounding 27. Clinton's recent comments were "insensitive," Sellers says, and he believes that most civil rights veterans will agree. He spoke to NEWSWEEK's Jeffrey Bartholet about the controversy, and about the upcoming contest in South Carolina. Excerpts:
What effect did Obama's win in Iowa have on black attitudes or perceptions in South Carolina?
I think it had a tremendous impact on those voters who were concerned about whether or not Obama was going to be able to generate white support in this presidential election. For people who had that question, Obama's strong second finish in New Hampshire and the first-place finish in Iowa were tremendous motivators, freeing those voters to come out to the polls and actually vote for a candidate that they know is, in fact, viable.
Can you talk a little more about those concerns? We've heard about concerns that Obama would not be able to attract the white vote, and also worries about his safety.
The concern about his safety is [related] to what has happened historically to African-American males when they have been outspoken—aiming to change a system that was, during the civil rights movement, segregated and oppressive. I'm convinced that some people were genuinely concerned [about what might happen to Obama] if he looked as if he would be successful … What resonates in the back of their minds is Bobby Kennedy and John Kennedy and the assassination of Dr. King. But I don't think that anybody would hold fast to that. One of the things they know is that in order for there to be change, there has to be sacrifice. The African-American community knows that full well.
Former president Clinton has sometimes been called the "first black American president," and he's certainly a politician in good standing with the black community. Does that make the choice more difficult?
I don't think so. President Bill Clinton is not running for president this time.
Is Hillary Clinton seen as different from her husband on matters of race and matters of importance to the black community?
Obama seems to be able to talk about those issues that resonate not only within the African-American community but within the larger community. And he is talking about creating a kind of environment in which those who have been locked out and marginalized over a period of time will have some voice.
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Member Comments
Posted By: Colonel Ray @ 01/25/2008 3:49:52 PM
Comment: Comment:
In Obama's own words yesterday he said he is not sure if the people who support him now would support Hillary if he (Obama) is not the Democratic Party candidate in November. Obviously he will not. He also said three days ago he would have to check and see how well Bill Clinton could "dance" before he would consider him to be a "brother". Some of my very best lifelong friends are Black, Hispanic, and Muslim. I am very, very concerned that Barrack Obama is a closet racist that will destroy the race relations in this country.
So I humbly ask that you and all those you know to do your own investigation and report this if true and put an end to this divisive primary campaign before too much damage is done.
God Bless You.
Former Host, The All Things Military Show and The Daily Briefing Radio Show, with Colonel Ray,
heard in Southern California.
Please read below:
"We were always playing on the white man's court -- by the white man's rules. If the principal, or the coach, or a teacher wanted to spit in your face, he could, because he had the power and you didn't. The only thing you could choose was withdrawal into a smaller and smaller coil of rage."
Obama once described the white race as ???that ghostly figure that haunted black dreams.???
???That hate hadn't gone away,??? he wrote, blaming ???white people -- some cruel, some ignorant, sometimes a single face, sometimes just a faceless image of a system claiming power over our lives.???
During college, Obama disapproved of what he called other "half-breeds" who gravitated toward whites instead of blacks. And yet after college, he once fell in love with a white woman, only to push her away when he concluded he would have to assimilate into her world, not the other way around. He later married a black woman.
Obama???s book is primarily about his rejection of his supportive white maternal extended family in favor of his unknown black paternal extended family.
At age 33, he wrote in "Dreams from My Father, that " he found solace in nursing a pervasive sense of grievance and animosity against his mother???s race.
Obama vowed that he would "never emulate white men and brown men whose fates didn't speak to my own. It was into my father???s image, the black man, son of Africa, that I???d packed all the attributes I sought in myself, the attributes of Martin and Malcolm, DuBois and Mandela."
In his memoir, "Dreams of My Father," Obama writes of a story in Life magazine that influenced him -- about a black man trying to bleach his skin white. No such article could be found in Life or Ebony.
Posted By: Julia55 @ 01/24/2008 9:06:17 PM
Comment: "Dr. King's dream began to be realized when President Lyndon Johnson passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964," Clinton said last week. "It took a president to get it done."
I understood what Senator Clinton was saying and it makes sense. She was not disputing the amazing amount of work Dr. King did. What she was saying was that had he NOT had a president in office to help him get the laws passed fotr the things we were fighting for, no amount of his work would have ended in the success the Civil Rights movement. Dr. King stood beside President Johnson when he signed that bill. Dr. King and Rev. Abernathy had to meet with the President to get it done. WHAT OTHER PRESIDENT aside from Kennedy were willing to help get these much needed laws passed? It's interesting that those media types and those folks who live for attention are quick to jump on things like this to push a andidate because of his color. The American media feels that it's easier to vilify Hillary Clinton because she happens to be White. Had Obama been a young WHITE man, he wouldn't get anywhere near the press he gets and he knows it. *(See John Edwards -- just as handsome and young and educated, yet he gets nominal press attention). You folks are selling magazines and newspapers and stirring up racial tensions for headlines and to garner talk, and at the end of the day, educated African Americans like myself are going to vote with our heads and not on the emotional rollercoaster you think we ride each day. I'm voting for Senator Clinton and, while I thought it was absolutely beneath her to get into themud with Obama and his tactics just before South Carolina, I know she'll make a better leader. He's not ready, and if he's elected, the first thing that will happen is people like the writers of this piece and all of the media outlets who portray him as today's darling will see him make mistakes based on his inexperience and they will say, "well, he was charming and dynamic and we were all wowed by his erudition and the fact that he spoke well, but boy were we wrong! Boy, if we could be so wrong about this kind of candidate *(and we weren't alone -- YOU voted for him, too, so we're all culpable), NO African American can be suited for the role of President of the United States." And you will set us back 100 years. Hillary gets my vote. And in 8 years after Mr. Obama has spent more time as a Senator and on committees that are relevant to this country.
Posted By: democratinillinois @ 01/24/2008 7:36:37 PM
Comment: This is to you - eddiewhere @ 01/16/2008 10:10:18 PM
You said "Latino's trust Hillary. There's that likeability factor." I'm Latina. I don't trust Hillary and I don't like her. "Likeability factor? She has been 'told' to be nice. What about that 'crying jag'? Well this Latina didn't get taken in by that...like so many of the New Hampshire women did. I wonder, if she becomes president, will she be that 'evil faced' person? Will she start crying when she doesn't get her way? Crying jags won't work for her as president...there aren't enough women in politics to give in to her way.