Black Man's Burden

As the campaign season winds down to its final day, there are only two questions on everyone’s mind. They are simple questions, very much in the vein of what it means to be American: Who is going to win and how are they going to do it? Well, as I get my Miss Cleo on, I predict the winner of the 2004 election is going to be, despite his ineptitude as a campaigner and his seeming inability to connect emotionally to other human beings, John Kerry. Indeed, Kerry will unseat our current president thanks largely to the efforts of black voters and the hip-hop generation.

These two, not mutually-exclusive groups of voters, notorious for their persistent (if not unjustified) political apathy, are set to turnout in record numbers to cast ballots, and cast them, not really for Kerry, but against Bush. Spurred by a once-in-a-lifetime convergence of mobilizing factors, these voters appear to be the potential deciding force in a number of swing states across the country.

Americans of all types were subject to a surprising civics lesson when Florida and New Mexico were decided by a few hundred votes each in 2000. Black voters, and those sympathetic to them, are particularly motivated by the events of the 2000 election, in which an untold number of black voters in Florida (and elsewhere) were prevented from voting by election officials trying to enforce illegal identification requirements, faulty equipment, state troopers temporarily detaining black drivers, and, infamously, by inaccurate felony rolls. The lack of redress for widespread voter suppression has caused much of black America to have a large collective chip on its shoulder that it hopes to be rid of tomorrow. Moreover, this administration’s willingness to govern unapologetically from the far right with regards to fiscal, military and social policy—despite their slim and questionable margin of victory—has only exacerbated the anger of many black voters, who are more likely to support social programs and oppose war. Thankfully for Kerry, this anger has transformed into genuine mobilization.

For the first time since the late 1980s, the new black celebrity elite of hip-hop stars, entertainers and moguls have been compelled to lend their fame, intelligence and marketing savvy to something besides alcohol and luxury cars. Russell Simmons’ Hip Hop Summit Action Network (HSAN) and Sean “P. Diddy” Combs’ Citizen Change are but two of the more prominent efforts by celebrities to raise awareness, register voters and get people to the polls. And in our painfully unoriginal follow-the-leader celebrity culture, these icons and trendsetters (along with Michael Moore) have created a politically charged atmosphere that the finest political scientists in America could never have predicted. For the first time, not voting or not commenting on politics in public is the lamest thing you could possibly do, right with not buying Jay-Z’s new CD or wearing Sean John brand clothes.

Now, airwaves are flooded with politically-minded songs from previously disinclined artists, like Eminem’s “Mosh” and Jadakiss’ smash “Why,” and people are packing in rallies and conventions held by Citizen Change, Simmons’ HSAN and the Hip-Hop Convention. This media-savvy organizing, coupled with the traditional grassroots registration and voter turnout by groups like the NAACP, America Coming Together (ACT) and America Votes, has resulted in surging registration rates for new black voters.

According to the Sept. 26 issue of The New York Times, these types of “Democrat-affiliated groups have added tens of thousands of new voters to the rolls in the swing states…a surge that has far exceeded the efforts of Republicans.” In Florida’s “strongest Democratic areas, the pace of new registration is 60 percent higher than in 2000, while it has risen just 12 percent in the heaviest Republican areas.” In Duval County, the site of much of last election’s controversy, “new registrations by black voters are up 150 percent over the pace of 2000.” Data in Ohio show “new registrations since January have risen 250 percent over the same period in 2000.” Project Vote claims to have registered over 147,000 new voters in that state alone. HSAN works closely with these groups to add star power to grassroots organizing, and has registered a record 114,000 new youth voter registrations throughout the state of Missouri. Currently, HSAN is on a nationwide bus tour modeled after the famous Freedom Summer of 1964, when activists rode through the South to register and turn out voters. The biggest difference is that this time around, the activists have tons of money, media access and experienced grassroots organizers.

And although both candidates would claim to love to see such an interest in participating in the democratic process, Bush has to be concerned if these numbers are credible. From the zip codes on the registration forms, one can see that a large number of the new voters are likely black, and blacks turned out a miniscule 8 percent of their vote for George W. Bush while supporting Al Gore ’69 at a clip of 90 percent in 2000. While much has been made of the Joint Center for Political Study’s new survey that speculates that Bush has doubled his support in the black community through his faith-based initiatives and opposition to gay marriage, that particular poll was taken before the debates—and the bulk of black Americans are infinitely more concerned about jobs than gay marriage.

And while the electoral college delivered disaster last time around, its anachronistic structure, coupled with the oft-ignored reality of residential segregation, mean that urban black voters are particularly situated to swing the election to Kerry. Blacks make up a huge percentage of the central cities in the major swing states for the election: Milwaukee, Wis.; Detroit, Mich.; St. Louis and Kansas City, Miss.; and most importantly, Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, Pa. and Cleveland and Cincinnati, Ohio. If Kerry wins every state that Gore won in 2000 (and he is leading in polls in each) plus Ohio or Florida—he wins the election.

The Bush team, however, is not going out without a fight. In addition to their positive outreach to black ministers, the Republicans have attempted all manner of voter suppression techniques in order to stifle black turnout. Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell (a black man himself) attempted to revive an archaic rule requiring that voter registration cards be printed only on thick, 80-pound paper. People for the American Way, part of a coalition of 60 civil rights organizations, have protested the “unduly burdensome and costly regulation that will…disenfranchise some voters at time of unprecedented new voter registration activity in Ohio.”

According to the Miami Herald, Florida attempted to revive its felon purge lists in 2004, again rife with inaccuracy, again disproportionately disenfranchising black voters. By the far the worst tactic was revealed by New York Times columnist Bob Herbert, who exposed that the state of Florida was “investigating” get-out-the-vote drives among blacks in Orlando by sending armed police officers into the homes of mostly elderly, African-American citizens who had filed absentee ballots. For someone to authorize the intimidation and terrorization of poor elderly black women who came of age in the midst of the Jim Crow South is about as low as politics can get, and evidence of how much this election means to both sides.

Hopefully, this voter suppression will go the way of poll taxes and grandfather clauses, but for right now, I do not think it will matter tomorrow. Black turnout will be record-breaking, and all of the 80-pound paper in Ohio cannot stop black voters from being the deciding factor in removing Bush from office. Either way, this election may well be dragged out over the course of a few months as lawsuits over balloting and voter suppression will be decided all over the nation. In the end, however, black voters will have carried Kerry to victory and he will have his first of many choices as leader of this nation. He can follow the Democratic trend and continue to take his black support for granted up until 2008, or he can acknowledge those who delivered him into the presidency and leverage the power of the executive on our behalf.

Brandon M. Terry ’05 is a government and African and African American studies concentrator in Lowell House. His column appears on alternate Mondays.