Blurring the Color Line?

When Professor of English and African and African American Studies John Stauffer talks to his undergraduate students who volunteer at Boston public schools, they tell him something troubling about race perceptions. When the volunteers ask the children whether they would like to grow up to be president, black and Hispanic students seem to think they are not allowed.

But Stauffer thinks these perceptions could change on Nov. 4.

“If Obama wins, it means that every American, from toddlers on, will grow up believing he has the possibility of becoming president,” Stauffer said.

An Obama victory on Tuesday would add another layer of significance to the rededication of the Lincoln Memorial, planned for this upcoming February to commemorate the bicentennial of Lincoln’s birth. On the steps where Martin Luther King, Jr. gave his “I Have a Dream” speech, speaking in honor of the president who freed the slaves could stand America’s first black president, a man who has tied himself closely to the Lincoln legacy.

In order to assess what implications an Obama win—or loss—would have for the United States after this historic election, The Crimson interviewed several professors and students who study issues in and around the black community.

Those interviewed said that an Obama victory would be a symbolic step towards healing America’s racial wounds. And an Obama loss could lead to a sense of “bitter disappointment.”

‘THE BIG WHAT IF’

“If Obama loses, I personally will feel disappointed, frustrated, hurt. I’ll conclude that a fabulous opportunity has been lost. I’ll believe that American voters have made a huge mistake,” Harvard Law School professor Randall L. Kennedy wrote in a letter printed in The Washington Post on Sept. 14. “And I’ll think that an important ingredient of their error is racial prejudice—not the hateful, snarling, open bigotry that terrorized my parents in their youth, but rather a vague, sophisticated, low-key prejudice that is chameleonlike in its ability to adapt to new surroundings and to hide even from those firmly in its grip.”

In his letter entitled “The Big ‘What If,’” Kennedy—who is teaching a course at the Law School this semester about the election—wrote of his emotional engagement with this election. Kennedy relayed how Obama’s progressive politics have expanded the public consciousness to accept the possibility of a black president. And he wrote about how dejected he’d feel if the senator loses.

Stauffer, who calls this year’s election the most important since 1932, and possibly even since 1860, said that the biggest factor in an Obama loss will probably be racism. A loss in this political climate would show “how insidious and pervasive it remains,” he said.

But since many of those interviewed said they believe an Obama victory is a forgone conclusion, many said they are more interested in the opposite question: “What if Obama wins?”

In a letter sent to friends and colleagues, Cameron Van Patterson—a Harvard graduate student in African and African American Studies and History of Art and Architecture—discussed what Obama’s rise to the candidacy has already shown and will show about the national conscience.

“He has proven already, and beyond the shadow of doubt, that America is, in fact, ready for a black president—which, in actuality, is a veiled way of saying that white America is prepared to confront the myth of white supremacy,” he wrote in the letter.

AFTER IOWA

Jason C. B. Lee ’08 said Obama’s win in the Iowa primary was the point when people in the Black Students Association started to be more optimistic.

“I think the support was always there,” said Lee, who was president of the BSA in the 2006-2007 academic year.

“People weren’t allowing themselves to get too excited before that juncture, before Iowa,” he added.

After this win, Lee said threads over e-mail lists turned to discussions of Obama as a real possibility instead of a long shot.

BSA President Timothy D. Turner ’09 said he agreed that the election has sparked a lot of excitement in the membership. Leading up to the election, the BSA has been politically active on campus and off, canvassing in New Hampshire and hosting viewings of the presidential debates. Turner added that the enthusiasm was not just because of Obama’s race, saying that the senator ran a post-racial campaign.

Still, the implications of Obama’s candidacy for black Americans in politics cannot be ignored.

Malcolm R. Rivers ’09, who last year chaired Harvard’s BSA’s Political Action Committee, said though many black students have impressed by what Obama has accomplished so far, he did not think they are satisfied with just a contender.

“The glass ceiling has been cracked but not necessarily broken,” he said.

‘WHAT WOULD IT TAKE?’

According to William Julius Wilson, a Harvard Kennedy School professor and sociologist who has written on race and poverty, the implications of electing Obama would be international in scope.

“Americans can say, despite our racist past, we have achieved something no other western democracy has achieved,” Wilson said.

Patterson said in an interview that regardless of the outcome on Tuesday, it has been Obama’s campaign to win or lose.

“Obama has shaped the political discourse and the public discourse in this election,” Patterson said.

Rivers, an African and African American Studies concentrator currently writing his thesis on black church crime prevention, said that Obama embodies identity politics, and, at least theoretically, serves as a representative of black America.

“As a symbol, he represents progress for black people,” Rivers said.

Patterson said that a loss for Obama would be disheartening because with a failing economy and an unpopular incumbent, conditions are ripe for a Democratic win.

“It’s the perfect scenario for someone to come in and change things,” Patterson said, “and if he loses we would have to ask, “What would it take, what does it take?”

—Staff writer Chelsea L. Shover can be reached at clshover@fas.harvard.edu.