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Thursday, November 06, 2008
Black like me
"I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation
where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content
of their character." --Martin Luther King Jr.
King implies that a moral person judges someone by their character, not by the colour of their skin. I agree. Because of this, I've been pondering the remarkable racial voting patterns in the U.S. presidential election.
Specifically, exit polls showed that a full 95% of African-Americans voted for Obama, a surge of 14 points in blacks' support of the Democratic presidential candidate. Most recently, John Kerry received "just" 81% of African-Americans' votes; however, Al Gore enjoyed 90% support.
Were the astonishingly high number of African-Americans who supported Obama all persuaded by his policies? It’s not likely; a portion probably voted for him because of their shared racial background (or, at least, ethnic identification). But does this mean that if blacks voted for Obama because of his race, they must then have voted against McCain because of his? And, if so, isn't this racism?
Interestingly, the New York Times reported yesterday that race turned out to be less of an issue than suspected (or feared). But the story concentrated on white voters and the possibility of their hidden racism, and did not examine black voters' racial motives.
I've been having an e-discussion about all this with a liberal friend of mine, who argues that even if blacks voted for Obama because of his race, they are entitled to. I agree; they have the right to vote according to whatever moves them. It's just that this does not reflect the high ground staked out by Martin Luther King Jr.
UPDATE: The link above, citing John Kerry's popularity with black voters, appears to be incorrect. I've done some more research, and it appears that Kerry actually received the support of about 88% of black voters. The story linked to here also says that Lyndon Johnson received the support of about 94% of black voters, a statistic that appears to pretty well answer all my questions about the significance of Obama's 95% figure.
Posted by Terry O'Neill on November 6, 2008 in International Affairs | Permalink
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Comments
Terry,
I agree with what might be the underlying premise of your post, that the Obama election is not yet the fulfillment of MLK's dream. That will only happen when the race of the candidates is seen as an incidental point of little interest in the election. The Obama election paves the way for this to be the case the next time a viable black candidate runs, but the first win has to be one where race still is an issue to be overcome. When JFK was elected his Catholocism was an issue. Today it would be barely worth noting. But the JFK victory made it possible for it to be a non-issue subsequently.
It also should be noted, however, that given the numbers cited by you, at most 5-14% of black voters could be said to have voted based on race. since 81-90% of blacks vote for white Democtats, they would be expected to vote for a black Democrat based on policy positions alone. And when you also consider that Obama got more popular vote overall than either Kerry or Gore, then just as some whites who voted Republican previously switched for policy reasons, some of the blacks who switched would be for policy reasons too. So it could be as little as 2% of blacks who voted based on race alone. Still not good enough, but not really all that bad, especially when compared to the 5% of whites who not only would not vote for a black person for President, but who were glad to share that fact with polsters. If 5% are admiting it openly, you know the real number must be a lot higher. Maybe closer to the 19% of whites who said that most of the people they know would not vote for a black person for President.
Dr. King's dream is not yet reality, but the Obama election is an important step toward it.
Posted by: Fact Check | 2008-11-06 7:30:04 PM
Terry, I am glad I am not the only one who has thought this.
Dont't forget also how the media pondered if racism was affecting which presidential candidate would win when Hillary was running against Obama. They wondered why Hillary was getting more white support than Obama. Is racism still alive in America they wondered.
These same people never bothered to question why a much higher percentage of blacks were supporting Obama. If it was racism causing the white vote to go to Hillary, wasn't it racism causing the black vote to go to Obama?
Now we see the same media gushing about Obama and not at all questioning that 95% of the black vote went to Obama.
Considering that 4 out of 5 people on the planet are not white... naw, I won't get in to that. I'll just say that people should be free to vote from who they want. And they should be allowed to not vote. I don't give a rats behind. But I do find it disgusting when the media, and many people, presume that rasicm afflicts whites only.
Posted by: TM | 2008-11-06 7:33:39 PM
Specifically, exit polls showed that a full 95% of African-Americans voted for Obama, a surge of 14 points in blacks' support of the Democratic presidential candidate. Most recently, John Kerry received "just" 81% of African-Americans' votes; however, Al Gore enjoyed 90% support.
Posted by Terry O'Neill on November 6, 2008
Why don't you do the same analysis on Obama's primary races when he was running against other Democrats, it would be a much better gauge. I'd like to bet the black vote went overwhelmingly to Obama in every Democratic primary.
Posted by: The Stig | 2008-11-06 8:32:05 PM
Stig,
"I'd like to bet the black vote went overwhelmingly to Obama in every Democratic primary."
Obama got at least three-quarters of the black vote in the primaries, but in October 2007 he was poling far behind Clinton with black voters nationally (Clinton - 57%, Obama - 33%, Others - 10%). By December Clinton and Obama were even in black support and by February, the black voters had shifted mostly to Obama. Voters knew Obama was black all along, so it would be odd to say their shift was simply because he is black. It is also worth noting that black voters traditionally have voted as a block in the primaries. Michael Barone wrote:
"... black voters tend to vote overwhelmingly for one candidate in Democratic primaries, even when that candidate's rival has valid claims on their votes. Case in point: In polls, Robert Kennedy swept the black vote against Hubert Humphrey in 1968, despite Humphrey's long and valiant fight for civil rights laws. If memory serves, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton also got the lion's share of black votes in primaries in 1976 and 1992."
Posted by: Fact Check | 2008-11-06 9:41:47 PM
Lets be real here folks-if Obama was white he never would have won. Yes he has great skills in public speaking, but its because of his race that so many blacks voted for him.
I had many people say to me that I did not support Obama because he is black.
How many Americans were guilted into voting for Obama for that reason?
Posted by: Merle | 2008-11-06 10:24:23 PM
Merle,
I'm all for being real, so long as that means we actually pay attention to the available information. As Terry told us, Obama got 14% more of the black vote than Kerry and only 5% more than Gore. Also, reports show that black voters made up 13% of the total voting population. So that means that if Obama had gotten as much of the black vote as the two most recent Democrats did, he would have gotten 1.82% fewer votes total comparing to Kerry or just 0.65% fewer votes total than Gore. Since he won the election by 6.5%, even with the bigger swing he still would have won by 2.86%. I leave it to you to try to crunch the numbers state by state to see how much it would have effected the electoral college results, but as you do this calculation, remember the 5% or more of white voters who said they would not ever vote for a black candidate and remember that some of them would have to be added to his vote column if he were white.
So by all means, be real. But do it with facts, not vague speculation.
So were Obama white, he might have gotten
Posted by: Fact Check | 2008-11-06 10:45:19 PM
How Jackson fared on Super Tuesday 1988*
White voters Black voters
Alabama 6% 95%
Arkansas 6 93
Florida 7 87
Georgia 6 93
Kentucky 7 --
Louisiana 6 96
Maryland 11 88
Massachusetts 16 --
Mississippi 6 92
Missouri 12 --
North Carolina 7 94
Oklahoma 8 84
Rhode Island 16 70
Tennessee 5 95
Texas 14 92
Virginia 14 95
*Data from ABC News Exit polls.
Posted by: DJ | 2008-11-06 11:12:45 PM
For more than 40 years, African-Americans have voted overwhelmingly Democratic by margins of up to 9-to-1.
Blacks voted 20-77 against Blackwell, in the 2006 Ohio gubernatorial race. The split was 3.85(Dem)-1(Rep). In other words a whole lotta black Democrats voted for the black Republican.
http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2006/pages/results/states/OH/G/00/epolls.0.html
Posted by: DJ | 2008-11-06 11:27:11 PM
FC
"When JFK was elected his Catholocism was an issue. Today it would be barely worth noting."
Are you kidding? I mean really? Are you seriously trying to get me to believe that if an intelligent, cultured, worldly, travelled CATHOLIC Republican ran, the Left and the media wouldn't start throwing mud by bring up pedophelia in the church, position on abortion and gays being church based, etc.?
I can just hear the repeated cries of "separation of church and state" right now.
Seriously, are you kidding me? I know you aren't that stupid? What else could it be?
Posted by: h2o273kk9 | 2008-11-07 2:03:02 AM
Terry
"But the story concentrated on white voters and the possibility of their hidden racism, and did not examine black voters' racial motives."
Of course. Blacks can't be racist or so I'm told. Oh the irony of such a racist belief.
Posted by: h2o273kk9 | 2008-11-07 2:06:30 AM
I'd like to bet the black vote went overwhelmingly to Obama in every Democratic primary.
Posted by: The Stig | 6-Nov-08 8:32:05 PM
Obama got at least three-quarters of the black vote in the primaries, but in October 2007 he was poling far behind Clinton with black voters nationally (Clinton - 57%, Obama - 33%, Others - 10%).
Posted by: Fact Check | 6-Nov-08 10:45:19 PM
What do polls have to do with this issue? The question was who voted for who in the primaries, not what polling data suggested four months before the primaries began.
Posted by: The Stig | 2008-11-07 3:04:39 AM
DJ,
"In other words a whole lotta black Democrats voted for the black Republican."
The example you give does not support this conclusion. It supports the opposite. In 2004, the black vote for President was 81%-19% for the Democrat. In 2006, the black vote for Governor in Ohio was 77%-20% for the Democrat. Pretty much the same split on ideological grounds. But the Democrat was white and the Republican was black in Ohio, so if racial allegiance was a real explanation of the vote, the black vote for the black Republican should have been much higher.
This case shows no evidence that any black Democrats voted Republican for racial reasons, much less that "a whole lotta black Democrats voted for the black Republican." If 19% of them voted for GW Bush in 2004, then 20% of them voting Republican in 2006 is no surprise at all.
Posted by: Fact Check | 2008-11-07 7:35:30 AM
No question most blacks (and many whites) voted for Obama *because* he was black.
There were also likely some whites that voted for Obama *in spite* of the fact he was black, and still a few more whites that *did not* vote for Obama because he was black.
All three voting positions are racist (that is based on race in one way or another)by definition.
For King's dream to have been realized, all voters would vote for candidates *regardless* of their race.
I realize that we have to walk before we run, but we are nowhere near MLK's vision after this election. Judging by media coverage following the election that interviewed members of the Toronto/Calgary/Vancouver etc. "black communities" who were quoted to say that "we" are in a position of power, "we" have a long way to go.
A similar issue exists with women candidates...the above analysis could be carried out using Hillary Clinton and/or Sarah Palin and substitute the word "woman" for "black", and I think you would find the same problem exists.
One more thing about Obama. To his credit, he went to great lengths to avoid playing the obvious race card to get votes. His speech on race dealing with the fallout from his pastor's views was likely his finest during the entire campaign.
I would not have voted for him because of his leftist policies, but I did admire Obama for not playing the race card himself to get votes. He didn't have to, his supporters did it often enough for him to win.
Posted by: Kelly | 2008-11-07 7:38:29 AM
Kelly,
"No question most blacks (and many whites) voted for Obama *because* he was black."
No question? Why? Because you say so? The data clearly supports the oppositie conclusion. The campaign supports the opposite conclusion. If so many people voted based on race, why did millions watch the debates? Why was there so much discussion of issues like the economy and foreign policy during the campaign? Why did the nomination of Palin and the economic crisis make significant differences in the poling numbers? Obama has been known to be black for a long long time and McCain has been known to be white for even longer. If race was motivating the vote, then none of the poles and none of the comparisons to past voting patterns make sense. Believe what you want, but the facts don't support your delusions - er - conclusions.
Posted by: Fact Check | 2008-11-07 11:34:13 AM
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