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Published weekly by the Charlotte Post Publishing Co.
1531 Camden Road Charlotte, N.C. 28203
Gerald O. Johnson
Publisher
Robert Johnson
Co-publisher/
General Manager
Herbert L. White
Editor
Buying elections — buying candidates
Is the Republican Party
America’s hottest
whites-only bastion?
Sherman Miller
Black History Month is a time to look back at all the key deci
sions made during the previous year to try to understand their
long-term impact on socioeconomic progress in the black commu
nity. One such decision was the first black female (Margaret
Rose Henry) to win a seat in the Delaware State Senate switched
political parties from Republican to Democrat when white candi
dates across the nation are going in the opposite direction.
Henry’s decision symbolized the prodigal daughter returning
home, but it also showed tunnel vision as to her potential power
in legitimizing blacks in the Republican Party.
Today, the Republican Party is in the stranglehold of the ultra
right conservatives. The Republican U.S. congressional delega
tion is enchanted with its so-called “Contract With America” and
they are making it crystal clear that the WASP mind-set is now
the national norm. Thus, America faces another general election
where the black community finds itself with all of its future
locked in the hand of liberal Democrats and conservative
Republicans have a good shot at retaining control of both houses
of Congress.
Having been active in the Republican Party, it is clear to me
that Henry killed the goose laying the golden egg when she aban
doned the Republicans. She found her two highly successful elec
tions supported by the permanent government (those key individ
uals who work behind the scenes controlling activities no matter
which political party comes to power). This suggested that she
was anointed and she needed only hone her ability at challenging
these people to do what is right.
There is no doubt in my mind that Henry found her initial
actions frustrating because she was trying to change ingrained
mind-sets and that takes time and patience. During my
Republican Party tenure, I somehow got labeled “a blue collar
Republican.” My interest is challenging this party to include the
■wants and needs of poor black folks and their agenda.
I was relieved to see
^ Margaret Rose Henry
win, for it
meant that I
did not need
to worry about
shouldering
the respon-
siblity of
fighting for
blacks in the
party, for she
was a profes
sional politi
cian. Henry
came complete
with compas
sion and the
desire to help
, .y. poor black
folks. She is also
an upwardly mobile black who can commu
nicate in the economic mainstream, with
everyday black folks and with the black Talented Tenth (often
labeled black sell-outs. Uncle Tom, boy toys and so on).
I believed Henry could have gone a long way in helping to set
the national Republican Party agenda if she merely asserted her
self. She needed only to recognize that power is taken and respect
is earned. That meant she had a long exhaustive struggle ahead
of her to change the political octoroon caricature symbolism of
black Republicans.
Since Henry left, a huge vacuum now exists in the Republican
Party in Delaware. Thus I am coming out of retirement until the
general election is over to work in the Republican Party to once
again challenge them to include the wants and needs of poor folks
in their agenda.
I see only two of the current Republican presidential candidates
as viable for the presidential election. They are Sen. Bob Dole and
Steve Forbes. Dole is a professional politician who will make the
necessary deals to get things going. Forbes is a breath of fresh
air and offers understandable solutions to problems that grab the .
attention of the average American.
Phil Gramm scares my pants off because he paints himself as
inflexible. Pat Buchanan believes he is a clone of former president
Ronald Reagan, but I see him as a member of an ultra-right anti
minority group hoping to set race relations back 100 years.
Lamar Alexander and Richard Lugar come across as decent men
who have yet to find a national following. I was one in a roomful
of black Democratic sympathizers in Baltimore that suggested
that Alan Keyes is nothing more than a “boy toy,” and I believe
they are right.
Thus, I urge Republicans to nominate either Dole or Forbes.
That offers the potential for us to expand the party to include all
peoples versus continuing our symbolism as the “Whites Only”
party. Can the Republican Party win the presidency being tainted
a “Whites Only” bastion?
Columnist SHERMAN MILLER lives in Wilmington, Del,
Can you be bought?
That is not a very nice way
to ask my question. But it is
the question that Steve
Forbes’ campaign for presi
dent raises.
Maybe it is better asked like
this: Are our votes for sale?
Our answer is, of course,
“No!” We don’t sell our votes
to anybody.
But Steve Forbes is a con
tender for the Republican
presidential nomination
because he has money to
spend. Meanwhile, thousands
of other people, like you and
me, who also have good ideas
and fresh faces, are reading
this column instead of making
TV ads that pound home our
version of the future.
Your vote isn’t for sale, you
insist. You might even say, as
Forbes does, that it is not his
money that has opened the
door. Rather, it is the power of
his ideas and the lack of confi
dence in other candidates that
give him a chance with you.
OK Your vote is not for sale.
But money opened the door
for Forbes to present his ideas
to you.
If it were not for his money,
the flat tax wouldn’t be a big
issue today.
And the lack of money
excludes other people and
other ideas.
A TV advertisement, careful
ly crafted and un-rebutted,
can move our collective minds.
Our votes may not be for
sale, but the gate to our deci
sion making process is.
Candidates who have access
to TV have access to us. Those
who can’t get on 'TV can’t get
to us.
So, are rich candidates the
problem with our political
process? The Steve Forbeses
and Ross Perots? No. I don’t
think so. A candidate who can
pay his own way onto the
political playing field may
bring enthusiasm, new ideas.
and new people into the
process. 'Tfiat is all for the
good.
Forbes is not the problem.
But his campaign clearly
points out the problem. The
importance of money to an
effective political campaign —
as shown by Forbes’ effort —
reminds us starkly how
important money is to the
other candidates. Money, not
new ideas and people, is the
lifeblood of a major political
campaign. It is true whether
the candidate spends his own
money — like Forbes, or has
to raise it — like Dole,
Gramm, Clinton, and the oth
ers.
One of the reasons that some
of the other candidates’ ideas
and people seem so uninspir
ing and ordinary is that those
campaigns have been focused
on fund raising. Securing the
essential resource for their
campaign effort has to be the
first priority — unless you are
Steve Forbes. Everything else
is secondary.
Candidates and their cam
paigns have to be out selling
their campaign to the big
givers, the interest groups,
the PACs. These folks want
some piece of the candidate.
And they are buying.
Of course, no candidate will
admit selling anything. Like
you and me, they will insist
that they are not for sale. But
all that money is buying some
thing. Ask those who are giv
ing the big bucks to candi
dates what they are buying.
They will tell you, finally, that
they are buying access. Access
to their candidates when they
become officeholders.
Access. The open door. The
chance to make a case. A sym
pathetic hearing. It is nothing
— and everything. We are not
selling our votes to the candi
dates. And they are not selling
theirs to the big contributors.
We are just selling access —
you and me and the candi
dates. Meanwhile, those who
don’t have money have a hard
time finding an open door.
Until somebody figures out a
way to replace money as the
life blood of politics, that is
the way it is going to be.
D. G. MARTIN is vice presi
dent for public affairs for the
University of North Carolina
system. You can communicate
with him by calling (919) 962-
7096 or e-mailing
dgmartin@ga. unc. edu.
Developing black political and intellectual leadership
Manning Marahle
Black Americans throughout
their history have always
been challenged by the harsh
and often brutal reality of
institutional racism.
As a system of unequal
power, political racism led to
the disfranchisement of
African Americans after the
Reconstruction era's brief
experiment in democracy.
Within America's cultural
institutions, the representa
tions of blackness were fre
quently racial stereotypes and
crude distortions. And within
the economy, generations of
African Americans found
themselves excluded from the
best jobs, the last hired and
the first fired. This structure
of raciql domination and
unequal power created the
context and necessity for the
development of black political
and intellectual leadership.
There have been three basic
models of leadership which
have informed the develop
ment of political struggles for
black liberation within US
society during the past centu
ry. The first strategy to
emerge after the Civil War
and the demise of radical
Reconstruction can be termed
"accommodation." With the
codification and social consoli
dation of Jim Crow segrega
tion in the 1890s, with the rise
of lynchings and the political
disfranchisement of blacks
throughout the South, the
possibilities for advancing
civil rights became extremely
limited. It was this repressive
context which produced con
servative black educator and
political leader Booker T.
Washington. Washington puh-
licly counseled blacks to
accept disfranchisement and
segregation, and to establish
coalitions with conservative
white elites in business and
the Republican Party.
Accommodationist politics
favored "black capitalism," the
establishment of black-owned
businesses which produced
goods and services solely for
the African American commu
nity, and opposed coalitions
with labor unions and poor
whites. Instead of relying on
the government to provide
resources or to guarantee civil
rights, blacks were urged to
"help themselves."
Washington's political orga
nization, the "Tuskegee
Machine," used its influence
with Republican administra
tions to appoint some middle
class blacks into the federal
bureaucracy. Washington
mobilized black public opinion
for his conservative policies
through his control of major
African American newspapers.
In the rapidly-growing black
urban ghettoes of the North,
accommodationist politics was
reflected in the increased
cooperation of black middle
class elites with conservative
white bosses and political
machines, which were fre
quently aligned with the
Democratic Party.
Although Washington died
in 1915, his basic approach to
the achievement of black
empowerment had a profound
impact upon the political cul
ture of black America. In the
1960s, black capitalism, self
segregation, and coalition
building with white
Republicans was central to
the "Black Power" programs of
Floyd McKissick, Roy Innis,
and many other conservative
black nationalists. (Indeed, it
is largely forgotten that the
only presidential candidate in
1968 who openly endorsed
"Black Power" was Richard M.
Nixon). Today, Booker T.
Washington's tradition of
accommodation is expressed
in part by black conservative
intellectuals such as Shelby
Steele, Glen Loury, Walter
Williams, Thomas Sowell, and
by black apologists for reac
tionary policies and Reaganite
economics like Tony Brown.
To some extent, even Louis
Farrakhan's program of self-
help, social conservatism and
separatism has more in com
mon with Booker T.
Washington than with
Malcolm X. Unlike Malcolm,
neither Washington nor
Farrakhan actually put for
ward a strategy that directly
challenges white capitalism or
institutional racism.
These "new accommodation-
ists" are "racially" black, but
their politics does little to
advance black people's inter
ests. We can not achieve real
power through the illusion of
"black capitalism" and self-
help alone.
MANNING MARABLE is
Professor of History and
Director of the Institute for
Research in African-American
Studies, Columbia University,
New York City.