I have heard many people, lead by certain talk radio and Fox News television hosts argue that the black vote has been swindled and stolen by the Democratic party. They argue that black people don’t know their history and don’t realize that it was Republicans and their hero Abraham Lincoln who freed the slaves and thus have their best interest at heart. They trumpet Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice, and Clarence Thomas out as symbolic proof of the loyalty of the Republican party to black interests. And when a self-described black man is elected president they claim that it’s because black people are racist and just voted for a man who shared their skin color rather than examinining the issues at hand.
Besides the obvious and rather sickening arrogance and disrespect for all African Americans represented in this perspective, it’s also just plain false.
It is a very shallow reading of history that equates the Republican and Democratic parties of the Lincoln era with the parties as they exist today. Most people are not that shallow. The composition and principles of both parties have shifted and altered many many times during the time between then and now to the point that there’s virtually no similarity between modern parties and those of that era.
But even if there was an equivalency, the history is complex. During the Lincoln era the Democratic party was radically split. There was the Southern Democrats who supported primarily states rights and succession and the northern democrats who tended more toward Lincoln’s political stances. When Lincoln ran for re-election the northern democrats were even further split into Peace Democrats who wanted to reconcile with with the south and Pro-War Democrats who joined Lincoln’s National Union Party (note Lincoln had been a Republican but for several complicated reasons decided to run under a new party and bring in these Democrats)
No. A much better argument that blacks ought to support Republicans would not be to use Lincoln but to use the Southern Democratic party which controlled the South for many years between liberation and the civil rights movement and instituted most of the “Jim Crow” laws that created segregation. Then again, the Republican party during that time period did little to stop these laws and largely showed ambivalence to the plight of black people. Still, black people, though disorganized, did tend to vote Republican in these days out of loyalty to the historically anti-slavery party.
So how far does black loyalty to Democrats go? Well at *least* to 1964 and we can see it’s starting to arise as early as 1924. In 1924 there was a significant split in the Democratic party when party leadership tried to enact a resolution condemning the very powerful KKK during the Democratic National Convention. The resolution was narrowly defeated but this was the first signs of a deep and lasting split within the Democratic party centered around civil rights.
In spite of the divide, FDR was able to keep the party unified under his New Deal Coalition. As a result the New Deal was a mixed bag as far blacks were concerned. While neither Republicans nor Democrats were willing to champion African American rights since they so desperately needed to court primarily Democratic votes that dominated the South, the new deal programs did provide economic advantages that helped improve the status of primarily poor black folks. In particular in enabled blacks to further their education albeit in a segregated fashion in the South.
It was during the era of FDR that Democrats really started to be defined as the liberal party that they are known as today. Whereas before they had been the “states rights” party now they were for big government, large social programs in support of the poor and working class Americans and big regulation of industry. The very things Republicans deride the Democratic party for to this day. But on civil rights social issues the party was still split pretty evenly. We can say honestly that during this period most people in power didn’t really think black people mattered enough to be worth courting.
It was with Truman, a Democrat, in the late 40′s that support for civil rights first started to take center stage. Truman and many other leaders in the Democratic party supported civil rights to the point that he was willing to risk the New Deal coalition that had been so successful. He angered southern Democrats to the point that they broke away and created the Dixiecrats who tended to side with Republican conservatives in congress against Truman’s policies. Many of these Dixiecrats ultimately became Republicans. It was this Conservative Coalition that blocked most attempts at social reform.
Luckily the time came when black people were finally able to start getting organized and started to come together to collectively fight for civil rights. This is the beginning of what we’ve all read in our history books called the civil rights movement. Many prominent black leaders came to the forefront of history and groups such as the NAACP were founded. And of course there was MLK. The newly organized black folks were not particularly loyal to EITHER party at the time, as you can see quite clearly if you read speaches and commentary of the era. They would support any candidate who would support their agenda of securing civil rights.
And it was the Democratic party by and large that picked up the ball here. Black people don’t forget John F.Kennedy’s support for civil rights and his willingness to meet with Martin Luther King. They remember Kennedy sending federal marshalls to protect the Freedom Riders who were black and white civil rights activists from the north who rode south on busses to ensure that the court decision which outlawed segregation on public transportation would be abided by.
Black folks don’t forget also the Johnson years where he was able to use the poliical capital spurred on by the national unity following Kennedy’s assassination to push through several major civil rights legislations, most notably the Voting Rights Act and the Civil Rights Act.
Around the same time as black votes were strongly shifting toward the Democrats thanks to these advancements, Republicans very intentionally were courting the white conservative southerner vote. They were assisted in large part by Demographic shifts in the era. Namely the long lasting migration north-eastwardly of black folks in search of manufacturing sector jobs and to escape segregation and Klan violence of which my family was a part. And the simultaneous migration to fast growing southern cities of many white republicans. During this period the South became a bastion for the Republican party and the Republican party largely began to resemble the party that we know to this day.
That’s the origins of black support for the Democratic party. The newly organized and united black vote tended to go united in the 90% range toward particular candidates. And usually the candidates were Democrats.
This party loyalty remained not because black people have been hoodwinked but because the Democratic party has repeatedly made signiicant gestures to keep that loyalty. Jimmy Carter was the first President to employ very large numbers of women and minorities in the white house a tradition strongly continued by Clinton. Carter’s emphasis on education and social security, also two hallmarks of black interests at the time did not go unremarked.
Clinton further supported the black agenda, actively campaigning for the black vote during his election bid even to the point that he’s been called with some especially obvious irony today, “the first black president”. Policy-wise his most effective legislation in terms of black interests were in support of gun control laws, another issue very near and dear to the black voter at the time considering the explosion of gun violence in primarily black inner city areas. His support for universal healthcare, although ultimately doomed to failure was also not unremarked.
Clinton also did not stand in the way of affirmative action in spite of growing calls amongst Republicans to see it end and his vice president Gore campaigned strongly in favor of affirmative action when he ran for the presidency in 2000. The Republican rhetoric against affirmative action and pro-gun, anti-drugs, anti-welfare sounded increasingly antithetical to black interests at the time. Indeed I’ve personally spoken to many black people who see the republican party as having grown increasingly racist even as the rest of the country has become more tolerant. The publishing of the Bell Curve (which people read as asserting that black people are inherently less intelligent than whites) and the rise of conservative talk radio certainly did nothing to alleviate these fears. Nor did the tendency of said radio hosts to ridicule Jessie Jackson a man many black people regard as a civil rights hero.
So in short if you are wondering why it is that the black vote goes in the 80-90% range pro-Democrat in recent years in spite of the fact that it was originally the Republican party that freed the slaves and the Democratic party that instituted Jim Crow the short short answer is that the black vote has unilaterally gone to the party that propelled their interest. And that has been the Democratic party. They have not, yet anyway, taken the black vote for granted. Though amongst black commentators there is significant concern that that may one day happen and so black leadership is always vocal and aggressive in ensuring that Democrats are well aware that their interests must also be represented.
This is not to say that the republican party has never done anything that black people consider praiseworthy in recent years. Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice were significant advances for the black people that probably did play a part in paving the way for an Obama presidency. And most black people will acknowledge that these were all intelligent and capable people who deserved their appointments, even Clarence Thomas. They just disagree with their stance on many of the major issues that most black people consider paramount. Republicans also have room to make inroads into black support on a few social issues that garner support from the black community, such as to my great disappointment, the gay marriage issue. Lastly, if the recession deepens I strongly suspect a number of black leaders will start to preach the rhetoric of reduced spending and conspicuous consumption, and try to turn toward conservative fiscal policies. But by and large outside of these few areas, Republicans have shown very little interest or inclination in courting the black vote probably logically gambling that black voter turn out would in most elections be small enough relative to other voting blocks to be able to be sacrificed.. This, I think will prove to be a major mistake and already looks to be with the overwhelming Obama victory.
Make no mistake the black voting block is unified and very well organized and focused on a few core issues. That’s why they vote together. It’s not racism. It has been that way at least since the 50′s and 60′s. And unless there is another large remarkable shift in party platforms it is likely to stay that for the foreseeable future.
