Barack Obama: The Hope of Black America?

Barack Obama's stunning win in the Iowa caucuses has some black Americans reflecting on the Obama campaign's meaning for America's enduring racial dilemma, from the New York Times:

For Sadou Brown in a Los Angeles suburb, the decisive victory of Senator Barack Obama in Iowa was a moment to show his 14-year-old son what is possible.

For Mike Duncan in Maryland, it was a sign that Americans were moving beyond rigid thinking about race.

For Milton Washington in Harlem, it looked like the beginning of something he never thought that he would see. “It was like, ‘Oh, my God, we’re on the cusp of something big about to happen,’ ” Mr. Washington said.

How Mr. Obama’s early triumph will play out in the presidential contest remains to be seen, and his support among blacks is hardly monolithic.

But in dozens of interviews on Friday from suburbs of Houston to towns outside Chicago and rural byways near Birmingham, Ala., African-Americans voiced pride and amazement over his victory on Thursday and the message it sent, even if they were not planning to vote for him or were skeptical that he could win in November.

“My goodness, has it ever happened before, a black man, in our life, in our country?” asked Edith Lambert, 60, a graduate student in theology who was having lunch at the Faneuil Hall Marketplace in Boston.

“It makes me feel proud that at a time when so many things are going wrong in the world that people can rise above past errors,” added Ms. Lambert, who said she had not decided whom to vote for. “It shows that people aren’t thinking small. They’re thinking large, outside the box.”

Other black presidential candidates, like Shirley A. Chisholm and the Rev. Jesse Jackson, have excited voters in the past. Mr. Jackson won primaries in 1984 and 1988.

Over and over, blacks said Mr. Obama’s achievement in Iowa, an overwhelmingly white state, made him seem a viable crossover candidate, a fresh face with the first real shot at capturing a major party nomination.

“People across America, even in Iowa of all places, can look across the color line and see the person,” said Mr. Brown, 35, who was working at the reception desk at DK’s Hair Design near Ladera Heights, a wealthy Los Angeles suburb.

Describing himself as a “huge, huge supporter,” of Mr. Obama, Mr. Brown added: “So many times, our young people only have sports stars or musicians to look up to. But now, when we tell them to go to school, to aim high in life, they have a face to put with the ambition.”

I'm leery of such talk. Obama's not a traditional black candidate. Some of the other interviewee's touch more closely on why Obama's not going over with black traditionalists, who are still grounded in the politics of racial recrimination (rather than Obama's politics of hope):

Some voters said Mr. Obama’s heritage as the son of a white mother and an African father meant that he was not exactly black, but added that it allowed him to appeal to more people.

“He’s demonstrated that a mixed-race guy with a Muslim name can get far,” said Tony Clayton, 43, as he had his shoes shined at the Metro station at L’Enfant Plaza in Washington. Mr. Clayton was referring to Mr. Obama’s middle name, Hussein.

These comments represent large numbers of African-Americans:

Even amid the joy over the dawning sense that Mr. Obama could indeed become president there were hesitancy and doubt.

“Right now, it’s too good to be true, and I think most of us don’t want to get our hopes up too high,” said Eboni Anthony, 28, manager of Carol’s Daughter, which sells scented candles, soaps and moisturizers across the street from Fort Greene Park in Brooklyn. “I think racism is as alive as it was 30 years ago.

“I would love to believe in a fairy tale of having a black president. But I don’t believe the whole United States would agree to it.”In Harlem, Mr. Washington, a 37-year-old manager of business development for a medical health research company, expressed similar skepticism.

“Listen, I’ve lived in the sticks, so I know how this country is,” said Mr. [Milton] Washington, who is half Korean and has lived in Mississippi, Oklahoma, Indiana and Virginia. “In the beginning, it was like, ‘I’d love a black dude, especially a black dude like that in the office.’ But I didn’t think it was possible.”

At the Bessemer Flea Market near Birmingham, Jasper V. Hall, 69, said: “I was hoping he didn’t win. I didn’t want him to get shot.”

We'll have to see how things turn out in other states, but Obama's support is going to be especially strong among Americans who see the Illinois Senator as bridging the racial divide, particularly liberal whites.

Recall early in 2007 Obama's rising popularity triggered a backlash amongst black traditionalists, those who argue the historic civil rights agenda of overturning enduring, systemic racism.

See, for example, Earl Ofari Hutchinson, "Why Blacks Won't Necessarily Back Obama," or Time's "Can Obama Count On the Black Vote?"

What is likely to happen is the traditional black leadership - Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, the members of the Congressional Black Caucus, etc. - will rally around Obama if he wins the nomination (notice how little traditional civil rights groups have mobilized for Obama so far).

The trick for Obama - if he becomes the Democratic standard-bearer - is whether his mantra of change includes burying the interest group politics of victimization that the old-line civil rights organizations uphold. This is the real promise of Obama's campaign for black America. An Obama presidency might truly break with the stale redistributionist politics of traditional Democratic constituencies. He might really press for hope in a politics of entrepreneurship and private opportunity, a politics of personal and family responsibility, and politics of educational achievement and professional aspirations for historically disadvantaged communities.

If Obama sticks to his talk of transracial progress, this would be the promise of real modern-day equal opportunity America, an agenda of real change.

Will the black community embrace it? I'm not betting on it.