Politics race

As Barack Obama seeks to become the nation's first black president, Virginia voters and experts reflect on race and what it means during this election

As a young girl, Dorothy L. Holcomb wrote a poem about being president, "knowing that it wouldn't materialize in my lifetime."

The presidency was far from the church basement where Holcomb was tutored when her Prince Edward County school closed rather than open its classrooms to black students.

Nearly 50 years later, the prospect of a black person being elected president ties into a poignant memory for Holcomb, but its significance goes beyond racial achievement.

Barack Obama "can't get elected on the black vote," she said. "It takes more than minority people believing in him to get in that office."

"And that means unity."

Race has lingered as a topic throughout this marathon presidential campaign, sometimes on the edges, sometimes at its center. It matters in varying degrees depending on voters' personal experiences, where they live, their ideology. Some believe it's a nonissue.

A Virginia academic says Obama's candidacy has led to a healthy national conversation about race.

It has caused a mom in Franklin County to confront her private biases.

And a Farmville professor sees a potential Obama presidency as the end of one chapter in the nation's civil-rights struggle.

"It is the epitome of the civil-rights movement," said Theresa Clark, an associate professor at Longwood University and another student who for years was denied an education from Prince Edward schools. "Now the doors are open for the next phase of the movement."

Obama is trying to become the first Democrat since 1964 to carry Virginia, a state whose history is intertwined with race. It once housed the capital of the Confederacy and practiced Massive Resistance to school desegregation. But it also claims the nation's first elected black governor, L. Douglas Wilder, who won that distinction in 1989.

Even in the tumult of Virginia's racial disharmony, there were examples of unity.

In the early 1960s, Holcomb's father turned to white friends, who helped him rent a gutted house in Appomattox County just to establish an address so his children could attend its public schools.

Holcomb was dropped off behind the house every morning. She entered the back door, walked through the house and out the front door to the bus.

Holcomb points to such unifying efforts when she discusses the presidential election, now nine days away.

In a Virginia poll conducted for the Richmond Times-Dispatch and released Wednesday, Obama had an advantage of 2 percentage points over Republican presidential nominee John McCain, an Arizona senator. The result was within the margin of error, which means the contest is a tossup.

Among white voters, McCain led 55 percent to 36 percent with 9 percent undecided. Among blacks, Obama led 92 percent to 3 percent with 5 percent undecided.

On the national level, most surveys in the past week have shown Obama with a significant lead over McCain, but others have the race much closer.

The Illinois senator's candidacy differs from past black candidates' campaigns, said Vesla Weaver, a professor of politics at the University of Virginia. For one, Obama has attracted many young voters who were born after the civil-rights struggle.

Variables that once applied aren't necessarily pertinent now -- like the so-called Bradley effect, named for former Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley, a black man who lost California's election for governor in 1982 after leading in the polls. Some theorize that in pre-election polls, white people indicated they were undecided or would vote for Bradley because they did not want to seem prejudiced, then voted for his opponent on Election Day.

If Obama loses after leading in polls, it probably will be because of a culmination of factors, Weaver said.

Obama's pedigree compared with previous presidential candidates generates questions about his past. The four years Obama lived in Indonesia as a child fueled a false rumor that he is Muslim. Obama is a Christian. He also was born in Hawaii, which some voters might consider unusual.

Dave Martin, a Midlothian resident and McCain supporter, said he thinks the media promote the possibility of the Bradley effect and push the race factor.

"I don't care if he's yellow. I disagree with his policies. The media has it set up so that if he loses, it's because he's black," he said.

"Why aren't General [Colin] Powell and the 93 percent of African-Americans who have been polled to support Obama, why aren't they labeled as racist for refusing to consider the white candidate?"

Many white voters who support McCain echo that they simply disagree with Obama on the issues. After all, in the past 40 years Republicans have captured seven of 10 presidential elections. Conservatives say it wasn't race but ideology that kept white Democratic nominees from crossing the red-and-blue divide.

In the recent Times-Dispatch poll, Obama's favorability rating of 46 percent was higher than his support among whites, perhaps a sign that some voters like him as a person but disagree with his positions.

Michael Branch, a Chesterfield County resident, hopes no voter is compelled to vote for Obama simply to make history.

"African-Americans have never been into this type of situation before, and I am sure it will sway some people," he said. "I'm hoping they will put, as McCain said, put their country first versus their race first and do what's right for the country."

As the nation confronts an economic crisis, voters must consider the severity of issues and make a substantive choice, said Evelyn Jemison, a retired biology professor at Virginia State University.

"People have been stimulated to look at the candidates for the highest office," she said, adding that real needs will trump consideration of race or gender.

"I am 87 years old, and I know that in the minds of so many people, they will not think things out. They will be dealing with sound bites. And each of us may have our own prejudices, but in a crisis situation, our needs sometimes supersede old feelings about things," she said.

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In parts of Virginia, some Obama supporters feel intimidated about publicly expressing their allegiance for fear of a backlash.

A white mom in New Kent County said she supports Obama because they share like origins and similar dreams -- all things she keeps under wraps. She avoids the subject with extended family, friends and definitely with her neighbors.

"I am in awe of him," she said of Obama. "I haven't told anyone except for my best friend, my sister, my husband and my daughter -- that's it, because I'm afraid of how people will react."

Debi Kelly Van Cleave of Penhook in Franklin County said she's scared her home will be vandalized if she posts an Obama yard sign, so she chose a "Veterans for Obama" bumper sticker, thinking it would be considered more acceptable.

She enjoys aspects of her rural lifestyle but said she has concerns about what she called closed-mindedness.

"I always wanted to be a redneck," she said. "I even like the Confederate flag. To me that symbolized [Lynyrd Skynyrd], the Allman Brothers; I like that whole [Southern rock] scene.

"But I think once this election happened and I started to see racism, I am starting to think I don't want my daughter to grow up around this kind of hatred."

The New Jersey native said this election has caused her to think about these "racist tendencies I had but didn't think of," such as avoiding certain parts of town. She said she has realized her issues are not with race but poverty.

Personal reflection is a positive effect of race becoming a larger part of the national conversation, said Weaver, the U.Va. professor of politics.

Usually, talking about race in an election is a net negative for a black candidate, she said. But Obama's March speech on race, made after the disclosure of some incendiary comments from his then-minister, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr., opened the conversation.

"It got people talking about and owning the issue of race in this country. We've engaged in it as a national topic," Weaver said.

In that speech Obama criticized Wright's remarks but said he could not "disown" him. In April, after more remarks from Wright, Obama severed a 20-year association with the minister, saying his comments go against the candidate's efforts to foster mutual understanding.

On the down side, increased anticipation and hope could make for a harder fall for Obama supporters if he loses, Weaver said.

And Martin, the McCain supporter from Midlothian, said he thinks the division in this year's election has the potential to set race relations back.

Some cities are planning to deploy extra police on Election Day and possibly afterward should tensions arise, according to news reports.

Weaver doesn't like to think about the result of an Obama loss Nov. 4 if he has a significant lead in the run-up to the election. It could not only alienate voters who were inspired to engage politically for the first time, but it also could spawn a third party, including blacks who feel Democrats take them for granted, and disenchanted young people, she said.

On Nov. 5, people may no longer see the American dream of an egalitarian society, she said, but a nation that wasn't able to get past its tortured racial history.

"We will see a nation that could not rise to its greatest principle of equality."
Contact Olympia Meola at (804) 649-6812 or .