Jackson Jambalaya

Note: Given the discussion on race this week due to the Presidential election, I decided it would be a good time to repost this column I wrote on electing more black candidates to higher offices in Mississippi.

Much has been made about the perceived lack of progress of blacks in Mississippi politics after the recent statewide elections. Cries of racism from people like Ronnie Agnew of The Clarion-Ledger over Gary Anderson, who is black and lost in the Insurance Commissioner's race, were published in the media. Such comments were similar to those made after a black candidate for Lieutenant Governor, Barbara Blackmon, lost in 2003 to Amy Tuck. As black candidates have failed to win elections for statewide offices (since reconstruction), one must ask if a black candidate can win such elections in Mississippi.

It must be acknowledged that yes, there is racism in Mississippi. However, some racism will always exist as human nature is not perfect and never will be. It is a bit of a stretch to attribute the losses of Blackmon and Anderson to racism. First of all, Ms. Blackmon ran against an incumbent, Amy Tuck. Beating an incumbent for a statewide office is always difficult even if a challenger is well-financed such as Ms. Blackmon, who is one of the leading trial lawyers in Mississippi. However,such an incumbent has other advantages such as name recognition, political favors to call in since she ran the Senate, and a statewide machine, which Ms. Blackmon had to build from scratch.

Mr. Anderson had a good record as he is widely regarded as being very smart, ran a major state agency, and has a very likable personality. However, he lost for several reasons. He had no insurance experience, which is very important as there is an insurance crisis due to Katrina. The last thing Mississippi needed was an Insurance Commissioner who did not know an actuary table from a coffee table. After reading an interview with his opponent, Mike Chaney who was chairman of the Senate committee that oversaw the insurance industry, in The Jackson Free Press, http://www.jacksonfreepress.com/comments.php?id=15049_0_9_0_C%C3%A2%E2%82%AC, I decided he was a stronger candidate and voted for him. It should be noted that Mr. Anderson also beat the White incumbent, George Dale, in the Democratic primary and received more votes in the general election than did Democratic candidates for other offices in a year that saw Governor Barbour steamrolling his way to victory. It is also important to note that Anderson was a weak candidate as he had never held elected office. There is no substitute for experience and that includes running for office. Most successful politicians have lost at some point. Bill Clinton. Haley Barbour. You have to fail before you succeed. Old adages do contain some truth.

However, Mr. Anderson's loss and the resulting discussions beg the question of what must be done in order to elect more blacks to statewide offices. If this discussion is going to take place, then there are some facts that need to be pointed out.First of all, blacks rarely run for state office. There were only two serious black candidates in 2007, two in 2003, and one in 1999. It is hard to claim racism keeps blacks from winning elections when very few are running in the first place. If you never swing at the pitch, you can't complain about a strike-out. Hoping to be successful and trying to be successful are two different things and that applies to winning elections.

If more blacks are to be elected, then more blacks must run for statewide offices. Using the baseball analogy, where is the farm team? Where is the minor league system for black candidates?

The lack of a farm team is probably the main reason for such failure. Typically most statewide candidates come from supervisors, legislators, and city council members. Although Mississippi has a good number of blacks elected to these offices, its time to scrutinize who is holding these offices.Consider black office-holders in the Jackson metro area. Most are fossils who have no higher aspirations then the offices they currently hold. How many of them are even under the age of 50? Anderson, Smith, Calhoun, the Blackmons, Harden, Melton, Harvey Johnson, Bluntson, Stokes, McLemore, Tilman, Flaggs. Fossils. They are old and happy to be exactly where they are as there is very little ambition among this group in terms of seeking higher office. Unfortunately, this means that younger blacks who want to be Governor or Treasurer one day have almost no place to start at the local level.

The next question to ask is why these fossils have a stranglehold on their offices. They tend to win elections in districts that are heavily black. This is fine if the goal is to see more blacks elected to a certain amount of offices at the local level. However, when it comes to statewide offices, the demographics change. As blacks make up less than 40% of Mississippi voters, a black candidate in such an election has to have some crossover appeal if he wants to have any chance at winning. However, the typical black officeholder in Mississippi is in a safely black district and thus has little experience in courting White voters. If the Ike Brown strategy of having a black only Democratic Party is followed, that means black Democrats can forget about winning statewide offices. See earlier post, http://kingfish1935.blogspot.com/2007/07/i-told-you.html"

But Kingfish, why should they? white are racist so it doesn't matter." Really? Jerry Moore won the race for constable in my area. He is black. I know EXACTLY who he is as I saw him all in Belhaven, NE Jackson, and other traditionally white areas. Unlike some black candidates, he didn't take anything for granted and worked the white areas just as much as he did the black ones. He went on Kim Wade's radio show. He gave whites plenty of opportunity to get to know him. I still do know who what his white opponent looks like as he was not as aggressive in campaigning. Guess what? Moore won the race.

There are going to be racists and more than a few people will vote for a candidate solely because of race. However, I just watched Bobby Jindal win the Governor's office in Louisiana. He supposedly lost in '03 because of the fact he is considered to be "dark-skinned" and Catholic in heavily protestant North Louisiana. First he applied the lessons he learned campaigning and ran for Congress, winning the election. Then when Katrina hit he came back and actually led while Jefferson had the National Guard take his loot out of his house. Guess what Jindal did for the last two years? He worked North Louisiana as if the grim reaper was at his back. The hard work paid off this year as he won the election while dominating North Louisiana. I refuse to think that racism will stop hard work and intelligence as people like Bobby Jindal have showed how it could be overcome.

Compare that to Gary Anderson. After beating George Dale, he was virtually silent for a long time. While Mr. Chaney went to venues such as The Jackson Free Press that were probably opposed to him ideologically, Mr. Anderson ignored media outlets such as Kim Wade's radio show that were more conservative in nature. He ran a weak campaign and it showed on election day."Kingfish, isn't it racist for you to say black candidates should court white voters?" Shouldn't white candidates court black voters?" Of course they should do so. If I was a candidate and facing a black opponent, I would not concede anything. I would be in the black churches, at the NAACP meetings, door-knocking in the black community, you name it. True, the odds would be against my winning their votes (Hell, I'm not so sure I would vote for me) however, there will be some who respect the fact that you reached out to them. Of course, that is just me and I'm sure there are much more politically experienced people who will tell me why that is stupid, but I digress. I focus on the issue of black candidates appealing to white voters because the discussions in the media about the elections have been the failure of blacks, not whites, to win statewide office.

If blacks want to get elected to higher offices, then the fundamentals must be followed. That means running younger black candidates for local offices that give them the experience they need to succeed in bigger elections as well as learning the ropes of how government works. Take some risks and put forth black candidates in districts that are not heavily black. Learn in those races how to court black and white voters. Avoid the trap of running for office in a district that is 90% black and being happy with a title and a little bit of money in your own neighborhood. It is said you play like you practice. If a black candidate is going to succeed in being elected to Governor, Secretary of State, etc, then he has to dare. There should be more candidates such as Marshand Crisler and Robert Smith. Hopefully, they will acquit themselves well in office and have the ambition to move up in Mississippi politics.Mississippi will have a Governor, Treasurer, or Lieutenant Governor one day that is black. Mississippi has come a long way. However, for blacks to be elected to statewide office, perhaps some fundamental questions need to be asked followed by a much-needed debate.