Mark Winston Griffith

Beyond Race Politics

Now that Yvette Clarke has won the Democratic party primary of the 11th Congressional district, it's important to take stock of race (electoral) politics in that part of America.

The 11th congressional district race gained city-wide attention because David Yassky, a white candidate, literally moved his residence a few blocks over so that he could run in that district. Generally perceived as a cynical attempt to take advantage of the fact that the black vote would be split by three black candidates - Clarke, Chris Owens and Carl Andrews - a call went out by members of Central Brooklyn's political establishment for two of these candidates to pull out so that the black vote could be consolidated around a black candidate and the racial purity of the congressional seat once held by Shirley Chisholm could be maintained.

America has remained a deeply racist place more than forty years after the Voting Rights Act helped usher in a generation of black elected officials. But now that areas like Central Brooklyn have consistently maintained black political representation, it's time to raise our political standards. Being black is longer a good enough prerequisite for holding office. The only thing more disrespectful to the 11th district than Yassky's divide and conquer tactic, was the idea that the skin color of these candidates was ultimately more important than their actual qualifications.

Areas like Central Brooklyn are paying a high price for this type of thinking. Our best and brightest studiously avoid politics, regarding it as a step down from most other forms of public service. Meanwhile incumbents feel little pressure to do more than be black in office.

Let's take Marty Markowitz and Major Owens as examples. Marty, when he was State Senator representing a predominately black district in Central Brooklyn, knew that he needed to deliver on constituent service or the black electorate would throw him out on his ass. Consequently, Marty, who was never much of a legislator, had the best constituent service in town. Congressman Owens has been a champion of important social justice causes, but when it came to providing constituent service, Owens was notoriously bad, acting as if he had a ghetto pass. Given how long he was in office, I guess he was right.

I don't know Yassky, but I've been friends and colleagues with Clarke, Owens and Andrews for twenty years or more. They're good and decent people, despite what some have written about them. But it doesn't bode well that two out of the three black candidates are children of former elected officials and the third is a life long member of the political status quo. Areas like Central Brooklyn better find a way to attract a new generation of political leadership and offer its electorate a broader range of choices. Otherwise, the political and social justice gains of the last forty years will shrivel up, like a raisin in the sun.

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Posted at 9:28 AM, Sep 15, 2006 in Politics
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