Whether for Clinton or Obama, black leaders revel in a moment of history

Veteran African American leaders backing Sen. Hillary Clinton admit that while she doesn't have great speech-making abilities, she and her husband presided personably over a White House attentive to important issues like urban crime and children's healthcare.

But those who support newcomer Sen. Barack Obama can't forget Clinton's affirmative vote on the war in Iraq, and say their man is better poised to inspire a beleaguered nation.

Either way, each side concedes it's an historic time for the Democratic Party and the 256,059 registered African American voters here, and a chance for New Jersey to play a vital role in its first ever early primary on Feb. 5th.

Trenton Mayor Douglas Palmer remembers flying from Selma, Al., with former President Bill Clinton in a private jet last year shortly after Clinton's wife spoke on the occasion of the 42nd anniversary of Bloody Sunday. Clinton asked Palmer how he thought Sen. Hillary Clinton did, and the mayor told him "great."

"I didn't want that plane ride to ever end," said Palmer, who's known the Clintons for years, and who didn't hesitate when considering whom he would support for president in 2008.

"I saw what happens when you have real allies in office," said the 18-year municipal executive, reflecting on Bill Clinton's presidency. "I saw our cities move forward in the 1990s, compared to the last seven years in which there's been a lack of real federal commitment and a war of convenience not commitment."

Whatever charisma Bill Clinton radiates at close range, backed up by high favorables in polls, he nevertheless fails to generate gravitas, and that goes for his wife too, according to Newark poet Amir Baraka.

"Aside from the tearful response that got her votes, these people are just not very inspiring," said Baraka, who supports Obama. "He's the clearest choice. You build a progressive coalition around Obama and reinstate a progressive bloc in politics."

Assessing Clinton, Baraka doesn't like what he sees as the dynastic factor: Bush I, Clinton I, Bush II, Clinton II. "The idea of getting Bill II in there, the other half of that team," said the poet, letting the sentence trail off in disbelief. "I just don't see any other direction but Obama. Obama offers more of an inspiration to the electorate."

A longtime leftist, Baraka doesn't like the triangulation style politics he ascribes to Clinton, in which the ultimate banal expression, in his view, was Sen. Clinton's vote authorizing Bush to go to war in Iraq.
Palmer counters that for 35 years, Hillary Clinton has championed progressive issues, starting with her work for the Children's Defense Fund straight out of college. He maintains that her shortcomings are stylistic, admitting that Clinton can come across as an unfeeling policy nerd on television.

"And it's not true," said Palmer, who said he's witnessed firsthand the "affection and love" Bill and Hillary Clinton have for each other, and the senator's good humor over the years.

In the meantime, "The media has really given Obama a pass," said Palmer. "They haven't scrutinized his performance or his record. Just as an example, his initial statement that he was opposed to the war: that was a prescient and wise exercise of judgement on his part. But then as Hillary's pointed out, once he got into office, he voted to continue to fund the war."

Obama's failure to pull the plug on war funding and his typical politician's tendency to rationalize his actions, in the words of Newarker Larry Hamm, irks the founder of the People's Organization for Progress, who hasn't yet decided whom he's going to support for president.

Hamm's leaning toward Obama, if only because Obama's grassroots organizers called him, he said. A lifelong activist who stormed Nassau Hall in the 1970s when he was a student at Princeton University in protest of South African apartheid, Hamm believes most African Americans will vote for Obama over Clinton.

He conceded that Obama's definitely captured people's attention and their imagination, especially after his victory in the Iowa caucuses.

But for the moment Hamm stops short of endorsing Obama's "improbable quest," as the Illinois senator describes his own presidential run.

"Remember," said Hamm, "Newark is the first East Coast city to elect a black mayor. The experiences people have had here with African American elected officials for 40 years has made then a little critical.

"Breaking the color barrier is important, but we want to know what this person is going to do," Hamm said. "After the election, will we find that the election of an African American or woman produced real change in this country? Will the war end? Will the war end rather quickly? Will we see the pioneer who brings about universal healthcare? Will we see real prison and education reform?"

Kabili Tayari, deputy mayor of Jersey City and president of the Jersey City NAACP, also wants results. But he said he believes Obama's candidacy is a significant result in and of itself. A veteran of the Civil Rights movement, Tayari describes his work registering voters and turning out the vote over the course of the next three weeks before the Feb. 5th primary as "the most important work of my life."z

"A new president in the White House who doesn't simply come out of the Washington establishment will restore a sense of integrity to our Democratic republic," said Tayari.

Tayari's contemporary, civilrights attorney Eldridge Hawkins of East Orange, who worked on Springfield Avenue in the aftermath of the Newark riots, was more cautious in eventually embracing Obama. Leery at first because of what he perceived to be waffling on the part of the candidate and the electability factor, after Iowa, he conceded Obama showed unprecedented strength as an African American candidate for the presidency.

"He beat her up," said Hawkins, whose son is running for mayor of Orange. "I didn't see Iowa coming but my son did."

Among the first half dozen lawyers to go to work in Washington, D.C., at the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), Hawkins later moved to Newark to work civil rights cases in the aftermath of the Newark riots. He wants a president specifically committed to social and economic justice, and he's hopeful Obama is that man.

"They can never know exactly what people in my generation went through with the Civil Rights movement," Hawkins said of Obama's generation. "But he'll have my support to the extent that he reflects knowledge of that pain and an ability to fight."

The Rev. Reginald Jackson of Orange's St. Matthew A.M.E. Church, executive director of the Black Ministers' Council of New Jersey representing more than 800 African American churches in the State of New Jersey, serves as co-chair of New Jersey's Clinton campaign, which has raised more than $4 million.

Looking at the election three weeks from today, Jackson first celebrated the historical impact. "We're at the point in this country where a majority believes an African American and a woman can be president," he said.

The difference maker in Jackson's mind is experience.

"When it comes to the international stage, Sen. Clinton wouldn't have to introduce herself to the world," he said. "She's had her husband's ear and is aware of those issues that impact the president."

A personal friend of the Clintons', Jackson emphasized successes during Bill Clinton's White House years, including a budget surplus and low unemployment figures. Like Baraka and Hamm, he believes Sen. Clinton's war vote remains a significant issue for her.

"I never supported the war," said Jackson, who sees this year's election as reminiscent of the Democratic primary of 1968 in which an inspiring Sen. Robert Kennedy vied with old party warhorse Vice President Hubert Humphrey.

"Hubert Humphrey's burden was that he was Lyndon Johnson's vice president in a time of war, while Bobby Kennedy rallied the young people," said Jackson.

Asked if he backed Kennedy then or fellow anti-war candidate Sen. Eugene McCarthy, Jackson said neither of them. First of all, he was too young to vote then - by four years - he said with a laugh. But from the vantage point of history, though the war was a tragedy, Johnson understood the home-front, Jackson said.

"I liked Lyndon Johnson," said the reverend, recalling sadly the president's post New Hampshire retreat from pursuing another term in office. "I was sorry Lyndon Johnson didn't run.

"In any event," he added, "now as then, it's an exciting time for the country, history in the making, and I'm glad I have the opportunity to be a part of it."